Colorado Springs, Colorado

Colorado Springs, Colorado, is best known as the "base camp" for sightseers to Pikes Peak, one of the most visited mountains in America. First jump-started by the California Gold Rush, today the city's economy thrives on tourism, high-tech manufacturing, and government spending on nearby military bases.

Landscape

Colorado Springs is located near the center of Colorado, about 68 miles south of Denver. At an elevation of just over 6,000 feet, the city lies on the east side of the Rocky Mountains, with Pikes Peak towering 8,000 feet above the city to the west. Colorado Springs marks the end of the flat prairie lands that stretch from Kansas into Colorado. The total land area of the city is a compact 186 square miles.

The mountains act as a buffer to the jet stream's west-to-east flow of weather-making winds, and Colorado Springs is left with relatively light precipitation for a city at such a high altitude. Annual rainfall is less than 16 inches; snowfall is about 37 inches. The city sees sunshine about two-thirds of the year, and the sunny, dry climate is technically classified as an alpine desert.

Temperatures are more extreme, as is typical with dry desert air. Summertime highs average about 95 degrees Fahrenheit, but drop significantly at nighttime, making for an average July temperature of 71 degrees. Winter lows average 16 degrees, but the area does occasionally receive a shot of warm winter air from northwesterly Chinook (snow-eating) winds. The average January temperature is 29 degrees.

The rugged terrain is well suited to various outdoor sports, including hiking and mountain biking in the warm months, and skiing and snowboarding during the winter. As with most desert environments, the air is largely free of allergens.

People

As of 2022, the estimated population of Colorado Springs stood at 486,248, making it the state's second largest city behind Denver. The ethnic makeup of the city was 66.2 percent White, 18.5 percent Hispanic or Latino (of any race), 6 percent Black or African American, 3.1 percent Asian, and 11.5 percent multiracial.

The people of Colorado Springs tend to appreciate Western traditions, as evidenced by the Pikes Peak or Bust Rodeo held every July, the state's largest outdoor rodeo; but they also have a taste for more whimsical entertainment. The city is home to the Great Fruitcake Toss in January, and the annual hot air balloon show in September that sees more than 100 hot air balloons take to the skies over the city.

With hundreds of churches to only three synagogues, and one mosque, the city's religious community has been fairly homogenous, but since the 1980s, there has been a trend toward evangelical Christianity. Evangelical groups in the city include Andrew Wommack Ministries, Inc., Focus on the Family, Biblica (the International Bible Society), The Navigators, and Young Life. The right-leaning, conservative religious makeup of the city also equates to a strong Republican affiliation among resident voters.

Economy

Traditionally, the economy of Colorado Springs, with the exception of the two-decade-long gold rush, has been based on tourism and, since World War II, the military. According to the Colorado Springs Chamber of Commerce, the aerospace industry brings in more than $7 billion annually as of 2023.

During the 1960s and '70s, manufacturing also began to spring up in the area, much of it centered on computer-related high technology such as semiconductor manufacturing. As of the late 2010s, there were more than four hundred manufacturers in the Colorado Springs–Pikes Peak region. Tech companies in the city include Agilent Technologies, Oracle, Atmel, and Sanmina. The manufacturing sector also produces electronics, mechanical devices, textiles, metal products, industrial equipment, plastics, and printed items.

The selection of Colorado Springs for the US Olympic Committee's national headquarters and an Olympic Training Center encouraged fifty-eight other nonprofit and amateur sporting organizations establish themselves in the city.

Farms and grazing lands are found to the east of the city, but agriculture makes up a very small portion of the city's economy. On the other hand, education makes a large contribution, as the city is home to Colorado College and the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs (UCCS), in addition to the US Air Force Academy.

By early 2023, the largest employers in Colorado Springs were in government; professional and business services; trade, transportation, and utilities; education and health services; and leisure and hospitality.

Landmarks

Pikes Peak, the landmark which Colorado Springs was founded to celebrate, is the first large Rocky Mountain peak visible when traveling from the east. The summit can be reached by rail, road or by hiking up Barr Trail, which was completed in the early 1900s after seven years of work. The peak also hosts two annual races that draw large crowds: the Race to the Clouds auto race held on Independence Day, and the Pikes Peak Marathon, a 28-mile footrace to the summit. The other major natural attraction in the area is the Garden of the Gods, a park that features huge red sandstone formations.

The Broadmoor in Colorado Springs started out as a casino in 1981. In 1918 it was turned into a hotel and remains the quintessential huge mountain resort, surrounded by three golf courses with the Rockies as a backdrop. The hotel is one of the many projects of Spencer Penrose, a Colorado Springs resident who made a fortune in gold and copper mining. Penrose is also responsible for the Pikes Peak Highway and the Cheyenne Zoo.

The zoo, built in 1926, has the distinction of being at the highest elevation of any zoo in the United States. It is home to the Will Rogers Shrine, a 114-foot high granite monument to the humorist and philosopher, commonly used as a viewing point for Pikes Peak.

Old Colorado City, founded in 1859, predates Colorado Springs. But the town fell out of favor as the gold rush waned, and it eventually became part of Colorado Springs. Now a historic district, the site is essentially a street mall with 100-year-old buildings full of modern shops and restaurants.

The US Olympic Center conducts tours year-round of its display training facilities and Olympic memorabilia. The Pro Rodeo Hall of Fame bills itself as the Museum of the American Cowboy, for whom "the rodeo is simply a way of life."

History

While Arapahoe, Cheyenne, and Ute Native Americans once lived in the area around Colorado Springs, the history of the city is firmly tied to the lure of gold. Prospectors first discovered the shiny metal in the South Park area of Colorado in 1859. From the east, gold diggers swarmed the area, aiming for "Pikes Peak or bust" in order to traverse the Ute pass on the way to the site where gold was found. (Pikes Peak itself was named for Zebulon Pike, who first explored the area in 1806.)

Once the railroad arrived in the area, a former Civil War general, William Jackson Palmer, visited the Pikes Peak area in 1871 and decided to found a resort community. He was successful in drawing many visitors, particularly wealthy English tourists, to see the grandeur of the mountains. In the 1890s, however, gold was discovered in nearby Cripple Creek and the town was quickly transformed into a booming supply station for miners. Although only one in ten prospectors that made it as far as Colorado ever found gold, they often settled in cities such as Colorado Springs. The gold rush continued into the early 1900s before subsiding, allowing the city to return to its heritage as a resort destination.

In a fortuitous decision for the city's economy, Colorado Springs officials sold a large tract of land to the US military during World War II. The land was used to establish Fort Carson. Following the war, the military pumped millions of dollars into the local economy as it established Peterson Air Force Base, Falcon Air Force Base (renamed Schriever Air Force Base in 1998), Cheyenne Mountain Air Force Base and the US Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs. Cheyenne Mountain also houses the headquarters for the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD).

Many of the city's landmarks can be tied to Spencer Penrose. In addition to a hotel and zoo, the mining magnate established the El Pomar Foundation, which received a landfall with the sale of the Broadmoor Hotel in 1988. The foundation has supported many nonprofit groups, resulting in the abundance of amateur athletics in the area and the plethora of religious groups, such as Focus on the Family, which El Pomar brought to Colorado Springs with a $4 million grant in 1988. The foundation has since provided funds to build the World Arena, a community concert and hockey venue.

The Great Recession of 2007–9 gutted municipal coffers. After tax-aversive residents voted down a proposed tax increase in 2009, Colorado Springs cut services drastically, making it a model for many similarly strapped communities throughout the country. Volunteerism helped fill in some of the gaps, and by 2011, services like street lights and garbage removal were reinstated.

In 2012, the Waldo Canyon fire wrecked more than three hundred houses in the Colorado Springs area and killed two.

Colorado Springs received the moniker Olympic City USA in 2016, and two years later, the US Olympic Museum and Hall of Fame opened there.

Trivia

• Katharine Lee Bates wrote the lyrics to "America the Beautiful" after visiting the top of Pikes Peak in 1893.
• Due to Colorado Springs elevation, oxygen is at two-thirds the amount found at sea level. The low density of the air also allows a golf ball hit in Colorado Springs to travel 15 percent farther than one hit at sea level.
• Racecar driver Bobby Unser, born in Colorado Springs in 1934, won the annual auto race up Pikes Peak thirteen times.
• NORAD's facilities inside Cheyenne Mountain are supported on 1,319 springs in order to lessen the shock of any attack against the mountain.
• Scott Stratton became a millionaire after finding gold at nearby Cripple Creek in the 1800s. At his death, thirteen women came forward claiming to be his widow.
• Pikes Peak was originally named "Pike's Peak"—the apostrophe was dropped in 1891 by the US Board on Geographic Names, which recommended against the use of the possessive in place names. Nearly 100 years later, the state legislature passed a law in favor of the new spelling.

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