Snowmass History: ‘Owl Creek land sale signals end of era’

On June 8, 1967, a headline in The Aspen Times read, “Owl Creek land sale signals end of era” describing how “the three ranches, all dating back to Aspen’s beginnings in the 1880s, run for about three miles along the Owl Creek road leading from Colorado Highway 82 to Snowmass-at-Aspen. They extend from Pitkin County Airport to the divide separating Owl Creek and Brush Creek. The ranches were purchased from Sam and Bernard Stapleton and Jens Christiansen by a Houston based firm. Jens Christiansen and his wife have retained about ten acres of the 640-acre Glendale Stock Farm, including their home and all the ranch buildings. He has owned it since 1924.” 

Historically, the Christiansens came to Aspen from Denmark in 1914 and met up with his aunt, Miss Kate Lindvig, (aka the “Cattle Queen” who owned the Snowmass Falls Ranch that was recently purchased by Pitkin County Open Space). His family rented the property from the Brunton’s and then purchased the property in 1924 to raise feeder cattle. The Stapleton family homesteaded their ranch where the airport is today in the early 1880s, and then as the family grew, they spread out to various ranch properties up Owl Creek Road. They also raised cattle and sheep in the area.