Brief by Central Staff
Old Spanish Trail – September 2001 – Colorado Central Magazine
Yvonne Halburian, a Sa-guache artist and mapmaker, has been honored by the Old Spanish Trail Association for her volunteer work.
The Old Spanish Trail stretched from Santa Fé to Los Angeles in the first half of the 19th century. Although wagons used portions of it, it was primarily a route for pack trains and livestock. The north branch of the trail passed through the San Luis Valley en route to the Continental Divide at Cochetopa Pass.
The OSTA is dedicated to preserving and marking the trail, despite a recent setback when a National Park Service study concluded that the trail lacked national historic significance and thus didn’t qualify for designation in the National Historic Trail system.
Halburian, who was profiled in the May, 1999, edition of Colorado Central, will receive the association’s annual Crampton Award, given to an outstanding volunteer and named for Utah historian Ralph Crampton, one of the first to research the trail.
Halburian served as first president of the OSTA’s first local chapter at Saguache, and has drawn maps and logos that she has donated to the association. She was instrumental in getting a $10,000 GOCO grant for a handsome trail marker in Saguache.
You can likely see her, and some of her other artwork, at the Saguache Fall Festival on Sept. 15 and 16 in Otto Mears Park in Saguache.
And for our part, having met Yvonne a few times, this honor couldn’t have happened to a nicer or more deserving person.
