I got burned by Continental Airlines, just like the passengers on fligth 1404

On December 20, 2008, at 12:13 PM, I received notification from Continental Airlines, that my flight CO529, confirmation AGHMGV, due to leave Denver International Airport (DIA) at 6:25 PM for Newark International Airport, had been canceled.  I was due to fly with my wife and son, to join our three daughters who had flown earlier, to New Jersey to spend Christmas with family.  I was told that there were no flights until December 23.  I immediately purchased three one way tickets on Frontier Airlines, at a cost of $1,705.50 for the three of us.  While we were in flight to New Jersey, at approximately 7:00 PM, Continental called my phone to tell me that flight CO 529 was reinstated and it would leave around 10:30 PM on December 20, 2008.  Of course I did not recieve that message until I landed in Newark, and that was too late to be of any use to us and it was past the scheduled departure time of the canceled flight.

Tonight, January 21, 2009, I called Continental airlines, to get them to pay for my Frontier tickets, and they refused, but did offer to refund the unused portion of my original ticket, which should amount to about $538.50, which leaves me out $1,167.00 for this event which was 100% the fault of Continental.  Obviously someone was very hasty in canceling the flight in the first place.  I hope that you can help me get Continental to pay for their error.  

Ironically, my Frontier flight was right behind Continental Airlines flight 1404, which crashed and burned right in front of us at DIA.  So I was not the only one to get burned by Continental Airlines that night.