80 Facts About Colorado

Colorado is the eighth most extensive and 21st most populous U S state.

The Territory of Colorado was organized on February 28, 1861, and on August 1, 1876, U S President Ulysses S Grant signed Proclamation 230 admitting Colorado to the Union as the 38th state.

Colorado is nicknamed the "Centennial State" because it became a state one century after the signing of the United States Declaration of Independence.

Colorado is bordered by Wyoming to the north, Nebraska to the northeast, Kansas to the east, Oklahoma to the southeast, New Mexico to the south, and Utah to the west, as well as touching Arizona to the southwest at the Four Corners.

Colorado is noted for its vivid landscape of mountains, forests, high plains, mesas, canyons, plateaus, rivers, and desert lands.

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Colorado is one of the Mountain States, and is a part of the western and southwestern United States.

Colorado is a comparatively wealthy state, ranking eighth in household income in 2016, and 11th in per capita income in 2010.

Region that is today the State of Colorado has been inhabited by Native Americans and their Paleoamerican ancestors for at least 13, 500 years and possibly more than 37, 000 years.

The remainder of Missouri Territory, including what would become northeastern Colorado, became an unorganized territory and remained so for 33 years over the question of slavery.

The original boundaries of Colorado remain unchanged except for government survey amendments.

The name Colorado was chosen because it was commonly believed that the Colorado River originated in the territory.

Colorado women were granted the right to vote on November 7, 1893, making Colorado the second state to grant universal suffrage and the first one by a popular vote.

Colorado became the first western state to host a major political convention when the Democratic Party met in Denver in 1908.

Colorado suffered greatly through the Great Depression and the Dust Bowl of the 1930s, but a major wave of immigration following World War II boosted Colorado's fortune.

Since the late 1990s, Colorado has been the site of multiple major mass shootings, including the infamous Columbine High School massacre in 1999 which made international news, where Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold killed 12 students and one teacher, before committing suicide.

The first USS Colorado was named for the Colorado River and served in the Civil War and later the Asiatic Squadron, where it was attacked during the 1871 Korean Expedition.

At the time of the attack on Pearl Harbor, the battleship USS Colorado was located at the naval base in San Diego, California, and thus went unscathed.

The most recent vessel to bear the name USS Colorado is Virginia-class submarine USS Colorado, which was commissioned in 2018.

Colorado is notable for its diverse geography, which includes alpine mountains, high plains, deserts with huge sand dunes, and deep canyons.

The southwest corner of Colorado is the Four Corners Monument at 36°59'56?N, 109°2'43?W.

The Colorado plains are mostly prairies but include deciduous forests, buttes, and canyons.

Eastern Colorado is presently mainly farmland and rangeland, along with small farming villages and towns.

Rocky Mountains within Colorado contain 53 true peaks with a total of 58 that are 14, 000 feet or higher in elevation above sea level, known as fourteeners.

Colorado is the only U S state that lies entirely above 1, 000 meters elevation.

The South Park of Colorado is the region of the headwaters of the South Platte River.

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In south-central Colorado is the large San Luis Valley, where the headwaters of the Rio Grande are located.

Western Slope area of Colorado includes the western face of the Rocky Mountains and all of the states to the western border.

The northwestern corner of Colorado is a sparsely populated region, and it contains part of the noted Dinosaur National Monument, which not only is a paleontological area, but is a scenic area of rocky hills, canyons, arid desert, and streambeds.

Desert lands in Colorado are located in and around areas such as the Pueblo, Canon City, Florence, Great Sand Dunes National Park and Preserve, San Luis Valley, Cortez, Canyon of the Ancients National Monument, Hovenweep National Monument, Ute Mountain, Delta, Grand Junction, Colorado National Monument, and other areas surrounding the Uncompahgre Plateau and Uncompahgre National Forest.

Western Slope of Colorado is drained by the Colorado River and its tributaries, or by evaporation in its arid areas.

Climate of Colorado is more complex than states outside of the Mountain States region.

Northeast, east, and southeast Colorado are mostly the high plains, while Northern Colorado is a mix of high plains, foothills, and mountains.

Northwest and west Colorado are predominantly mountainous, with some desert lands mixed in.

Southwest and southern Colorado are a complex mixture of desert and mountain areas.

Much of Colorado is very dry, with the state averaging only 17 inches of precipitation per year statewide.

However, some of the mountainous regions of Colorado receive a huge amount of moisture from winter snowfalls.

Water flowing out of the Colorado Rocky Mountains is a very significant source of water for the farms, towns, and cities of the southwest states of New Mexico, Arizona, Utah, and Nevada, as well as the Midwest, such as Nebraska and Kansas, and the southern states of Oklahoma and Texas.

Climate change in Colorado encompasses the effects of climate change, attributed to man-made increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide, in the U S state of Colorado.

In 2019 The Denver Post reported that "[i]ndividuals living in southeastern Colorado are more vulnerable to potential health effects from climate change than residents in other parts of the state".

Common wildlife found in the mountains of Colorado include mule deer, southwestern red squirrel, golden-mantled ground squirrel, yellow-bellied marmot, moose, American pika, and red fox, all at exceptionally high numbers, though moose are not native to the state.

Colorado is divided into 22 judicial districts, each of which has a district court and a county court with limited jurisdiction.

Colorado was once considered a swing state, but has become a relatively safe blue state in both state and federal elections.

In presidential politics, Colorado was considered a reliably Republican state during the post-World War II era, voting for the Democratic candidate only in 1948, 1964, and 1992.

Colorado politics has the contrast between conservative cities such as Colorado Springs and Grand Junction and liberal cities such as Boulder and Denver.

Colorado is represented by seven Representatives to the United States House of Representatives:.

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In 1881 Colorado voters approved a referendum that selected Denver as the state capital.

Colorado was the first state in the union to enact, by voter referendum, a law extending suffrage to women.

In 1972 Colorado voters rejected a referendum proposal to fund the 1976 Winter Olympics, which had been scheduled to be held in the state.

In 1992, by a margin of 53 to 47 percent, Colorado voters approved an amendment to the state constitution that would have prevented any city, town, or county in the state from taking any legislative, executive, or judicial action to recognize homosexuals or bisexuals as a protected class.

On May 29, 2019, Governor Jared Polis signed House Bill 1124 immediately prohibiting law enforcement officials in Colorado from holding undocumented immigrants solely based on a request from U S Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

The ten most populous Colorado counties are all located in the Front Range Urban Corridor.

Colorado has 272 active incorporated municipalities, comprising 197 towns, 73 cities, and two consolidated city and county governments.

Colorado municipalities operate under one of five types of municipal governing authority.

Colorado currently has two consolidated city and county governments, 61 home rule cities, 12 statutory cities, 35 home rule towns, 161 statutory towns, and one territorial charter municipality.

Colorado now has 13 municipalities with more than 100, 000 residents, and 17 with fewer than 100 residents.

The 16 most populous Colorado municipalities are all located in the Front Range Urban Corridor.

Colorado has more than 4, 000 special districts, most with property tax authority.

Colorado has a high proportion of Hispanic, mostly Mexican-American, citizens in Metropolitan Denver, Colorado Springs, as well as the smaller cities of Greeley and Pueblo, and elsewhere.

Southern, Southwestern, and Southeastern Colorado has a large number of Hispanos, the descendants of the early settlers of colonial Spanish origin.

The Hispanic population of Colorado has continued to grow quickly over the past decades.

Colorado has some large African-American communities located in Denver, in the neighborhoods of Montbello, Five Points, Whittier, and many other East Denver areas.

Colorado has the 5th-largest population of Mexican-Americans, behind California, Texas, Arizona, and Illinois.

In percentages, Colorado has the 6th-highest percentage of Mexican-Americans, behind New Mexico, California, Texas, Arizona, and Nevada.

In 2017, Colorado recorded the second-lowest fertility rate in the United States outside of New England, after Oregon, at 1.

One Native American language still spoken in Colorado is the Colorado River Numic language known as the Ute dialect.

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Our Lady of Guadalupe Catholic Church was the first permanent Catholic parish in modern-day Colorado and was constructed by Spanish colonists from New Mexico in modern-day Conejos.

Colorado is generally considered among the healthiest states by behavioral and healthcare researchers.

Colorado now has the largest annual production of beer in any state.

Unlike most states, which calculate taxes based on federal adjusted gross income, Colorado taxes are based on taxable income—income after federal exemptions and federal itemized deductions.

Uranium mining in Colorado goes back to 1872, when pitchblende ore was taken from gold mines near Central City, Colorado.

Not counting byproduct uranium from phosphate, Colorado is considered to have the third-largest uranium reserves of any U S state, behind Wyoming and New Mexico.

Some Colorado landmarks have been featured in films, such as The Stanley Hotel in Dumb and Dumber and The Shining and the Sculptured House in Sleeper.

Colorado is known for its Southwest and Rocky Mountain cuisine, with Mexican restaurants found throughout the state.

Colorado wines include award-winning varietals that have attracted favorable notice from outside the state.

Colorado is home to two designated American Viticultural Areas of the Grand Valley AVA and the West Elks AVA, where most of the vineyards in the state are located.

Colorado is home to many nationally praised microbreweries, including New Belgium Brewing Company, Odell Brewing Company, Great Divide Brewing Company, and Bristol Brewing Company.

Colorado has five major professional sports leagues, all based in the Denver metropolitan area.

Colorado is the least populous state with a franchise in each of the major professional sports leagues.

DIA handles by far the largest volume of commercial air traffic in Colorado and is the busiest U S hub airport between Chicago and the Pacific coast, making Denver the most important airport for connecting passenger traffic in the western United States.

From its establishment in 1955 until the construction of appropriate facilities in Colorado Springs was completed and opened in 1958, the Air Force Academy operated out of Lowry Air Force Base in Denver.