The Middle Fork South Platte River is a tributary of the

South Platte River The South Platte River is one of the two principal tributaries of the Platte River. Flowing through the U.S. states of Colorado and Nebraska, it is itself a major river of the American Midwestern United States, Midwest and the American Sou ...

, approximately long,U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline data
The National Map
, accessed March 25, 2011 located in central

Colorado Colorado is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States. It is one of the Mountain states, sharing the Four Corners region with Arizona, New Mexico, and Utah. It is also bordered by Wyoming to the north, Nebraska to the northeast, Kansas ...

in the

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

. The river provides part of the drainage of

South Park ''South Park'' is an American animated sitcom created by Trey Parker and Matt Stone, and developed by Brian Graden for Comedy Central. The series revolves around four boysStan Marsh, Kyle Broflovski, Eric Cartman, and Kenny McCormickand the ...

, the intermontane grassland basin located between the

Front Range The Front Range is a mountain range of the Southern Rocky Mountains of North America located in the central portion of the U.S. State of Colorado, and southeastern portion of the U.S. State of Wyoming. It is the first mountain range encounter ...

and the

Mosquito Range The Mosquito Range (elevation approximately 14,000 ft) is a high mountain range in the Rocky Mountains of central Colorado in the United States. The peaks of the range form a ridge running north–south for roughly 40 mi (64 km) fr ...

in the

Rocky Mountains The Rocky Mountains, also known as the Rockies, are a major mountain range and the largest mountain system in North America. The Rocky Mountains stretch in great-circle distance, straight-line distance from the northernmost part of Western Can ...

southwest of

Denver Denver ( ) is a List of municipalities in Colorado#Consolidated city and county, consolidated city and county, the List of capitals in the United States, capital and List of municipalities in Colorado, most populous city of the U.S. state of ...

. The river rises in northwestern Park County, at the

continental divide A continental divide is a drainage divide on a continent such that the drainage basin on one side of the divide feeds into one ocean or sea, and the basin on the other side either feeds into a different ocean or sea, or else is endorheic, not ...

along the north side of

Mount Lincoln Mount Lincoln may refer to one of various mountains located in the United States: {{Mountainindex, Lincoln ...

, just west of Hoosier Pass. It descends to the southeast in a narrow valley along State Highway 9 past

Alma Alma or ALMA may refer to: Arts and entertainment * ''Alma'' (film), a 2009 Spanish short animated film * ''Alma'', an upcoming film by Sally Potter * ''Alma'' (Oswald de Andrade novel), 1922 * ''Alma'' (Le Clézio novel), 2017 * ''Alma'' ( ...

, emerging into the northwest end of South Park at

Fairplay FairPlay is a family of digital rights management (DRM) technologies developed by Apple Inc. for protecting videos, books and apps and historically for music. Music The initial version of FairPlay was created to protect music on the iTunes S ...

, which sits on a bluff on the east side of the river. It crosses South Park towards the southeast, between the watersheds of

Tarryall Creek Tarryall Creek is a tributary of the South Platte River, approximately long,U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map accessed March 25, 2011 in Park County in central Colorado in the Uni ...

to the north and the South Fork South Platte River to the south, running along the western side of Red Hill, receiving several smaller creeks. It joins the South Fork from the north to the South Platte main branch just east of Hartsel, approximately two miles (3.2 km) east of the junction of State Highway 9 and U.S. Highway 24. The river was a significant source of placer

gold Gold is a chemical element; it has chemical symbol Au (from Latin ) and atomic number 79. In its pure form, it is a brightness, bright, slightly orange-yellow, dense, soft, malleable, and ductile metal. Chemically, gold is a transition metal ...

during the Colorado Gold Rush of 1859, leading to the first large influx of white settlers into South Platte, previously inhabited principally by the

Ute Ute or UTE may refer to: * Ute people, a Native American people of the Great Basin * Ute Indian Tribe of the Uintah and Ouray Reservation, Utah * Ute Mountain Ute Tribe, Colorado, New Mexico, and Utah * Southern Ute Indian Tribe of the Southern ...

people. The river bed near Fairplay continued to be a productive gold source for many decades and was the location of mining and milling operations up through the middle 20th century.

References

{{authority control Rivers of Colorado Tributaries of the Platte River Rivers of Park County, Colorado

See also

References