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Native Americans at the arrival of Europeans

(Editor’s note: There is no great term for the people who were here OR for the people who came. Populations are always on the move for a variety of reasons, especially in borderlands. (see the Frontier). The Utes were not happy when the Plains peoople showed up. The Puebloans were not happy about the Utes. Folks of European descent in New England were “native-born,” and didn’t consider themselves European, and were in many cases of mixed ancestry. )

The area now known as Douglas County, Colorado was inhabited and used by several Indigenous peoples before European contact, primarily:

The Arapaho were among the primary inhabitants of this region. They were Plains people who moved into Colorado in the 1700s-1800s and extensively used the areas along the Front Range, including what is now Douglas County, for hunting and seasonal camps.

The Cheyenne also had a significant presence in this area, often allied with the Arapaho. They similarly used these lands along the eastern slopes of the Rockies for hunting, particularly buffalo, and as travel corridors.

The Utes, particularly eastern bands, utilized the mountainous western portions of what is now Douglas County. They had been in Colorado for much longer than the Arapaho and Cheyenne, with evidence suggesting presence for hundreds of years.

The area was particularly valuable because:

• It sits at the intersection of plains and mountains, providing diverse resources
• Plum Creek and Cherry Creek (which flow through the county) were important water sources and travel routes
• The region was rich in game, including buffalo, elk, and deer
• It served as a seasonal transition zone between mountain and plains environments

These groups didn’t have fixed boundaries as Europeans understood them. The land was used fluidly, with different groups occupying areas seasonally and sometimes simultaneously. The archaeological record shows evidence of camps, hunting sites, and travel routes throughout the county dating back thousands of years.

By the 1860s, European-American settlement and the Colorado Gold Rush led to the forced removal of these Indigenous peoples from Douglas County through treaties and military action.