St. Charles Capital was founded in early 2005.

The firm represents the continuation of senior partners working together since the early 1980s at Boettcher & Co., a large regional investment bank headquartered in Denver. In 1984, The Wallach Company was formed to focus on merger and acquisitions and to raise private capital for middle-market companies. Over time, partners joined Wallach from Boettcher, and in subsequent years, new investment bankers joined the firm. By the end of 2000, Wallach had matured to be the largest investment bank specializing in general merger and acquisition advisory services in the Rocky Mountain region. It was then sold to McDonald Investments, a subsidiary of KeyCorp. After four successful years with McDonald Investments, five of the former Wallach investment bankers left McDonald to form St. Charles Capital.

About Our Name

Before 1858, the Front Range of Colorado was the domain of the Arapahoe and Cheyenne Indians and a handful of trappers and traders. Parties entered the region seeking gold during the summer of 1858. In September of that year, a prospecting party from Lawrence, Kansas, selected the northeast corner of the confluence of Cherry Creek and the South Platte River for the new site of a town company, St. Charles. With winter coming on, and not expecting new prospectors until spring, the party retreated to the east, leaving Charles Nichols behind to protect the claim. Following pioneer custom of claiming territory, Nichols laid out four logs on the ground at today’s Blake Street.

St. Charles Becomes Denver

In November, another party, led by General William Larimer, arrived from Leavenworth, Kansas, and immediately began eyeing the exceptional town site of St. Charles. Larimer gathered his followers, argued that they take the site as their own, and shrewdly proposed naming the town after William Denver, then governor of Kansas Territory (in which St. Charles was located). Charles Nichols attended the claim-jumping meeting and protested, but was silenced by physical threats. He eventually acquiesced.

St. Charles on the Map

The first map of the Front Range of Colorado and also the first to evidence the gold rush was by William Hartley, a surveyor and member of the Lawrence Party. The original Hartley map, which is housed at the Denver Public Library, was produced in December 1858. It clearly shows St. Charles as the principal settlement in the new goldfields. Subsequent maps introduced the name Denver, and within a year St. Charles had vanished from the map.

Who Was St. Charles?

St. Charles Borromeo became the Archbishop of Milan, Papal Secretary of State under Pius IV, his uncle, and one of the chief leaders in the Catholic Counter-Reformation. Born in 1538 to an important Northern Italian family, Charles became the principal negotiator of important matters of state on behalf of the Medici family. Later, when Charles was Secretary of State for Pope Pius IV, he demonstrated great patience and negotiating skill in assembling the Council of Trent, which met 25 times over two years and included the Pope, the Emperor, and more than 100 cardinals and bishops. The resulting decrees of the Council caused significant changes known as the Counter-Reformation in the Catholic Church. As a representative of the Pope, Charles’ role was critical to these negotiations. He later gave his significant wealth to the poor and attempted to model the new piety under the Council’s decrees. He is renowned for refusing to flee the city of Milan (unlike other clergy) during a vicious outbreak of the plague; instead, he assisted the plague-stricken sufferers in their homes. Charles’ position in Europe was remarkable; popes and major sovereigns sought his advice. His skill in diplomacy culminated in radical changes to the Church.