Denver, Colorado: The City Built on a Jumped Claim

Denver, Colorado, sits on a town site that another company had already staked out and named St. Charles. The men who took it over in November 1858 renamed it for James W. Denver, governor of Kansas Territory that year, which at the time took in the spot.

St. Charles, the first name on the ground

In September 1858, a group that had split off from a party of gold seekers from Lawrence, Kansas, claimed a square mile at the mouth of Cherry Creek. That’s the story Wilbur Fisk Stone tells in his 1918 History of Colorado. They called the place St. Charles, a name suggested by Charles Nichols, who had lived in St. Charles, Missouri. Stone adds that several members insisted on “Golden City” instead. Hold on to that one, because you’ll see it again west of town, at Golden.

Then the St. Charles men made a mistake. Most of them went back to eastern Kansas for the winter, sure nobody else would show up before spring. People kept coming. Nichols was sent back to hold the claim, and all he managed was to lay four logs on the ground, the frontier sign that a cabin was on the way.

A meeting in McGaa’s cabin

In mid-November a new party rolled in. It included William Larimer Jr. and three men Governor Denver had appointed as officials of Arapahoe County, which Stone says was “nothing more than a name attached to the western end of Kansas.” On the night of November 17, in trader William McGaa’s cabin, they organized the Denver City Town Company on the St. Charles land.

Nichols objected to the “jumping” of his company’s claim. According to Stone, he went quiet when he was threatened with being the guest of honor at a “neck-tie party.” The company’s own minute book, dated November 22, 1858, says the town site was “Called Denver City.” The St. Charles stockholders did get shares in the new company to make up for it.

Why Governor Denver

Stone says the city was named “in honor of Governor Denver, the head of the Kansas Territory administration,” who had played a big part, in Stone’s words, in “inaugurating the movement” that led to the town. Frank Hall’s 1889 history puts it as a “compliment to the then executive head of Kansas Territory.” Henry Gannett’s 1905 place-names list for the U.S. Geological Survey and the federal government’s record agree on James W. Denver.

Who actually proposed the name is another matter. Stone writes that “the identity of the individual who proposed Denver’s name is not known,” and that many writers say it was picked by acclaim. So you can name the man it honors, but if you want the person who first said it out loud, the record comes up empty.

Auraria loses its name

Denver City wasn’t alone. Right across Cherry Creek stood Auraria, the bigger camp that first winter. In April 1860 the two were merged into one town, and Stone says the Denver name “became the most popular” while Auraria “was gradually dropped.”

Hall added one more detail. Writing in 1889, he called the city one of the proudest monuments ever built to any man “on the American continent,” and then noted that Denver, “though still living,” had “honored it with but a single visit, and that many years ago.” For the story of how the state itself got named, see How Colorado Got Its Name.

Sources & further reading

• Wilbur Fisk Stone, ed., History of Colorado, vol. 1 (1918). The St. Charles association, Charles Nichols and the “Golden City” suggestion (pp. 134–135); the Leavenworth and Lecompton parties, Governor Denver’s Arapahoe County officials, the McGaa cabin meeting and the “neck-tie party” threat (pp. 141–142); the minute book, the naming and the unknown proposer (p. 143); the 1860 merger with Auraria (p. 144).
• Frank Hall, History of the State of Colorado, vol. 1 (1889), p. 182. St. Charles “displaced” by Denver “in compliment to the then executive head of Kansas Territory,” and Denver’s single visit.
• Henry Gannett, The Origin of Certain Place Names in the United States (USGS, 1905), p. 104. Named for James W. Denver, “a former governor of Kansas.”
• GNIS feature 201738, Denver (U.S. Geological Survey). The federal record: named after James W. Denver, governor of Kansas Territory in 1858.