Bristol, Colorado is an unincorporated community in Prowers County, Colorado. Based on a homestead created in 1887, Bristol was platted on November 6, 1906 and F. S. Butcher is credited with helping Mary Dugger, who had purchased the homestead from Butcher, establish the town, which was named after one of the chief officials of the Santa Fe Railroad.
The community is named after Chester Howard Bristol, an assistant general manager (1903-1908) of the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway stationed in La Junta. He owned land in the vicinity of Hartman, and the town of Bristol was originally to be called Hartman after George Hartman, who owned land near Bristol. However, a records mix up in the Chicago office of the Santa Fe railroad led the stations at those two points to be misnamed, and the towns followed suit.
The townshop was doing very well until the 1920s. In the early morning of June 13, 1924, the main building of the Denver Alfalfa Milling Company's Bristol Mill burned to the ground. An even more devastating fire hit Bristol a year later, around July 3, 1925, when an entire block of the original business district burned on the east side of Labelle Avenue. During that summer a number of arson fires had occurred in the area, including a hay field at Hartman just a day or two before the Bristol fire, so it could have been started by arson.
Though the west side of the business district remained, the fire was an economic blow from which the community never recovered. Bristol, still unincorporated, remained a small convenience center for the neighboring farm community.
Bristol, Colorado
Image: Wikimedia
Bristol, Colorado (Wikipedia)
Bristol History (Bristol Community Project) - I thought this page was empty at first, but highlighting the page shows the text on it.
Chester Howard Bristol (Our Family Tree)
Place names in Colorado (HathiTrust)
Bristol Head
About a 290 mile drive, roughly a 5 or 6 hour drive, west of Bristol on US 160 W is Bristol Head in Mineral County, Colorado. It is a 12,712-foot (3,875 meter) high mountain on land managed by the Rio Grande National Forest about 8 miles (13 km) southwest of the community of Creede.
Bristol Head
Images from Wikimedia
The name "Bristol Head" originated in the 19th century, when an English settler in the San Juan Mountains of Colorado likened the mountain's distinctively shaped, cloud-shrouded profile to the cliffs of Bristol, England. The term "Head" reflects a common element in British topographic nomenclature, denoting a prominent peak, promontory, or headland, as seen in place names like Beachy Head or Lizard Head. The name was first documented in official records during the Hayden Survey of 1876, where Bristol Head served as a key triangulation station (Station 54) for mapping the region's high plateaus.
Bristol Head (4x4Explore)
Bristol Head (Grokipedia)
Bristol Head (Wikipedia)