And the West is History: Jackson Hardware & Novelty Carriage Works – ca. 1920

Arriving in Durango while working as a blacksmith and following the Denver & Rio Grande Railroad as it laid track from Alamosa to Durango in 1881, Harry Jackson opened his first blacksmith shop near where the Strater Hotel is today. By 1884, he had moved his business to 742 Main Ave., pictured above. Jackson opened a hardware store alongside the blacksmith shop that manufactured carriages and wagons. A successful businessman, he sold Winton automobiles in 1919 after he turned over his interest in the hardware store to his two daughters and their husbands. The dealership was short-lived, but the Jackson Hardware store operated until 1957. It subsequently became French Hardware. – Ed Horvat for Animas Museum, edhorvat@animasmuseum.org (Catalog Number: 93.27.9.4 from the La Plata County Historical Society Photo Collections).