Boulder Trivia: Fun Facts

• Bicycling is so highly regarded in Boulder that sometimes the city plows the Boulder Creek bike path before they plow the streets!
• The exterior of the house located in Boulder was used as the characters' home in the well-known "Mork & Mindy" television show. It is now a private residence.
• Parts of the movie "Sleeper," with Woody Allen, were filmed at the National Center for Atmospheric Research.
• Baseline Road is a significant east-west route to both Boulderites and cartographers, for it marks the 40th parallel on world maps.
• Boulder's Third Flatiron towers 1,400 feet high, a few hundred feet higher than the Empire State Building, and has been climbed by people without using their hands, on roller skates, naked and in eight minutes (by separate climbers).
• A survey by the Centers for Disease Control found that Colorado had fewer overweight people per capita and more people who exercise than any other state.
• Boulder was called the Happiest City in the U.S. by National Geographic and has a repeated rating as the nation's best city for well-being by a Gallup study.

• A Colorado Daily poll found that seven out of 10 Boulderites own bicycles. Another guidebook states that Boulder's bicycle count is approximately 93,000 — almost equal to the total population!
• The Chautauqua Auditorium is an all-wood structure built in 1898. In the evening, when the Colorado Music Festival musicians stop playing, you can often hear the rafters-dwelling owls hooting along with the music.
• The Flatirons Mountains got their name by pioneer women who said they looked like flat, metal irons used to iron their clothes.
• Flagstaff Mountain was named for the flagpole that sits on top of the summit, which was visible when Boulder was first settled, as it was a completely treeless plain.
• Scott Carpenter, a NASA astronaut, grew up in Boulder. There is a city park named after him, with a playground featuring a rocket-shaped climbing structure.
• The University of Colorado at Boulder's buildings are built with red sandstone, quarried in nearby Lyons.

• With Coors and Anheuser-Busch nearby, plus 20 local microbreweries, this area has become the largest beer-producing triangle in the world.
• Robert Redford was a janitor at The Sink, before moving on to become famous!
• Boulder has more used bookstores per capita than any other city in the country.
• Boulder's going to the dogs! Visitor counts to Boulder Mountain Parks found a ratio of 1 dog to every 5 visitors.
• Every year, Boulder Mountain Parks core area receives 1.8 million visits. If that many people made a human chain, it would stretch from Boulder, Colorado, to New York City!

• In the past, Chautauqua Meadow has served as a cattle pasture, golf course, backdrop for the "Mork & Mindy" television show and a ski area with rope tow, all before it was protected as a natural grassland.
• In 1967, Boulder became the first city in the United States to tax itself for funds to be used specifically for the acquisition, management and maintenance of open space.
• The Hotel Boulderado was named by combining Boulder and Colorado so no visitor would ever forget where they had stayed.