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The community of Edwards got an early start in comparison with the other ranching communities of the valley. Joseph Brett and John Bowman located a homestead at the mouth of Lake Creek, one mile west of the present community. In 1882, Harrison Berry settled the ranch where the post office was later erected. The settlement was first called Berry’s Ranch by the Denver and Rio Grande, when the line reached the place in 1887. Later it was rechristened Edwards, after Melvin Edwards of Red Cliff who was later Secretary of State for Colorado.
A school was built in Edwards in 1890. The first teacher earned fifty dollars a month. According to Early Days on the Eagle by MacDonald Knight and Leonard Hammock, “The community never gained much prominence, but on the other hand suffered none of the setbacks evident in the mining communities.” They noted Edwards’ reliance on the more generally stable ranching economy, along with support from lumbering on nearby Lake Creek.
That history was clearly written before Edwards’ resurgence as the thriving metropolitan mid-valley center it is today.
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