Last Chance: the crossroads that named itself for the empty road ahead

Some towns are named for a founder or a river. This one is named for what comes after it: nothing, for a good long while. Where US 36 meets State Highway 71 on the Washington County plains, a homesteader named Charlie Harbert turned his land into a stop for early car travelers and called it Last Chance, a name that was equal parts warning and sales pitch. According to History Colorado, the spot became official in 1925, just as automobiles were filling American roads and drivers needed gas, food, and a bed before the open miles ahead.

For decades it worked. Through the booming car-travel years into the mid-1960s, Last Chance was a real waypoint, with a filling station, places to eat, and a motel. Then Interstate 70 opened to the south and pulled the through-traffic with it, leaving the old junction quiet by the late 1970s.

It is not a tidy attraction, and that is the appeal. If you are crossing the eastern plains, it is a few worn buildings and a wide sky that still tells the story the name promised. Just take the name literally and fuel up before you go. For the full history, see History Colorado’s “Last Rites of Last Chance.”