Gold is discovered in Dry Creek [Englewood], stimulating
the Pikes Peak Gold Rush.
First permanent Anglo-European Settlers arrived at mouth
of Boulder Canyon.
First reported gold discovery in mountains of Colorado
at Gold Run [Gold Hill area].
Boulder City Town Company formed 10 February 1859.
The first irrigation ditch in Boulder County dug.
Coal discovered in Marshall area southeast of Boulder.
Jim Baker mined surface coal near Lafayette and sold
it in Denver.
The Wellman brothers planted the first wheat crop in
Boulder County.
The first schoolhouse in Colorado built strictly for
educational purposes was erected in Boulder on the southwest
corner of 14th and Front [Walnut].
The Ward Mining District was formed; named after Calvin
Ward.
Andrew J. Macky erected the first frame building in Boulder
on the northeast corner of 14th and Pearl.
Colorado became a Territory.
Treaty of Fort Wise signed with leaders of several bands
of Arapahos and Cheyennes "extinguishing their land
title" in Colorado except for a reserve in Southeast
Colorado.
Boulder County is formed.
Congress passed the Homestead Act.
Joseph Marshall erected a small blast furnace and produced
pig iron from the local hematite southeast of Boulder.
Boulder and Longmont’s Company "D" of the 3rd
Colorado Volunteer Cavalry involved in the November Sand
Creek Massacre.
The town of Valmont [contraction of "valley"
and "mountain"] platted; it soon rivaled Boulder
in size and commercial activity.
Boulder County’s first newspaper, the Valmont Bulletin,
began publication on New Years Day.
The Congregational Church in Boulder built.
Valmont Presbyterian Church built.
Boulderites entice editor of Valmont Bulletin to move
his newspaper to Boulder where it was renamed the Boulder
Valley News.
The Boulder County Pioneer succeed the Boulder Valley
News, only to be succeeded by the Boulder County News.
The town of Ryssby formed.
The first county fair in Colorado Territory opened in
Boulder on 12 October 1869.
Silver discovered at Caribou re-igniting the mining boom.
Boulder City is incorporated.
Longmont settled by the Chicago-Colorado Colony.
Railroad extended to Boulder.
The first mill and smelter [Boyd Mill] erected in Boulder
Martha Maxwell opened her Rocky Mountain Museum on Pearl
Street. Her taxidermy collection became centerpiece of
Colorado’s exhibit at 1876 Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia.
Niwot platted.
The first high school graduation class in Territory of
Colorado was in Boulder.
Colorado became the 38th state 01 August 1876.
The University of Colorado opened.
State Preparatory School founded as part of University
because of a lack of adequately prepared high school graduates.
Mary Rippon appointed first woman professor at CU.
The Boulder telephone exchange opened with 25 subscriptions.
The University’s first graduating class consisted of
six members.
The cornerstone for the old Boulder County Courthouse
on Boulder’s old town square was laid on 04 July 1882.
Pine Street School [Whittier School] opened.
The Greeley, Salt Lake, and Pacific railroad completed
between Boulder and Sunset; extended service to mountain
communities.
Joseph B. "Rocky Mountain Joe" Sturtevant began
to record the early history of Boulder county by taking
photographs between 1884 and 1910.
The Simpson Mine, a rich coal mine, opened in Lafayette
and was a major factor in subsequent economic development
of community.
"Old" Broomfield began to develop when railroad
depot and post office were relocated after standard gauge
replaced narrow gauge tracks one mile to the east.
Mapleton School in Boulder opened.
New Boulder train depot dedicated at 14th and Water St
[Canyon Blvd].
The Boulder Camera founded. Became daily the next year.
Mount Saint Gertrude Academy opened.
The Boulder Creek "100-year" flood damaged
the town.
State Preparatory School moves into its own building
at 17th and Pearl.
Colorado Sanitarium, a branch of Dr. J.H. Kellogg’s Battle
Creek Sanitarium in Michigan, dedicated in Boulder.
Boulderites approved $20,000 bond election for Texas-Chautauqua
Auditorium opened on 04 July 1898.
The Colorado & Northwestern Railroad route between
Boulder and Ward named "The Switzerland Trail of
America" by a Greeley man.
Tungsten discovered. Boulder County became world's leading
producer of tungsten by World War I.
Boulder’s request for 1,800 acres of mountain backdrop/watershed
extending from South Boulder Creek to Sunshine Canyon
approved by U.S. Congress.
The first automobile seen in Boulder was in June, 1900.
By 1906, there were 26 registered auto cars, or "mankillers".
Summer home of John and Kate Harbeck completed; now a
Boulder landmark, present-day home of the Boulder Museum
of History.
Disastrous fire destroyed central Ward.
Lafayette business district burned.
City ordinance made it "unlawful for any person
to ride or drive within Boulder at a rate of speed in
excess of 6 miles per hour".
Carnegie library opened at 1125 Pine Street in Boulder.
Ed Tangen took the first of his 16,000 photographs capturing
the history of Boulder County from 1906 to 1951.
Curran Opera House opens at 1132-34 Pearl Street.
Boulder passed anti-saloon ordinance.
Three were killed and the Boulder freight depot blown
up when a union brakeman set fire to burn out scab switchmen
asleep in a caboose. Fire spread to a freight car loaded
with 2,400 pounds of dynamite.
First run of electric Interurban train from Denver to
Boulder.
Adolph J. Zang’s 4,000 acre ranch occupied a large percentage
of what is now the City of Broomfield and Jefferson County
Airport.
World’s largest tungsten mill built north of Nederland.
Ivy Baldwin made a record breaking high wire walk on
a cable stretched 565 feet high across Eldorado Springs
canyon.
Ten thousand pumpkin pies, thirty thousand sandwiches,
and 75 barrels of coffee were served at Longmont’s Annual
Pumpkin Pie Days.
The Boulderado Hotel opened for business on New Years
Day.
"Baseball Billy" Sunday, the "World’s
Greatest" Evangelist, held a crusade in Boulder.
The Union Pacific Railroad introduced a self-contained
forty-two passenger rail car on the Denver-Boulder route.
The 78 foot car was powered by a six cylinder gasoline
engine, had seats of "unusual width", oval windows
that could be opened for fresh air, and a compartment
for smokers.
3,000 coal miners in Boulder County go on strike; lasted
five years.
The daily stagecoach between Boulder and Nederland replaced
by Stanley Steamer.
Western States Cutlery and Manufacturing Company founded
in Boulder.
Charles C. Buckingham family donated Boulder Falls site
to the City of Boulder.
US Army occupied Louisville during coal miner's strike.
William F. Cody met with old friends in Boulder while
in town with the Sells-Floto Circus/Buffalo Bill’s Original
Wild West Show.
Enos Mills, Father of Rocky Mountain National Park, succeeded
in stimulating legislation that resulted in establishing
Park.
The Colorado Chautauqua Bulletin reported "We Call
it the Colorado Chautauqua, but it might as well be called
the Colorado Music Festival".
The University of Colorado faculty voted to approve one
of the first Reserve Officer Training [ROTC] programs
in the nation.
The paving of Boulder streets began on 11 September 1917
when the first concrete was poured near the corner of
18th and Pearl.
Boulder Day Nursery founded as one of the earliest day
care centers in the nation.
Spanish influenza resulted in 41 deaths in Nederland
and a quarantine in Boulder.
Switzerland Trail train scrapped.
Lions Club erected Panorama Park Shelter House on Flagstaff
Mountain and donated it to the City of Boulder; this began
a half-century of the Club’s providing park facilities
to the city.
Boulder Boy Scouts, led by Ralph Hubbard, performed Indian
dances before the British Royal Family, King Albert, and
the Olympics in Antwerp.
Hellems was the first building completed in the "Rural
Italian" or "Tuscan" style [sandstone and
red roof tiles] on the University of Colorado campus.
Florence C. Molloy and Mabel N. Macleay operated a taxi
and touring company in Boulder.
KKK paraded down Pearl Street.
Construction began on the Lakeside [Valmont] Power Plant,
the "largest industrial project in the history of
Boulder
County". It is still considered one of the most
efficient plants in Public the Public Service Company
[now EXCEL].
Police officer, Elmer Cobb, was murdered. Case remains
unsolved.
Hygienic Swimming Pool [Spruce Pool] opened using warm
water produced from the manufacture of ice at adjacent
Hygienic Ice Company.
The University of Colorado Stadium [Folsom Field] completed
in time for Homecoming.
Fire destroyed Bleecker and Company plant at 3rd and
Arapahoe in Boulder. Plant manufactured luminous paint
and "Zero Hour Bombs".
Fred C. Smith of Boulder set a worlds record for continuous
automobile driving of 104 hours and 8 minutes.
Former President of the Women’s Christian Temperance
Union arrested for selling homemade intoxicants to university
students. She led movement that closed Boulder saloons
in 1907.
Last run of Boulder's electric street cars
Old Boulder County Courthouse burns down.
The largest still "ever found in Northern Colorado"
uncovered on Gunbarrel Hill east of Boulder.
CCC boys finish Flagstaff Mt. amphitheater
First Pay Dirt Pow Wow celebration
Early morning explosion in Monarch #2 kills eight coal
miners
Boulder Theater opened in renovated Curran Opera House
First traffic light installed in Boulder at the corner
of 12th (Broadway) and Pearl.
New WPA-built Boulder High School opened. Nude sculptures
of "Wisdom and Strength" [Minnie and Jake] over
entrance allowed to remain despite controversy.
Byron "Whizzer" White, later Rhodes Scholar
and U.S. Supreme Court Justice, became CU’s first All-American
football player.
Glenn Miller's plane went down.
Boulder Historical Society organized. History museum
proposed in new Municipal Building..
Denver-Boulder Turnpike opened.
National Bureau of Standards broke ground for Radio Propagation
Laboratories in Boulder.
Engine #30 of Switzerland Trail RR placed in Central
Park.
Secret Rocky Flats Nuclear Weapons Factory opens 8 miles
south of Boulder .
Railroad passenger service to old depot in downtown Boulder
ends.
PLAN-Boulder organized and secured passage of "Blue
Line" to prevent development along mountain backdrop.
Valverdan Park renamed Scott Carpenter Park in honor
of Scott Carpenter, a NASA astronaut, from Boulder, who
manned the Aurora 7.
Crossroads mall built.
The IBM plant along the Boulder-Longmont Diagonal triggered
growth that is ongoing.
Boulder voters were first in the nation to approve a
tax to purchase and preserve open space for a greenbelt
around the community.
Boulder votes approved sale of intoxicating beverages
after 60 years.
Regularly scheduled railroad passenger service ends in
Boulder.
Denver-Boulder Turnpike became toll free; the debt was
paid off early.
Boulder's Central Park declared health hazard because
of transients.
Mount Saint Gertrude Girls School closed.
Celestial Seasonings, now a worldwide tea company, was
founded by Mo Siegel of Boulder.
CU's Regent's Hall occupied by youthful anti-war demonstrators.
Boulder adopted a fifty-five foot height limitation for
new buildings.
Demolition of Central School stimulated growth of Historic
Boulder, Inc. and the adoption of a City Landmark Ordinance.
Turnpike interchange at 28th Street occupied by antiwar
demonstrators.
Boulder's Flatirons School bombed.
Bomb explodes in car at Burger King in Boulder killing
three.
Bomb explodes in Chautauqua killing three.
Red Zinger Bicycle Classic Race, started by Celestial
Seasonings, first raced through Boulder. Lasted 5 years
until it became sponsored by Adolph Coors Co.
Boulder votes approved a 2% growth limitation referendum,
know as the Danish Plan.
Pearl Street Mall closed to automobile traffic, pedestrain
mall opens.
The forty-five year old Pow Wow Days are held for the
last time in Boulder. Moved to Longmont and Louisville
before its demise in 1982.
Bolder Boulder, a 10 kilometer road race on Memorial
Day, run for the first time through the streets of Boulder.
Kinetics Conveyance Race first held at the Boulder Reservoir
Tom Czech, a CU professor, and Sidney Altman, a CU graduate,
won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry
Tea House, sent from Boulder’s sister city of Dushanbe,
Tajikistan, erected on 13th Street east of Central Park,
after much discussion as to where it should be placed.
Mount Saint Gertrude Academy reopened as a retirement
community.
