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In 1861 gold was discovered in a nearby river by Jim Taylor and 2 companions. One found gold in his tin cup as he prepared to take a drink of freshly dipped water, so the story goes.
But it wasn't till the late 1870's when strikes of high grade gold and silver were made at the Gold Cup, Jimmy Mack and other mines. The rush was on, and Virginia City was born in 1880. The name was changed to Tin Cup in 1882.
Ore from the mines was packed out by burros and wagons to the rail heads of the Denver and South Park Railroad for processing in the smelters.
Inflated prices for necessities such as food and lodging soared. In 1881 a freighter hauled in 3,500 pounds of flour and sold it all before he could unload it off the wagon. Some miners had been skiing or snowshoeing out for supplies and making a tidy profit for their efforts.
By 1882 there were 6000 residents and over 20 saloons in town. The most notorious saloon being Frenchy's Place. The gamblers that gathered in Tin Cup controlled the town. They hired marshals to give Tin Cup an appearance of law and order so they could fleece the "tinhorns".
The first marshal was told to "See nothing. Hear nothing. Do nothing, and the first arrest you make will be your last".
There were 8 marshals during the early years and only the eighth one finished out his term. The first one quit, second was fired, third gunned down, fourth shot by a gambler, fifth quit and became a preacher, sixth went insane, and the seventh shot.
Because of the rampant lawlessness in Tin Cup a fourth section was added to Cemetery Hill south of town. Called the Boot Division, it was for those who "died gloriously or otherwise in the thick of smoke from guns".
By 1884 mining began to decline in Tin Cup and the population dropped to 400. The town remained active for years, as the Gold Cup continued to product superior ore into the 1900's. Even during the panic of 1893 the Gold Cup continued to be worked.
Fire hydrants were installed in 1891 and can still be seen today with swirls of grass surrounding each rusty hydrant along the dirt streets. Telephone service was also installed in this small mining camp town.
In 1903 a second boom sent in 2000 miners, but by 1910 most of the mining had ceased. The Gold Cup closed in 1917, spelling disaster for Tin Cup as a mining camp.
The 1950's brought a renewed interest in Tin Cup. A popular Denver radio talk show host, Pete Smythe, claimed to be broadcasting from "East Tin Cup". This generated hundreds of visitors to see this "near" ghost town.
Tin Cup is located in Gunnison County at the foot of the Cumberland Pass to the south, and has a summer community of hunters, fisherpersons and tourists. It's said that the local general store sells tin cups.
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