Larimer County is a

county A county is a geographic region of a country used for administrative or other purposes Chambers Dictionary, L. Brookes (ed.), 2005, Chambers Harrap Publishers Ltd, Edinburgh in certain modern nations. The term is derived from the Old French ...

located in the

U.S. state In the United States, a state is a constituent political entity, of which there are 50. Bound together in a political union, each state holds governmental jurisdiction over a separate and defined geographic territory where it shares its sove ...

Colorado Colorado (, other variants) is a state in the Mountain states, Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It encompasses most of the Southern Rocky Mountains, as well as the northeastern portion of the Colorado Plateau and the wes ...

. As of the 2020 census, the population was 359,066. The

county seat A county seat is an administrative center, seat of government, or capital city of a county or civil parish. The term is in use in Canada, China, Hungary, Romania, Taiwan, and the United States. The equivalent term shire town is used in the US ...

and most populous city is

Fort Collins A fortification is a military construction or building designed for the defense of territories in warfare, and is also used to establish rule in a region during peacetime. The term is derived from Latin ''fortis'' ("strong") and ''facer ...

. The county was named for

William Larimer, Jr. William Larimer Jr. (October 24, 1809 – May 16, 1875) was a Kansas state senator, American settler, and land developer who is best known as the founder of Denver, Colorado, in 1858. Larimer often went by "General Larimer", having acquired the ...

, the founder of

Denver Denver () is a consolidated city and county, the capital, and most populous city of the U.S. state of Colorado. Its population was 715,522 at the 2020 census, a 19.22% increase since 2010. It is the 19th-most populous city in the United ...

. Larimer County comprises the Fort Collins, CO

Metropolitan Statistical Area In the United States, a metropolitan statistical area (MSA) is a geographical region with a relatively high population density at its core and close economic ties throughout the area. Such regions are neither legally Incorporated town, incorporate ...

. The county is located at the northern end of the

Front Range The Front Range is a mountain range of the Southern Rocky Mountains of North America located in the central portion of the U.S. State of Colorado, and southeastern portion of the U.S. State of Wyoming. It is the first mountain range encountere ...

, at the edge of the

Colorado Eastern Plains The Eastern Plains of Colorado refers to a region of the U.S. state of Colorado east of the Rocky Mountains and east of the population centers of the Front Range. Geography The Eastern Plains are part of the High Plains, which are the wester ...

along the border with

Wyoming Wyoming () is a state in the Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It is bordered by Montana to the north and northwest, South Dakota and Nebraska to the east, Idaho to the west, Utah to the southwest, and Colorado to the sou ...

History

Larimer County was created in 1861, and was named after General William Larimer. Unlike that of much of Colorado, which was founded on the

mining Mining is the extraction of valuable minerals or other geological materials from the Earth, usually from an ore body, lode, vein, seam, reef, or placer deposit. The exploitation of these deposits for raw material is based on the economic ...

gold Gold is a chemical element with the symbol Au (from la, aurum) and atomic number 79. This makes it one of the higher atomic number elements that occur naturally. It is a bright, slightly orange-yellow, dense, soft, malleable, and ductile ...

and

silver Silver is a chemical element with the Symbol (chemistry), symbol Ag (from the Latin ', derived from the Proto-Indo-European wikt:Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-European/h₂erǵ-, ''h₂erǵ'': "shiny" or "white") and atomic number 47. A soft, whi ...

, the settlement of Larimer County was based almost entirely on

agriculture Agriculture or farming is the practice of cultivating plants and livestock. Agriculture was the key development in the rise of sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of domesticated species created food surpluses that enabled peop ...

, an industry that few thought possible in the region during the initial days of the

Colorado Gold Rush The Pike's Peak Gold Rush (later known as the Colorado Gold Rush) was the boom in gold prospecting and mining in the Pike's Peak Country of western Kansas Territory and southwestern Nebraska Territory of the United States that began in July 1858 ...

. The mining boom almost entirely passed the county by. It would take the introduction of

irrigation Irrigation (also referred to as watering) is the practice of applying controlled amounts of water to land to help grow crops, landscape plants, and lawns. Irrigation has been a key aspect of agriculture for over 5,000 years and has been dev ...

to the region in the 1860s to bring the first widespread settlement to the area.

Early history

At the time of the arrival of Europeans in the early 19th century, the present-day county was occupied by Native Americans, with the Utes occupying the mountainous areas and the

Cheyenne The Cheyenne ( ) are an Indigenous people of the Great Plains. Their Cheyenne language belongs to the Algonquian languages, Algonquian language family. Today, the Cheyenne people are split into two federally recognized tribe, federally recognize ...

and

Arapaho The Arapaho (; french: Arapahos, ) are a Native American people historically living on the plains of Colorado and Wyoming. They were close allies of the Cheyenne tribe and loosely aligned with the Lakota and Dakota. By the 1850s, Arapaho ...

living on the

piedmont it, Piemontese , population_note = , population_blank1_title = , population_blank1 = , demographics_type1 = , demographics1_footnotes = , demographics1_title1 = , demographics1_info1 = , demographics1_title2 ...

areas along the base of the foothills. French

fur trappers The fur trade is a worldwide industry dealing in the acquisition and sale of animal fur. Since the establishment of a world fur market in the early modern period, furs of boreal, polar and cold temperate mammalian animals have been the mo ...

infiltrated the area in the early decades of the 19th century, soon after the area became part of the United States with the

Louisiana Purchase The Louisiana Purchase (french: Vente de la Louisiane, translation=Sale of Louisiana) was the acquisition of the territory of Louisiana by the United States from the French First Republic in 1803. In return for fifteen million dollars, or app ...

and was organized as part of the

Missouri Territory The Territory of Missouri was an organized incorporated territory of the United States that existed from June 4, 1812, until August 10, 1821. In 1819, the Territory of Arkansas was created from a portion of its southern area. In 1821, a southe ...

. In 1828 William H. Ashley ascended the

Cache la Poudre River The Cache la Poudre River ( ), also known as the Poudre River, is a river in the state of Colorado in the United States. Name The name of the river () is a corruption of the original Cache à la Poudre, or " cache of powder". It refers to ...

on his way to the Green River in present-day

Utah Utah ( , ) is a state in the Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. Utah is a landlocked U.S. state bordered to its east by Colorado, to its northeast by Wyoming, to its north by Idaho, to its south by Arizona, and to its ...

. The river itself received its name in the middle 1830s from an obscure incident in which French-speaking trappers hid

gunpowder Gunpowder, also commonly known as black powder to distinguish it from modern smokeless powder, is the earliest known chemical explosive. It consists of a mixture of sulfur, carbon (in the form of charcoal) and potassium nitrate ( saltpeter) ...

along its banks, somewhere near present-day Laporte or Bellvue. In 1848 a group of

Cherokee The Cherokee (; chr, ᎠᏂᏴᏫᏯᎢ, translit=Aniyvwiyaʔi or Anigiduwagi, or chr, ᏣᎳᎩ, links=no, translit=Tsalagi) are one of the indigenous peoples of the Southeastern Woodlands of the United States. Prior to the 18th century, th ...

crossed through the county following the North Fork of the Poudre to the

Laramie Plains The Laramie Plains is an arid highland at an elevation of approx. in south central Wyoming in the United States. The plains extend along the upper basin of the Laramie River on the east side of the Medicine Bow Range. The city of Laramie is the ...

on their way to

California California is a state in the Western United States, located along the Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the most populous U.S. state and the 3rd largest by area. It is also the ...

along a route that became known as the

Cherokee Trail The Cherokee Trail was a historic overland trail through the present-day U.S. states of Oklahoma, Kansas, Colorado, and Wyoming that was used from the late 1840s up through the early 1890s. The route was established in 1849 by a wagon train h ...

. The area of county was officially opened to white settlement following negotiations with the Cheyenne and Arapaho in the 1858 Treaty of Fort Laramie, by which time the area was part of the

Nebraska Territory The Territory of Nebraska was an organized incorporated territory of the United States that existed from May 30, 1854, until March 1, 1867, when the final extent of the territory was admitted to the Union as the State of Nebraska. The Nebras ...

. The first U.S. settlers arrived that same year in a party led by

Antoine Janis Antoine Janis (March 26, 1824–1890) was a 19th-century French-American fur trader and the first white homesteader in Larimer County, Colorado, in the United States. The first recorded permanent white settler in northern Colorado, he founded ...

from

Fort Laramie Fort Laramie (founded as Fort William and known for a while as Fort John) was a significant 19th-century trading-post, diplomatic site, and military installation located at the confluence of the Laramie and the North Platte rivers. They joined ...

. Janis, who had visited the area near Bellvue in 1844 and proclaimed it "the most beautiful place on earth", returned to file his official claim and helped found the first U.S. settlement in present-day Colorado, called Colona, just west of Laporte. Nearly simultaneously,

Mariano Medina Mariano Medina Isabel (8 July 1922, in Toledo – 28 December 1994, in Madrid) was a Spanish meteorologist and weather presenter. He was the first television weatherman in Spain appearing since the early broadcasts of Televisión Española ...

established Fort Namaqua along the

Big Thompson River The Big Thompson River is a tributary of the South Platte River, approximately 78 miles (123 km) long, in the U.S. state of Colorado. Originating in Forest Canyon in Rocky Mountain National Park, the river flows into Lake Estes in the tow ...

just west of present-day Loveland. The first irrigation canals were established along the Poudre in the 1860s. In 1862 the settlement established by Janis became a

stagecoach A stagecoach is a four-wheeled public transport coach used to carry paying passengers and light packages on journeys long enough to need a change of horses. It is strongly sprung and generally drawn by four horses although some versions are draw ...

stop along the

Overland Stage Route The Overland Trail (also known as the Overland Stage Line) was a stagecoach and wagon trail in the American West during the 19th century. While portions of the route had been used by explorers and trappers since the 1820s, the Overland Trail ...

which was established because of threats of attacks from Native Americans on the northern trails in Wyoming. In 1861, Laporte was designated as the first county seat after the organization of the

Colorado Territory The Territory of Colorado was an organized incorporated territory of the United States that existed from February 28, 1861, until August 1, 1876, when it was admitted to the Union as the State of Colorado. The territory was organized in the ...

. In 1862, the

United States Army The United States Army (USA) is the land warfare, land military branch, service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the eight Uniformed services of the United States, U.S. uniformed services, and is designated as the Army o ...

established an outpost near Laporte that was designated as

Camp Collins Camp Collins (also known as the Fort Collins Military Reservation) was a 19th-century outpost of the United States Army in the Colorado Territory. The fort was commissioned in the summer of 1862 to protect the Overland Trail from attacks by Native ...

. A devastating flood in June 1864 wiped out the outpost, forcing the Army to seek a better location. At the urging of Joseph Mason, who had settled along the Poudre in 1860, the Army relocated its post downstream adjacent to Mason's land along the Overland stage route. The site of the new post became the nucleus of the town of

, incorporated in 1873 after the withdrawal of the Army. By that time, Mason and others had convinced the Colorado Territorial Legislature to designate the new town as the county seat. In 1870, the legislature designated Fort Collins as the location of the state agricultural college (later Colorado State University), although the institution would exist only on paper for another 9 years while local residents sought money to construct the first campus buildings. In 1873, Robert A. Cameron and other members of the Greeley Colony established the Fort Collins Agricultural Colony, which greatly expanded the

grid plan In urban planning, the grid plan, grid street plan, or gridiron plan is a type of city plan in which streets run at right angles to each other, forming a grid. Two inherent characteristics of the grid plan, frequent intersections and orthogo ...

and population of Fort Collins.

Railroads

One of the primary goals of the early citizens of the county was the courting of

railroad Rail transport (also known as train transport) is a means of transport that transfers passengers and goods on wheeled vehicles running on rails, which are incorporated in tracks. In contrast to road transport, where the vehicles run on a pre ...

s. County residents were disappointed when the Denver Pacific Railroad bypassed the county in 1870 in favor of Greeley. The first railroad finally arrived in the county in 1877 when the

Colorado Central Railroad The Colorado Central Railroad was a U.S. railroad company that operated in Colorado and southeastern Wyoming in the late 19th century. It was founded in the Colorado Territory in the wake of the Colorado Gold Rush to ship gold from the mountai ...

extended a line north from Golden via

Longmont The City of Longmont is a home rule municipality located in Boulder and Weld counties, Colorado, United States. Longmont is located northeast of the county seat of Boulder and north-northwest of the Colorado State Capitol in Denver. Longmont' ...

. The town council of Fort Collins designated

right-of-way Right of way is the legal right, established by grant from a landowner or long usage (i.e. by prescription), to pass along a specific route through property belonging to another. A similar ''right of access'' also exists on land held by a gov ...

through the center of town (and through the campus of the unbuilt college) for the line, creating a contentious issue to this day. Along the new railroad sprung up the new

plat In the United States, a plat ( or ) (plan) is a cadastral map, drawn to scale, showing the divisions of a piece of land. United States General Land Office surveyors drafted township plats of Public Lands Surveys to show the distance and bea ...

ted towns of Loveland and Berthoud, named respectively after the

president President most commonly refers to: *President (corporate title) * President (education), a leader of a college or university *President (government title) President may also refer to: Automobiles * Nissan President, a 1966–2010 Japanese f ...

and chief surveyor of the Colorado Central. Likewise,

Wellington Wellington ( mi, Te Whanganui-a-Tara or ) is the capital city of New Zealand. It is located at the south-western tip of the North Island, between Cook Strait and the Remutaka Range. Wellington is the second-largest city in New Zealand by m ...

(founded in 1903) was named for a railroad employee. The Greeley, Salt Lake, and Pacific Railroad arrived three years later as a subsidiary of the

Union Pacific Railroad The Union Pacific Railroad , legally Union Pacific Railroad Company and often called simply Union Pacific, is a freight-hauling railroad that operates 8,300 locomotives over routes in 23 U.S. states west of Chicago and New Orleans. Union Pac ...

, with the intention of creating a transcontinental line over Cameron Pass. Although the line was never extended over the mountains, it opened up the quarrying of stone for the railroad at

Stout Stout is a dark, top-fermented beer with a number of variations, including dry stout, oatmeal stout, milk stout, and imperial stout. The first known use of the word ''stout'' for beer, in a document dated 1677 found in the Egerton Manuscri ...

, furnishing another industry for the region. The brief attempt at the mining of gold in the region centered at the now

ghost town Ghost Town(s) or Ghosttown may refer to: * Ghost town, a town that has been abandoned Film and television * ''Ghost Town'' (1936 film), an American Western film by Harry L. Fraser * ''Ghost Town'' (1956 film), an American Western film by All ...

Manhattan Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five Boroughs of New York City, boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the List of co ...

in the

Poudre Canyon The Poudre Canyon is a narrow verdant canyon, approximately 40 mi (64 km) long, on the upper Cache la Poudre River (called the "Poudre" for short, which locals pronounce as "Pooder") in Larimer County, Colorado in the United States. The ...

Agriculture

The early growth of agriculture, which depended highly on direct river irrigation, experienced a second boom in 1902 with the introduction of the cultivation of

sugar beet A sugar beet is a plant whose root contains a high concentration of sucrose and which is grown commercially for sugar production. In plant breeding, it is known as the Altissima cultivar group of the common beet ('' Beta vulgaris''). Together ...

s, accompanied by the construction of the large processing plant of the Great Western Sugar Co. in Loveland. In the following decade, the sugar beet industry brought large numbers of German emigrants from the Russian Empire to the county. The neighborhoods of Fort Collins northeast of the Poudre were constructed largely to house these new families. A significant increase in the agricultural productivity of the region came in the 1930s with the construction of the Colorado Big Thompson Project following the Great Depression, sort of a third boom for the agricultural industry around Fort Collins. This project collected and captured Western Slope water, and carried it over to the

counties of

Boulder In geology, a boulder (or rarely bowlder) is a rock fragment with size greater than in diameter. Smaller pieces are called cobbles and pebbles. While a boulder may be small enough to move or roll manually, others are extremely massive. In ...

, Larimer, and Weld, along with extensive water storage and distribution system, which significantly extended the irrigable growing season and brought substantial additional land under irrigation for the first time.

Geography

According to the

U.S. Census Bureau The United States Census Bureau (USCB), officially the Bureau of the Census, is a principal agency of the U.S. Federal Statistical System, responsible for producing data about the American people and economy. The Census Bureau is part of the ...

, the county has a total area of , of which is land and (1.4%) is water.

Adjacent counties

Laramie County, Wyoming Laramie County is a county located at the southeast corner of the state of Wyoming. As of the 2020 United States Census, the population was 100,512 or 17.4% of the state's total 2020 population, making it the most populous county in Wyoming, ...

—northeast *

Weld County Weld County is a county located in the U.S. state of Colorado. As of the 2020 census, the population was 328,981. The county seat is Greeley. Weld County comprises the Greeley, CO Metropolitan Statistical Area, which is included in the Denver ...

—east *

Boulder County Boulder County is a county located in the U.S. state of Colorado of the United States. As of the 2020 census, the population was 330,758. The most populous municipality in the county and the county seat is Boulder. Boulder County comprises th ...

—south * Grand County—southwest * Jackson County—west *

Albany County, Wyoming Albany County ( ) is a county in the U.S. state of Wyoming. As of the 2020 United States Census, the population was 37,066. Its county seat is Laramie, the site of the University of Wyoming. Its south border lies on the northern Colorado stat ...

—northwest

Major highways

Interstate 25 Interstate 25 (I-25) is a major Interstate Highway in the western United States. It is primarily a north–south highway, serving as the main route through New Mexico, Colorado, and Wyoming. I-25 stretches from I-10 at Las Cruces, New Mex ...

U.S. Highway 34 U.S. Route 34 (US 34) is an east–west United States highway that runs for from north-central Colorado to the western suburbs of Chicago. Through Rocky Mountain National Park it is known as the Trail Ridge Road where it reaches elevation , ...

U.S. Highway 36 * US 87

U.S. Highway 87 * US 287

U.S. Highway 287 * Colorado 1

State Highway 1 The following highways are numbered 1. For roads numbered A1, see list of A1 roads. For roads numbered B1, see list of B1 roads. For roads numbered M1, see List of M1 roads. For roads numbered N1, see list of N1 roads. For roads numbered S ...

State Highway 7 * Colorado 14

State Highway 14 * Colorado 56

State Highway 56 * Colorado 60

State Highway 60 * Colorado 66

State Highway 66 * Colorado 392

State Highway 392 * Colorado 402

State Highway 402

National protected areas

* Cache La Poudre Wilderness * Comanche Peak Wilderness * Neota Wilderness * Rawah Wilderness *

Rocky Mountain National Park Rocky Mountain National Park is an American national park located approximately northwest of Denver in north-central Colorado, within the Front Range of the Rocky Mountains. The park is situated between the towns of Estes Park to the east and ...

Roosevelt National Forest The Roosevelt National Forest is a National Forest located in north central Colorado. It is contiguous with the Colorado State Forest as well as the Arapaho National Forest and the Routt National Forest. The forest is administered jointly with ...

State protected areas

* Boyd Lake State Park * Lory State Park

Demographics

As of the

census A census is the procedure of systematically acquiring, recording and calculating information about the members of a given population. This term is used mostly in connection with national population and housing censuses; other common censuses in ...

of 2000, there were 251,494 people, 97,164 households, and 63,156 families residing in the county. The

population density Population density (in agriculture: Stock (disambiguation), standing stock or plant density) is a measurement of population per unit land area. It is mostly applied to humans, but sometimes to other living organisms too. It is a key geographical ...

was 97 people per square mile (37/km²). There were 105,392 housing units at an average density of 40 per square mile (16/km²). The racial makeup of the county was 91.44%

White White is the lightness, lightest color and is achromatic (having no hue). It is the color of objects such as snow, chalk, and milk, and is the opposite of black. White objects fully diffuse reflection, reflect and scattering, scatter all the ...

, 0.66%

Black Black is a color which results from the absence or complete absorption of visible light. It is an achromatic color, without hue, like white and grey. It is often used symbolically or figuratively to represent darkness. Black and white ha ...

African American African Americans (also referred to as Black Americans and Afro-Americans) are an Race and ethnicity in the United States, ethnic group consisting of Americans with partial or total ancestry from sub-Saharan Africa. The term "African American ...

, 0.66% Native American, 1.56% Asian, 0.08%

Pacific Islander Pacific Islanders, Pasifika, Pasefika, or rarely Pacificers are the peoples of the Pacific Islands. As an ethnic/racial term, it is used to describe the original peoples—inhabitants and diasporas—of any of the three major subregions of Ocea ...

, 3.41% from other races, and 2.19% from two or more races. 8.27% of the population were

Hispanic The term ''Hispanic'' ( es, hispano) refers to people, cultures, or countries related to Spain, the Spanish language, or Hispanidad. The term commonly applies to countries with a cultural and historical link to Spain and to viceroyalties for ...

or Latino of any race. There were 97,164 households, out of which 31.70% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 53.60% were

married couples Marriage, also called matrimony or wedlock, is a culturally and often legally recognized union between people called spouses. It establishes rights and obligations between them, as well as between them and their children, and between t ...

living together, 7.90% had a female householder with no husband present, and 35.00% were non-families. Of all households 23.40% were made up of individuals, and 6.30% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.52 and the average family size was 2.99. In the county, the population was spread out, with 23.80% under the age of 18, 14.20% from 18 to 24, 30.70% from 25 to 44, 21.80% from 45 to 64, and 9.60% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 33 years. For every 100 females there were 99.90 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 98.20 males. The median income for a household in the county was $48,655, and the median income for a family was $58,866. Males had a median income of $40,829 versus $27,859 for females. The

per capita income Per capita income (PCI) or total income measures the average income earned per person in a given area (city, region, country, etc.) in a specified year. It is calculated by dividing the area's total income by its total population. Per capita i ...

for the county was $23,689. About 4.30% of families and 9.20% of the population were below the

poverty line The poverty threshold, poverty limit, poverty line or breadline is the minimum level of income deemed adequate in a particular country. The poverty line is usually calculated by estimating the total cost of one year's worth of necessities for ...

, including 6.80% of those under age 18 and 4.40% of those age 65 or over.

Communities

Cities

* Loveland

Towns

* Berthoud (partially in Larimer and partially in Weld county) * Estes Park * Johnstown (partially in Larimer and partially in Weld county) * Timnath *

* Windsor (partially in Larimer and partially in Weld County)

Census-designated places

* LaPorte * Red Feather Lakes

Unincorporated communities

* Bellvue * Buckeye * Campion *

Cherokee Park Cherokee Park is a municipal park located in Louisville, Kentucky, United States and is part of the Louisville Olmsted Parks Conservancy. It was designed in 1891 by Frederick Law Olmsted, the father of landscape architecture along with 18 of ...

Drake Drake may refer to: Animals * A male duck People and fictional characters * Drake (surname), a list of people and fictional characters with the family name * Drake (given name), a list of people and fictional characters with the given name ...

* Glendevey * Glen Haven * Livermore * Kinikinik * Masonville *

Norfolk Norfolk () is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in East Anglia in England. It borders Lincolnshire to the north-west, Cambridgeshire to the west and south-west, and Suffolk to the south. Its northern and eastern boundaries are the Nort ...

* Pinewood Springs * Pingree Park * Poudre Park * Rustic * Waverly

Ghost towns

* Old Roach *

Virginia Dale Virginia Dale (born Virginia Paxton; July 1, 1917 – October 3, 1994) was an American actress and dancer. Biography Dale was born in North Carolina. She was the daughter of Lula Helms Paxton, and she graduated from Central High School in Ch ...

Politics

Larimer was long a Republican stronghold. Between 1920 and 2004, the only Democratic presidential candidate to win a majority of votes in the county was Lyndon Johnson in 1964. However, increasing urbanization, as well as the influence of Colorado State University, caused the Republican margins to decline steadily in the 1990s and early 2000s. In 2008,

Barack Obama Barack Hussein Obama II ( ; born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who served as the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, Obama was the first Af ...

became the first Democrat to carry the county with the majority of the vote since 1964, and in so doing recorded the best performance by a Democrat since the days of

Woodrow Wilson Thomas Woodrow Wilson (December 28, 1856February 3, 1924) was an American politician and academic who served as the 28th president of the United States from 1913 to 1921. A member of the Democratic Party, Wilson served as the president of P ...

and

William Jennings Bryan William Jennings Bryan (March 19, 1860 – July 26, 1925) was an American lawyer, orator and politician. Beginning in 1896, he emerged as a dominant force in the Democratic Party, running three times as the party's nominee for President ...

. In 2020, Joe Biden's margin of victory was even greater. Larimer County is a

bellwether county Election bellwether counties in the United States are counties that vote in alignment with the country as a whole in United States presidential elections, so that the county votes for the candidate who ultimately wins the election. The strongest ...

; as of the

2020 election This national electoral calendar for 2020 lists the national/federal elections held in 2020 in all sovereign states and their dependent territories. By-elections are excluded, though national referendums are included. January *5 January: **Cro ...

, it has voted for the statewide winner in every election since

1948 Events January * January 1 ** The General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) is inaugurated. ** The Constitution of New Jersey (later subject to amendment) goes into effect. ** The railways of Britain are nationalized, to form British ...

, when

Harry Truman Harry S. Truman (May 8, 1884December 26, 1972) was the 33rd president of the United States, serving from 1945 to 1953. A leader of the Democratic Party, he previously served as the 34th vice president from January to April 1945 under Frankli ...

carried Colorado without it.

Education

* Park R3 ( Estes Park)Park R3
/ref> * Poudre R1 (

& Surrounding Area) * Thompson R2-J ( Berthoud & Loveland) Fort Collins is home to Colorado State University.

Recreation

Prehistoric site

* Lindenmeier Site

National trails

Continental Divide National Scenic Trail The Continental Divide National Scenic Trail (in short Continental Divide Trail (CDT)) is a United States National Scenic Trail with a length measured by the Continental Divide Trail Coalition of between the U.S. border with Chihuahua, Mexico a ...

* Greyrock Mountain National Recreation Trail * Mount McConnel National Recreation Trail *

Round Mountain National Recreation Trail Round Mountain National Recreation Trail is a hiking trail in Roosevelt National Forest west of Loveland, Colorado. The trail was designated a National Recreation Trail The National Trails System is a series of trails in the United Stat ...

Bicycle route

Great Parks Bicycle Route The Great Parks Bicycle Route is a two-part bicycle touring route developed and mapped by Adventure Cycling Association. Great Parks North runs 751.5 miles (1209.4 km) from Jasper, Alberta, Canada, to Missoula, Montana, U.S. Great Parks South exten ...

* Poudre River Trail * Spring Creek Trail * Mason Trail * Fossil Creek Trail *

Cathy Fromme Prairie Natural Area ''Cathy'' is an American gag-a-day comic strip, drawn by Cathy Guisewite from 1976 until 2010. The comic follows Cathy, a woman who struggles through the "four basic guilt groups" of life—food, love, family, and work. The strip gently pokes f ...

* Power Trail * Loveland's Recreation Trail

Scenic byways

* Cache La Poudre-North Park Scenic and Historic Byway * Peak to Peak Scenic and Historic Byway * Trail Ridge Road/Beaver Meadow National Scenic Byway

Other features and attractions

* Horsetooth Mountain * Big Thompson Canyon * Medicine Bow Mountains *

Notes

References

External links

*
Rocky Mountain National Park website

Colorado Historical Society

Community website for Larimer County specifically Fort Collins and the surrounding areas.
{{authority control 1861 establishments in Colorado Territory Colorado counties Populated places established in 1861