DENVER & RIO GRANDE WESTERN ROUTE. 5 
cluded that part of the present State of Colorado which lies east of 
the crest of the Rocky Mountains. The first house in Denver is said 
to have been erected by Gen. Larimer on the banks of Cherry Creek, 
between what are now Blake and Wazee streets. The towns of Mon- 
tana and Auraria soon disappeared or were swallowed up by the more 
rapidly growing “ City of Denver,” as it was known in the early days. 
Denver, though not a mining city, has long been the financial and 
distributing center of an immense mining region, including the Rocky 
Mountains from northern Wyoming to southern New Mexico. It has 
become also a great railroad center, partly because it is a center of 
distribution and partly because most tourists making a trip to the 
Far West desire to pass through or stop in this flourishing city. 
The city has the wonderful health-giving climate of the mountain 
region, and many who have found the humid, heavy atmosphere of 
the East depressing have each year sought and been benefited by the 
dry, exhilarating, and rarefied air of Colorado. 
Denver is now the metropolis of the Rocky Mountain region. It is 
noted for its broad, clean streets, its handsome residences, and: the 
beauty and number of its public parks. Grass and trees are not nat- 
ural to Denver, so the people there take the greatest interest in them 
and are willing to spend time and money freely for a beautiful lawn 
and a growth of trees. Farther east, where such things are abundant, 
they are not prized so highly and are generally neglected, so that 
they do not grow in the perfection that they attain in the semiarid 
region, where irrigation is possible. 
One of the best known of Denver’s parks is the Capitol Grounds 
and Civic Center, shown in part in Plate Il. The Civic Center 
has recently been acquired by the city and made into a beautiful 
park. The largest of Denver’s playgrounds is City Park, which 
contains 320 acres and has been beautified by trees, flowers, lakes, and 
fountains until it is the equal of almost any other artificial park in 
the country. In it is a zoological garden and a museum of natural 
history. Washington Park also is becoming one of the beauty spots 
of the city. Cheesman Park is noted for the magnificent view of the 
mountains which may be had from its pavilion. Here on a clear day 
the traveler may obtain a sweeping view of the great Front Range 
from Longs Peak, 60 miles away on the north, to Pikes Peak, 80 
miles to the southwest. To assist the traveler to recognize the more 
prominent peaks a brass plate, upon which are engraved the names 
of the peaks and the lines of sight pointing toward them, has there 
been set on a pedestal, This diagram, together with a fairly good 
map of the State, enables one to place accurately all the more strik- 
ing mountain features in the vicinity. 
80697 °—22-_2 
