Nathan Cook Meeker was born on July 12, 1817 on a farm by Lake Erie. Not much is known of Nathan's childhood.

Meeker worked as a farm editor at Horace Greeley's New York newspaper in 1869. He was sent to Colorado to find out if it was a good place for farming. He thought it would be good farm land if people worked hard. So in April 1870 Meeker and his family and a group of other settlers started the Union Colony and the town of Greeley.

Meeker borrowed money from Horace Greeley to build the colony. When Greeley died his family wanted the money so Meeker got a job as the Indian Agent at the White River Ute Indian Reservation.

Meeker took his wife and children and a few men on the 170 mile trip in a wagon to the reservation. We wouldn't want to travel in a bumpy wagon. When they got there he tried to make the Utes farm but they didn't want to be farmers. Then he wanted to dig up their horse track and pasture to make a farm. The Utes did not like this idea at all because their horses were important to them.

On September 29, 1879 Meeker started plowing the horse track. The Utes became very angry. They shot him and stuck a stake in his throat. His wife and children were kidnapped but later released.

We got our information from:
Colorado Kids Dig Up the Past
and this web site.