| Placerville, Colorado | |
| Settlement Type: | Census-designated place |
| Pushpin Map: | Colorado |
| Pushpin Label: | Placerville |
| Pushpin Label Position: | bottom |
| Pushpin Map Caption: | Location of the Placerville CDP in the State of Colorado |
| Subdivision Type: | Country |
| Subdivision Name: |  United States |
| Subdivision Type1: | State |
| Subdivision Type2: | County |
| Subdivision Name2: | San Miguel County |
| Government Type: | unincorporated community |
| Unit Pref: | Imperial |
| Area Footnotes: | [1] |
| Area Total Km2: | 1.961 |
| Area Land Km2: | 1.961 |
| Area Water Km2: | 0.000 |
| Population As Of: | 2020 |
| Population Note: | [2] |
| Population Total: | 362 |
| Population Density Km2: | auto |
| Population Density Sq Mi: | auto |
| Timezone: | MST |
| Utc Offset: | -7 |
| Timezone Dst: | MDT |
| Utc Offset Dst: | -6 |
| Coordinates: | 38.0014°N -108.0311°W |
| Elevation Ft: | 7415 |
| Postal Code Type: | ZIP Code[3] |
| Postal Code: | 81430 |
| Area Code: | 970 |
| Blank Name: | GNIS feature ID |
| Blank Info: | 2805925 |
Placerville is a census-designated place (CDP) and post office in and governed by San Miguel County, Colorado, United States. The Placerville post office has the ZIP Code 81430 (post office boxes).[3] At the United States Census 2020, the population of the Placerville CDP was 362.
Placerville was originally established as a small mining camp, named after the placer gold mines located on the San Miguel River and Leopard Creek. The location became known as Old Placerville after the Rio Grande Southern Railroad constructed a depot and several passing sidings west of the original settlement, calling it Placerville.
A. B. Frenzel discovered vanadium-bearing sandstone near Placerville in the late 1890s. The ore was in strataform bodies in the Entrada Sandstone (Jurassic) east of the town. The principal mineral was roscoelite, with minor montroseite and carnotite. By the fall of 1899, development was described as "of the most superficial character," although Frenzel had driven one tunnel 18 feet into the rock.[4] By 1901-1902, Frenzel was excavating several thousand tons intended for shipment to Europe.[5] Most of the Placerville ore was less than 3% vanadium, too low grade to pay for shipment to Europe, so in 1905 the Vanadium Alloys Co. built an ore-processing mill southeast of Placerville to recover the metal as ferro-vanadium, which it sold.[6] At least five mines were active at one time, and by 1919 the two ore mills at Placerville were producing 30% of the world's vanadium.[7] Through 1940, the mines produced about 3.7 million pounds of vanadium.[8]
The Placerville Schoolhouse, a one-room schoolhouse, operated from 1908 to 1960.
In 1909, the failure of the Trout Lake Dam caused the flooding of Placerville as well as Sawpit and Newmire.[9] Although carnotite was recognized as a minor constituent of the ore since its discovery, the amount was small, and no assays were made of the uranium content of the ore until World War II.[10] Beginning about 1950, the small uranium content of the ore was also recovered from the ore.[11]
The Placerville CDP has an area of 1.961km2, all land.[1]
According to the Köppen Climate Classification system, Placerville has a warm-summer humid continental climate, abbreviated "Dfb" on climate maps. The hottest temperature recorded in Placerville was 95F on July 23, 2020 and June 12 - 13, 2021, while the coldest temperature recorded was -17F on February 2, 2011 and January 15, 2013.
The United States Census Bureau defined the for the
Placerville is part of Colorado's Bustang network. It is on the Durango-Grand Junction Outrider line.[12]