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The Sunrise Mine Historic District encompasses 225 acres in the rural, high desert foothills of eastern Wyoming, where the Sunrise Iron Ore Mine and company town operated from 1898 to 1980. The now abandoned town of Sunrise, Wyoming, where the mining operations and company town were located, lies on the floor of Eureka Canyon, surrounded by canyon walls on the north, south, and east. The soil in the district is red, due to the large amount of red ochre that accompanies the iron and copper deposits scattered throughout the area.

The property contains buildings, foundations and landscape features representing 80 years of iron-ore mining, with an associated company town. The district is a part of the Hartville Uplift, an area in southeastern Wyoming that connects the southern Black Hills with the Laramie Range. The Sunrise Mine was the principal source of iron used at the Colorado Fuel and Iron plant in Pueblo, Colorado, from 1899 until 1980, making it an important contributor to the economy of Colorado as well as Wyoming. Also, the Sunrise Mine was important in the social and ethnic history of the region. The unskilled workers at Sunrise included Italians, Greeks, Syrio-Lebanese, Japanese, Scandinavians, and English.