Topic
History and culture
Mining towns and railroads, landmarks and museums, festivals, food, and the local-color stories that make each corner of Colorado make sense.
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Local notes
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History and culture
The Iron Horse Bicycle Classic: When Durango Cyclists Race the Train
Every Memorial Day weekend, Durango cyclists try to beat the narrow-gauge steam train to Silverton over two high mountain passes, in a race born from a brothers' bet in 1971.
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The Museum Built So Everyone Climbs the Same Ramp
Colorado Springs holds the licensed 'Olympic City USA' title, and its downtown U.S. Olympic & Paralympic Museum was designed so visitors of every ability move through it together.
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The Ute Mountain Ute Tribe is a sovereign neighbor in this county
Part of Montezuma County is the Ute Mountain Ute Reservation, a sovereign tribal nation centered at Towaoc, with its own government and its own rules for visitors.
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This was Ute homeland, and it still is Ute country
Archuleta County lies within long-held Ute homeland, and the 1873 Brunot Agreement is part of the difficult history of how those lands changed hands.
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Visiting the Air Force Academy While the Chapel Is Wrapped Up
A new visitor center outside the North Gate, an overlook above Colorado Springs, and a free planetarium keep the Air Force Academy worth a stop even while its famous chapel is under repair.
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Why the North Fork Valley Eats So Well
Around Paonia, a tight cluster of organic orchards, farms, and high-altitude vineyards turns a short growing season into one of Colorado's richest farm-to-table valleys.
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Aurora's Havana Street is a four-mile run of immigrant kitchens
Along roughly four miles of Havana Street in Aurora, immigrant-owned Ethiopian, Somali, East African, Vietnamese, Korean and Mexican restaurants cluster together in one of the metro area's most international dining corridors.
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Bent's Old Fort tells the Santa Fe Trail story near La Junta
Bent's Old Fort National Historic Site near La Junta is a reconstructed 1800s trading post on the Santa Fe Trail and a careful place to learn the valley's layered history.
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Breckenridge's Main Street sits inside a historic district
The heart of Breckenridge is a listed historic district of late-1800s and early-1900s mining-town buildings, which is why its Main Street looks the way it does.
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Dearfield was a Black agricultural colony in Weld County
Dearfield began in 1910 as an African American agricultural colony in eastern Weld County, built on land, dryland farming, and self-reliance.
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Each March, Monte Vista throws a three-day festival for the cranes
For more than 40 years, the Monte Vista Crane Festival has built a three-day March event around the sandhill cranes that stop near town on their spring migration.
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From Fitzsimons Army Hospital to the Anschutz Medical Campus
Aurora's busy medical campus grew out of an Army tuberculosis hospital that once held the largest building in Colorado.
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How Archuleta County and Pagosa Springs got their names
The county carries a Hispanic family name from the San Luis Valley, while the town's name comes from a Ute word tied to its famous spring.
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Lake City exists because of mining on land taken from the Ute people
Lake City grew as a mining supply town in the 1870s on land the Ute people were forced to cede, history worth understanding plainly.
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Leadville is home to the National Mining Hall of Fame and Museum
The National Mining Hall of Fame and Museum in Leadville tells the story of American mining from a former school building in town.
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Littleton is the Arapahoe County seat, and it started with a flour mill
Littleton grew from Richard Little's 1860s homestead and the Rough and Ready Flour Mill, and it has served as the seat of Arapahoe County government.
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Much of downtown Lake City is a listed historic district
Lake City's downtown is a National Register historic district with dozens of original mining-era buildings, many rebuilt in brick and stone after an 1879 fire.
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Much of Park County sits inside the South Park National Heritage Area
Congress designated the South Park National Heritage Area to recognize and help interpret the mining, ranching, and railroad history spread across much of Park County.
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Near San Luis, some mountain land carries old shared-use rights
The mountain land east of San Luis, long known as La Sierra, is tied to historic common-use rights that courts have addressed, and they are a real factor in local land questions.
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Ouray is named for a Ute leader, and the county carries the name too
The town and county of Ouray are named for Ouray, a nineteenth-century leader of the Tabeguache (Uncompahgre) band of Ute people, and early accounts say the townsite was first known as Uncompahgre City.
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Red Rocks was hand-built by Depression-era work crews
The amphitheatre at Red Rocks near Morrison was carved out and built largely by Civilian Conservation Corps crews in the 1930s, which is why it is a designated National Historic Landmark, not just a concert venue.
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The Brush Rodeo: a Fourth of July tradition on the plains
The City of Brush lists the Brush Rodeo as a July 2-4 community event with rodeo events, a parade, barbecue, and fireworks.
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The Cameron Peak Fire still shapes the land west of Fort Collins
The 2020 Cameron Peak Fire burned a large stretch of Larimer County's high country, and its burn scar continues to affect flooding, roads, and recreation years later.
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The Dust Bowl shaped Baca County's land and its people
Baca County was at the heart of the 1930s Dust Bowl, and that history still explains its grasslands, its small towns, and how the land is used today.
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