Hair-raising tales of Colorado frontiersmen battling mountain lions were often reported in local newspapers during the 1800s. Miners, cowboys, ranchers, and other pioneers quickly discovered these apex predators posed a formidable threat. After all, mountain lion territory in Colorado covered—and still covers—most of the state. What follows are some of their harrowing accounts.
Reporters investigating a shootout are attacked on Berthoud Pass
In July of 1883, an Old West gang of masked men ambushed three Grand County commissioners as they left a hotel in Grand Lake, Colorado. Motivated by a dispute over which town would serve as the county seat, the ambush resulted in a deadly gunfight known as the Grand Lake Shootout.
When news of the murders spread, two Georgetown reporters, desperate for a payday, rode out on horseback to investigate the scene. Rarely stopping for food or rest, the men and their horses grew weary as they neared the steep switchbacks of Berthoud Pass. Below them lay a deep chasm; above them, a towering mountainside. Around them, the wind whistled through the pines.
Abruptly, their horses stopped in their tracks. They pawed the earth, sniffed the air, and snorted wildly. A strange growl seeped out from the rocks overhead. The men shot their gaze upward to see a ferocious mountain lion crouching on an upper ledge. Before they could draw their revolvers, the lion lunged at them as if they were prey.
In a flash, the men clapped their spurs to their horses, which galloped up the winding road. They were in a race with death, as the lion’s predatory instincts were ignited. One reporter drew his revolver as the lion chased them, but he had neglected to load it, rendering the weapon useless. The other reporter couldn’t steady his hand.
As the lion closed in on them, the reporters saw a ranch in the distance and urged their horses to speed up. A man sat on the front porch, undoubtedly armed. The reporters yelled at him to shoot the lion, but he hesitated, doubting whether he should waste a bullet on men who might be state militia.
Luckily, the rancher’s better nature prevailed, and he fired at the lion as the reporters neared. With a single bullet, their lives were saved by a man who, they later learned, was infamous for killing law enforcement in an Alabama shootout years earlier.
Pikes Peak mountain man fights to the death for his trophy
In the fall of 1875, a mountain man named M.E. Irving was traveling on horseback near Pikes Peak when he spotted a shaggy pony grazing with a herd of buffalo. Irving recognized the pony; it had once belonged to an old pioneer who had been absent for many years. Wishing to claim the pony as his own, Irving sought approval from a justice in Colorado Springs, then returned to the range on a mule with a lariat and rifle.
Three days later, Irving located the buffalo herd and saw the pony feeding some distance away. He carefully approached the pony and readied his lariat, but the skittish animal took flight and disappeared into a narrow, rocky canyon. Unable to urge his mule to enter the canyon, Irving dismounted, secured the mule to a tree, and continued on foot.
Through a dense growth of pinyon pines, Irving followed the pony’s trail. He was unsure how far he would have to track the animal until he rounded an outcropping of boulders and found the pony in the clutches of a mountain lion. The predator had sunk its teeth into the pony’s side and was pulling it to the ground.
Irving’s first reaction was fear, but he quickly stifled it. He was intent on capturing the pony and wanted the mountain lion as a trophy too.
In a swift movement, Irving secured the pony with a lariat fastened to his belt. The mountain lion loosened its grip on the pony but fixed its gaze on Irving and crouched in an attack position. Aware the beast was about to pounce, Irving drew his Winchester and fired at the lion. He missed.
Thunderously, the lion roared and waged an attack against the seasoned mountain man. The pair fought to the death—man against beast—until Irving delivered the kill shot. He returned to Colorado Springs in worse condition than when he left days earlier, but brought with him the injured pony and the expired mountain lion’s head and hide.
Greenhorn rancher battles his greatest foe
A young New Yorker, starved for adventure, traveled to Colorado’s San Luis Valley in 1880 to buy a cattle ranch and try his hand at ranching. As a greenhorn through and through, he had never set foot in the wild and had no sense of the dangers frontier life had in store for him.
While on a spring cattle drive miles from the ranch, the fledgling rancher dismounted his horse so it could eat and headed off to explore the range on foot. Down by a brook bubbling from the undergrowth, he thought he heard unfriendly voices. Fearing he’d provoked a group of natives who were now on his track, he hurried into the timber and hid beneath a rocky ledge.
From within a cavity behind the rocks, the rancher heard a low growl and saw two eyes shining in the dim light. In a split second, he drew his knife and raised his arm to cover his throat. A mountain lion sprang from the cavity and sank its teeth into the arm shielding his jugular.
The rancher tried to stab the lion with his knife but was knocked off his feet by the predator’s vicious efforts to get at his throat. He fumbled his knife, and soon the lion had him pinned down, clawing and biting him as they rolled on the ground in a desperate rough-and-tumble fight.
The rancher’s exertion was rapidly wearing thin. He was nearly ready to yield to the lion when he found the last threads of strength to throw the animal off himself. In a frantic scramble, he secured his knife and battled his wild foe until at last he claimed victory.
Grand Lake tourist meets her stalker at the water's edge
On a summer afternoon in 1874, a young woman in her twenties joined a party of tourists traveling to Grand Lake, Colorado. After a multi-day journey over rugged mountain passes by railroad and stagecoach, the group arrived at their breathtaking destination. While some took to fishing, the woman set out for a walk along the water’s edge, seeking natural specimens to take home.
Terror washed over the solitary woman. She feared yelling for help would provoke the lion to attack, and she was too far from camp to be heard anyway. She knew better than to run for her life, as that would cause the lion to give chase. Holding her ground was the only option, but the lion continued inching forward, and the woman sank helplessly to the ground.
Out of the brush, a barking dog dashed onto the scene and diverted the lion’s attention. On its heels came two men camping farther down the lake. One of the men fired his rifle to scare off the lion and helped the woman to her feet. She collected herself and thanked him, then hurried back to camp. There, the woman told the other tourists about her near-fatal encounter. They were relieved she made it back alive but wondered why she left behind the brave man who saved her.
Brutal winter brings silver miner a fearsome houseguest
Colorado miners often left their mines during the winter months. Heavy snowfall, freezing temperatures, and the threat of avalanches posed too great a risk. Come springtime, the first men to return were some of the toughest. Their journey frequently required breaking trail through towering snowbanks for a considerable distance. They never knew what condition camp would be in.
The first miners to return to the Last Chance Mine in Creede, Colorado, in May of 1870 received a daunting reception. It had been a brutal winter, and when the men arrived after an exhausting journey shoveling their way through snowdrifts higher than their heads in places, they found their log cabins buried in snow up to the rooftops. Only the chimneys were visible.
As the miners began the arduous task of unearthing their cabins from the snow, one of them discovered mountain lion tracks leading to and from his chimney. Upon closer inspection, he determined a mountain lion had taken possession of his cabin and was using the chimney for access.
The mountain lion wasn’t inside, so the miner figured it must be out hunting. But soon after he finished digging out his snowbound cabin, the predator returned. Their fateful meeting could have turned deadly, but the lion wasn’t in the mood for a fight. Realizing the cabin had been reclaimed by its rightful owner, the animal retreated. In recognition of its civil manners, the miner allowed it to go in peace.
Gold rush prospectors dance with death in a nighttime ambush
During the Pikes Peak Gold Rush of 1859, two prospectors whose pay dirt had dried up abandoned their claims and headed to Georgetown, Colorado, in search of better luck. When they arrived at the majestic Argentine Gulch in the mountains above Georgetown, they ran out of meat. They set up camp in the trees to do some hunting.
Hours later, the men spied a bull elk moving into a thicket and took aim. It was a good shot, and soon they were processing the meat. But the day had been long, and the men were exhausted. Rather than hanging the meat in the usual manner, they left it lying on the hide on the ground. They cooked their dinner, extinguished their campfire, and tucked in beneath their wool blankets for the night.
In the wee hours, the men were jolted awake by the bone-crunching sounds of two mountain lions feasting on their elk. They slowly retrieved their rifles lying beside them, hopeful the lions would retreat upon hearing the sound of their weapons cocking. But the mountain lions were inflamed with the taste of meat and furious at being disturbed. They arched their backs and lunged at the prospectors, who struggled to see their attackers in the dark.
Unable to fire his weapon, one of the men yanked his heavy blanket over himself for protection as a lion bore down on him. The other man fired a shot that took the second lion out. Then he fought off the beast clawing at the blanket under which his fellow prospector hid.
Once the battle was over, both men had sustained significant injuries, but they lived to tell their tale of narrowly surviving a nighttime attack by two bloodthirsty mountain lions.
Kannah Creek cowboys square off with hungry predators
Two gritty cowboys, known as “Tex” Reed and “Hardtack” Smith, made the papers in November of 1899 for squaring off with hungry mountain lions while braving the bitter cold to search for snowbound cattle near Kannah Creek, Colorado.
As the cowboys ascended the vast Grand Mesa on horseback, where the winter conditions intensified, they spotted the half-starved cattle stranded in the snow. To their horror, a pair of mountain lions was walking in a circle around the weakened cows. The predators had been out hunting when they discovered the unprotected herd and had claimed it as their feast.
The cowboys were unarmed, so they moved cautiously as they approached the snowbound herd to get a better look at the situation. They figured if they charged at the lions on horseback, they could chase them off. But the predators were unfazed by the cowboys’ advances, lashing their tails and baring their teeth in a ferocious manner.
No match for the unflinching lions, the unarmed cowboys were forced to retreat. They returned to the ranch to collect their rifles, but the sky had turned dark. Rescuing their herd would have to wait until dawn. A sleepless night was guaranteed.
The Kannah Creek cowboys weren’t the only men of their kind to square off with mountain lions. Earlier in 1899, a cattleman and a cowboy in Routt County, Colorado, were thrust into a fierce battle with a mountain lion after discovering fresh tracks near their ranch.
On horseback, the men followed the tracks into the timber with their dogs trailing behind them. A mile in, the lion ambushed them as they passed beneath the tree in which it was lurking. The cowboy tried to lasso the beast, but it jumped through the rope and leaped at him. The men were forced to retreat after the cowboy’s horse suffered a gash on the leg, and two of the dogs were badly injured.
Lost Park settlers fear the legend of "Old Golden"
In the rugged valley of Lost Park, Colorado, early settlers enjoyed a hunter’s paradise. Herds of buffalo and deer, flocks of bighorn sheep, and solitary bears looking for berries roamed in abundance. Elusive mountain lions roved there too, silently stalking their prey.
In the winter of 1891, the Lost Park settlers noticed fresh mountain lion tracks of an unusual size in the snow around their log cabins. None of the men had seen the predator to which the tracks belonged, but the animal’s presence was felt in the little hairs that stood up on the backs of their necks.
One of the settlers, O.C. Stewart, dubbed the stealthy mountain lion “Old Golden.” Stewart was tough and armed, and so were his fellow settlers, but the men were gripped by a wholesome fear of a lonely meeting with the formidable beast.
The Lost Park settlers’ spooked reaction to seeing the tracks of “Old Golden” was sound. Stories of Colorado pioneers encountering mountain lions lurking near their cabins were growing in frequency. Just that fall, a miner living in a remote cabin near Half Moon Gulch was startled during the night by angry thumps against his door. A ravenous lion had smelled the meat hanging inside the miner’s cabin and was determined to make a meal of it.
Oregon Trail pioneers concoct the "merciful mountain lion" hoax
Sensational news of a merciful mountain lion roaming the northern plains of Colorado spread across the state in June of 1876, reprinted by one paper after another. The usual headline read: “A Merciful Mountain Lion Captures a Child, Carries it Five Miles, but Handles it with Care.”
The outlandish tale originated with a group of pioneer families who were traveling west to Oregon by wagon train, and camped for a night near the Colorado-Nebraska-Wyoming border. As their story went, in the dusk of the evening, their children were playing a short distance from camp. Suddenly, a cry of terror rang out. In a panic, the children reported a mountain lion had snatched up a two-year-old girl.
Fearing the worst, the adults searched the surrounding wilds for the girl through the night. Around dawn, five miles from camp, they found her lying on an upheaval of rocks. She was clawed up but still breathing. For some reason, the lion had tempered its instinct to make a meal of her. The adults rushed her back to camp where she recovered.
When news of the merciful mountain lion spread, many believed it was a hoax. It seemed impossible an apex predator would kidnap a girl, lug her five miles without severely injuring her, and leave her to be found by her parents. But some believed the spectacular tale. The Rocky Mountain News reported that even though the facts seemed incredible, they had been reliably vouched for.
Estes Park lumberman outwits a lethal predator
A seasoned lumberman working near the remote headwaters of the Cache la Poudre River by Estes Park, Colorado, narrowly escaped the jaws of a vicious mountain lion in March of 1876.
According to the man’s hair-raising account, he was traversing the forest alone, making tracks back to camp when the mountain lion snuck up on him from behind. From fifteen feet away, the wild animal bounded at him as if he were its favorite prey of deer or elk.
In a stroke of good fortune, the lumberman had just slung his bulky overcoat over his shoulder, and it was the coat that the lion seized. As the fierce predator tore the coat to shreds, evidently thinking its intended victim was inside, the lumberman beat a hasty retreat to camp. He had unknowingly outwitted the stealthy predator and survived by the skin of his teeth.
Longmont settler saves his dog from certain death
On a tranquil evening in August of 1882, a Longmont settler living up in the St. Vrain Canyon was alerted to danger by a series of distressed yelps coming from his dog outside. The man bolted out of his log cabin to discover a mountain lion had crept onto his property and snatched up the dog in its deadly teeth.
