Durango offers the best of the best. Outdoor recreation, shopping, dining, and of course history! Check out some more fun facts about over favorite town:
- Jack Dempsey fought Andy Malloy on October 7, 1915 at the Jarvis Suites Hotel. Dempsey, born in southern Colorado, became the heavy weight boxing champion in 1919.
- The Iron Horse Bicycle Classic began in 1972, and is the longest continuously run cycling event in the U.S. Road bikers race the Durango-Silverton Train to Silverton over Memorial Day weekend.
- Fort Lewis College was originally an Indian School, located on the Ute Reservation.
- Many of the buildings in historic downtown Durango were constructed with stone and brick due to a city ordinance enacted after a fire in 1889, which damaged several blocks along Main Avenue.
- Durango’s newspaper, the Durango Herald, was originally called the Durango Democrat in the 1880s.
- The honeybees at Honeyville live for 6 weeks and work 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. They can also fly at speeds as fast as 14 mph.
- The Diamond Belle Saloon at the Strater Hotel opened its doors in 1957 and has a bullet hole in the far east drawer behind the bar.
- The headquarters of the Southern Ute Indian Tribe is located in Ignacio, located 25 miles southeast of Durango.
- The water of Trimble Hot Springs contains the following minerals: zinc, sulfate, sodium, potassium, phosphate, nitrogen, manganese, magnesium, lithium, iron, fluoride, chloride, calcium and boron.
- Durango is the hometown of the original Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory
- Several well known movies were made in Durango, including Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, City Slickers, Cliffhanger, National Lampoon’s Vacation, Night Passage, Ticket to Tomahawk, Around the World in Eighty Days, How the West Was Won, and Tracker.