1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Trinidad (Colorado)

TRINIDAD, a city and the county-seat of Las Animas county, Colorado, U.S.A., in the south part of the state, about 100 m. S. of Pueblo. Pop. (1890) 5523; (1900) 5345 (659 foreign-born), (1910) 10,204. Trinidad is served by the Denver & Rio Grande, the Colorado & Southern, the Colorado & Wyoming, and the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fé railways and by electric railways to the neighbouring coal-mining towns. The city is regularly laid out on a hilly site, on both sides of the Purgatory (or Las Animas) river, near a picturesque canyon and mountain district, including the Stonewall Valley, and at the foot of the Raton Mountains, of which the highest peak, Fisher’s (or Raton) Peak (9586 ft.), is 10 m. south of Trinidad. The city has a Carnegie library, a Federal building, an opera house, an amusement park, and the San Rafael hospital, under the charge of the Sisters of Charity. A steam heating plant pipes heat to many shops, offices and residences. Trinidad is in a coal and coke and stock-raising region, and alfalfa, frijole and sugar beets are produced in large quantities in the surrounding region, much of which is irrigated. Dry farming has been successfully carried on at an experiment farm, established in 1906, 12 m. north of the city. Trinidad has railway shops, foundry and machine shops, and coking ovens, ships large quantities of coal, has a wool scouring mill, and various manufactures. The municipality owns and operates the waterworks. Trinidad was incorporated as a town in 1876, and in 1879 became a city of the second class.