Las Animas - Bent County Library District

Biography of the wife of Chief Ouray of the Ute Indians in Colorado. She was born Kiowa Apache. Her parents were both killed in a raid shortly after her birth. The Tabegauche (Uncompahgre) Utes found and raised her as their own. They named her Chipeta, meaning White Singing Bird. She was appointed to care for Chief Ouray's son after the death of his first wife, and in 1859 they were married.

Elizabeth M. Byers moved west during the Pikes Peak Gold Rush and quickly became a civic leader in the small settlement of Denver City. Her husband, William N. Byers, founded the Rocky Mountain News, Colorado’s first newspaper. The Byers lived in Denver as it grew from a boom-and-bust town into the thriving state capital of Colorado. She was burned out of one home and flooded out of another, but she also found humor throughout her life.