Boulder County encompasses 740 square miles of the western plains and Rocky Mountains in north central Colorado. The county straddles three unique geographic zones: mountains in the west, plains in the east, and a natural trough that runs between the…

Colorado’s combination of high elevation, midlatitude, and continental interior geography results in a cool, dry, and invigorating climate. The average annual temperature for the state is 43.5 degrees Fahrenheit (F), which is 13.7 degrees below the…

Colorado, “the Centennial State,” was the thirty-eighth state to enter the Union on August 1, 1876. Its diverse geography encompasses 104,094 square miles of the American West and includes swathes of the Great Plains, southern Rocky Mountains, and the…

The Colorado–Big Thompson Project (C–BT) is the largest transmountain water diversion in the state of Colorado. Built between 1938 and 1956, the C–BT Project provides supplemental water for municipal, industrial, and irrigation purposes in…

Denver is the capital of Colorado and the twenty-first largest city in the United States, sprawling over six counties and 3,497 square miles of the High Plains and the Rocky Mountain foothills. Centered at the confluence of the South Platte River and…

Greeley is a growing community of 100,000 people along the Front Range in northeastern Colorado. Founded as an agricultural colony in 1870, the city has an economic, political, and cultural reach that extends far beyond its municipal borders. Greeley is…

The tension between aridity and irrigated agriculture has been a defining characteristic of Colorado for much of its modern history. On average, the state receives less than fifteen inches of annual precipitation, making it the seventh driest state in…

Longmont is a city of about 92,000 along the Front Range in eastern Boulder County. Named after the prominent Longs Peak to the west, the city was founded in 1871 by members of the Chicago-Colorado Colony, near the confluence of Left Hand and St. Vrain…

Established on January 26, 1915, Rocky Mountain National Park (RMNP) has for more than a century been one of the country’s most visited national parks. Mountain vistas and wilderness solitude draw millions of people every year. The park lies between…

Founded in 1893, the Western Federation of Miners (WFM) was one of the largest and most active labor unions in the late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century American West. The union was involved in some of the most important labor disputes in Colorado…