The History Colorado Center (1200 Broadway, Denver) opened in 2012 as the headquarters, museum, and research center of History Colorado. Established in 1879 as the State Historical and Natural History Society, History Colorado had outgrown a succession…

Established in 1979, the Aspen Art Museum is a noncollecting museum that focuses on exhibitions of contemporary visual art. It grew out of a long tradition of contemporary art in Aspen and has displayed the work of modern masters such as Willem de…

The Blair-Caldwell African American Research Library is located in the Five Points neighborhood of Denver. Named for Omar Blair and Elvin Caldwell, two prominent local civil rights leaders, it is the largest of Denver Public Library's neighborhood…

The Broomfield Depot was built in 1909 to serve the Colorado & Southern and Denver & Interurban Railroads. It is a rare surviving example of a combination passenger and freight depot that also served both steam railroad and electric interurban…

Built in 1883, the Byers-Evans House at 1310 Bannock Street in Denver is a Victorian mansion notable for its association with two of the city’s most influential early families. William Byers, who built the house, had established the city’s first…

The Colorado History Museum, the second major home of the Colorado Historical Society (now History Colorado), opened in 1977 to replace the Colorado State Museum (1915). Located on the south side of Civic Center in Denver, the modern museum was three…

The Colorado State Museum (200 E. Fourteenth Avenue, Denver) opened in 1915 as the first stand-alone home for the Colorado Historical Society (now History Colorado). The last work of Frank E. Edbrooke, Colorado’s best-known architect of the late 1800s…

The Colorado Women’s Prison in Cañon City was built in 1935, after three previous women’s buildings at the State Penitentiary had been appropriated for other uses. Standing just east of the penitentiary walls, the women’s prison housed female inmates…

Built in 1874 by pioneer homesteader William Zane Cozens, Cozens Ranch was an important early ranch and stage stop in the Fraser River valley in north-central Colorado. The ranch also served for nearly thirty years as the area’s main post office. The…

The Denver Art Museum (DAM) (100 W. 14th Avenue) in the city’s Civic Center boasts more than 70,000 works from across the centuries and the world. Best known for its collection of Indigenous art, it was the first major museum to establish a separate…

The Denver Museum of Nature & Science (DMNS) is the largest natural history museum between Chicago and the West Coast of the United States. Incorporated on December 6, 1900 as the Colorado Museum of Natural History, the museum was known as the Denver…

The Denver Zoo started in 1896 with a single bear in City Park and has grown to an eighty-acre campus. There are 350 employees overseeing a total of about 3,700 animals from more than 600 species. The zoo draws more than 2 million visitors per year,…

The Denver Museum of Nature and Science (DMNS), previously the Colorado Museum of Natural History, was established in 1900. Although the museum has made many contributions to archaeology and anthropology, it has also played a crucial role in educating…

Established in 1842, El Pueblo (301 N Union Ave, Pueblo, CO 81003) was an independent adobe trading post that operated at the site of the present-day city of Pueblo and was used by a diverse, multi-ethnic group of trappers, traders, women, and mountain…

The US Army operated Fort Garland in the San Luis Valley for twenty-five years, from 1858 to 1883. The fort was built to protect early settlers from Native American raids in the years before treaties, reservations, and removal made that mission obsolete…

Louis Vasquez and Andrew Sublette operated the fur-trading post Fort Vasquez from 1835 to 1842. After ruthless competition and changing trade patterns caused the pair to leave the fort, it served as a landmark along the South Platte River Trail before…

The Fort Garland merchant John M. Francisco and his trading partner, Henry Daigre, built Francisco Plaza near the Cucharas River, at the site of present-day La Veta, in 1862. The first dwelling in the Cucharas Valley, the plaza served as a defensive fort…

Hiwan Heritage Park and Museum in Evergreen comprises a four-acre outdoor space and a twenty-five-room log cabin. Josepha Williams, one of the first female doctors in Colorado, acquired the property in 1893 as a place for friends and family to stay…

Completed in 1930, the Union Pacific Railroad depot in Julesburg is a reminder of the town’s long-standing ties to the railroad. In the 1860s Julesburg served briefly as the end-of-track town when the Union Pacific was building its transcontinental line…

Built in 1890 at 2335 Arapahoe Street in Denver, the Justina Ford House served for forty years as the home and office of Colorado’s first black woman physician. In 1984 the house was moved to save it from demolition, and after renovations it opened at…

The Limon Railroad Depot was built in 1910 on a triangular piece of land bounded by the intersection of Chicago, Rock Island & Pacific Railroad (CRI&P) and Union Pacific Railroad (UP) lines. The interchange made Limon, in Lincoln County, an…

Built in 1922, the State Armory in Craig was one of many new armories built to house national guard units across the state. The Craig building, based on a design by John James Huddart, served for many decades as a place for military training and…

The Ute people, or as they call themselves, Nuche (The People), are Colorado’s longest continuous residents. Their rich cultural heritage and history is on display at the Ute Indian Museum. Nestled in the heart of traditional Uncompahgre Ute territory in…