When They Were Born - Denver's Big Four

My favorite grandparent was the youngest of the lot, born in 1918. Though the month of her birth was notable simply for the fact she was in it, she was also born in the same month the Allies forced the Germans back behind the Hindenburg Line in World War I. Because of the war, they also started the World Series a month early, and had it wrapped up in six days. Not a bad debut for “Skeet” Hubbard. Over the course of her life, she saw the introduction of commercial television, was one of the first families in her neighborhood to have a car, saw another World War occur just as she became a mother, saw a president assassinated, a man land on the moon, and the invention of the internet, which she quickly assimilated with fervor, and more. Much more. She had dozens of “Where were you when…?” moments over the course of a long and interesting life.

This Summer, my third grandchild will be born, with their eldest cousin not yet three by the time he or she arrives. Someday their grandchildren might sit around and wonder about all of the earth-changing things that occurred during their lifetimes, including and quite prominently featuring the fact that each of them was alive during the season the entire planet ground to a halt.

But before this goes too far down the route of, “when I was a kid, candy was a NICKEL!”, there will also be dozens of other amazing and tragic things that are “Where were you when…?” moments that define the course of their barely-begun lives. But as young as each of them are, I doubt they will be able to describe to their families what these moments were like. How people both came together and fell apart in the midst of a difficult time. Why every sporting event, concert, and general public gathering disappeared. It simply may be difficult for them to describe something they were alive for, but don’t recall. It can be interesting to see the conditions someone is born into. Or something, as the case may be.

When each of the big four teams arrived in Denver, the city was in the midst of a unique point in her history. Here’s what things were like around the Mile High City for the birth of each of them.

In 1960, when the Denver Broncos started play in the AFL, the city’s population was just shy of a half million people. Their housing boom was also starting to slow, with the 60’s producing only a third of the single-home construction the 50’s had wrought. Rocky Flats was only seven years old, and it would take another eight years before it was discovered to be contaminating the ground around it. It was also around the time that Denver’s Victorian architecture was considered too old and ugly to keep, with so much of the style being torn down as to establish a preservation district for most of what remained. The Beat Poet generation landed on Denver hard throughout the 60’s as well, with several famous poets dotting the Denver landscape from most of the decade. The crowd that surrounded them sometimes came into direct conflict with the generation of World War II vets who’d come to live in Denver after having seen it during their training pre- and post-combat.

The Mile High City was a mish-mosh of cultures, ideas, and directions just as their first pro sports team came to set down roots. Somehow that wildly diverse group of people came together to love their AFL squad, who struggled early on to put a winning combination on the field, but won their first game, in Boston against the Patriots. They were also the first professional football team to employ an African-American kicker, in Gene Mingo, their leading scorer that first year. Further into the decade were the first AFL team to beat an NFL team, a preseason friendly against the Detroit Lions. The Broncos were a big part of the league’s history from the moment they arrived, and have found ways to stay relevant since their arrival.

By decade’s end, the Broncos found themselves with a new crosstown rival for people’s discretionary income towards sporting events. A new baby sibling tromped in before the decade closed. The Denver Rockets began ABA play in 1967, with three winning seasons under their belts out of the gates, culminating in Spencer Haywood’s stellar rookie season in 1969-70. That success bred a mostly-decent audience for both Mile High teams, with the Broncos having shown that pro sports could well exist in a town of Denver’s size. The Broncos success helped the ABA make Denver one of the teams in it’s portfolio, and as hoped, Denver embraced the Rockets quickly. Well, quickly-ish.

The team that would be renamed the Nuggets by the mid-70’s walked into a town that had taken a liking to its size for that moment, with less than 3% overall growth in the seven years between the Broncos’ arrival and the Nuggets. Tripping back to Denver’s Beat Poet Scene, the Nuggets first game came about three weeks after Timothy Leary had staged the “Human Be-In” at Denver’s City Park with his dear friends The Grateful Dead. The 5,000-plus who attended the “Be-In” had several in attendance who decided to bathe and dance in the fountain during the show. With all the detail that “bathe” intimates. The show also had probably had more than a few folks who also got to see the Nuggets then open their first ABA season with a narrow five point victory over the Anaheim Amigos. If they didn’t, they sure could have gotten tickets, as that first Rockets home game had less than 2,800 in attendance. Maybe someone was outside bathing in the fountain. I don’t believe McNichols Sports Arena had a fountain at the time.

It took a decade before another sport was born in Denver. Late 1976 saw Jack Vickers purchase and move the two-year old Kansas City Scouts franchise to Denver’s to become the Colorado Rockies. That Denver dalliance lasted a scant six years before the team would move to New Jersey to become the Devils.

And for over a decade, Denver was a two-sport town again.

But in 1993, Major League Baseball came calling in Colorado with one of two expansion squads granted that year. The previous hockey team’s name was so popular and obvious that the MLB squad wisely co-opted it for themselves, and Rockies Baseball was born. Their Opening Day crowd of 80,277 established a MLB record. Denver’s population had also boomed from that 60’s lull, topping two million in the broader metro area the year the Rockies came to town. The Mile High City still had two thriving newspapers, and added a self-focused glossy that year as well, in 5280 Magazine. The Pope visited Denver in 1993 for World Youth Day. The first Chipotle in the nation opened in Denver that year, and fuel was about a buck and a half a gallon. Candy was not a nickel. Oh, and I had my first kid. Who I did not feed nickel candy.

It was a scant two years later when the NHL decided Colorado hockey needed a re-birth, with the move of the long-tenured Quebec Nordiques to Denver to become the Avalanche. You’d think not much would have changed in the two years between the arrivals of the Rox and Avs, but ’95 saw the arrival of a brand-new and more distant airport, the national culmination of the O.J Simpson trial, and the release of the locally-shot film “Things To Do In Denver When You’re Dead”. The city saw a population bump of over 100,000 residents in those 700 days. By the time Denver became a four-sport town, it was a city very very much on the rise. And still is.

Oh, and in their first season, the Avs brought Denver their first Championship. It was also a first for the franchise. Poor Quebec.

That was the flavor of things in Denver when each of the big four came to town. It was a vastly different city in the 35 years between each and every one, let alone the arrivals of the first and the last, but found itself in the midst of some pretty historic moments during each of their arrivals. There’s no doubt each of their seasons will have an asterisk next to it when we see it in the rearview mirror. Here’s to the day each of them gets to write a little bit more of that history as soon as possible. They’re all pretty good at those stories. All five teams mentioned above won their first game. Have a good weekend, Denver.