Growing up in Denver really made me appreciate the Midwest

I grew up in California and currently live in Denver. Its the Midwest and no offense intended.

rdoner? The R doner who attended UCCS?

People can differ, but I think the American West begins in a longitudinal line about 30-40 miles west of the Missouri River. The climate (including conspicuously rainfall or lack thereof,) drives the culture. I recall visiting Valley, Nebraska, years ago - 30 miles from Omaha, and pondered why a big irrigation equipment business decided to locate there. It makes sense - close enough to a center of manufacture and rail service (Omaha), but on the edge of where there customers were located - hundreds of miles to the west. One way to describe it, although incompletely, is the difference between a farming culture (the Midwest - I was raised in Illinois) and a ranching culture - the Great Plains and points west. The spaces between towns become vast to the west of this line, and people tend to reflect a culture of self-reliance, albeit debatable given the Federal Government's role in Western economies.

Denver is a large metropolitan area with a culture all of its own - actually quite distant from other large metropolitan areas - a competitive advantage for Denver in one sense - but also a difficult culture to encapsulate in summary form. Denver has always had its aristocracy -I think outside of Denver - yes, that means away from Boulder, too, you encounter the West and its Great Plains culture.

Again, there is always room for argument, but I recall running on the rural roads in western Douglas County, Nebraska, with a very good runner who through transfer had the distinction of being both a Big 8 (I am old) and Big 10 champ, seeing the heat waves shimmer off the short grass prairie which seemed to be slightly prevailing in its battle over the irrigated cornfields, and definitely feeling different than running through the prairies and soybean fields of Illinois - the West was beginning, so to speak.

Your initial post about Denver being in the Midwest was to spark a conversation. Quit trying to win this battle, you're 100% wrong and you know it.

another view on the matter wrote:

... I recall running on the rural roads in western Douglas County, Nebraska, with a very good runner who through transfer had the distinction of being both a Big 8 (I am old) and Big 10 champ, seeing the heat waves shimmer off the short grass prairie which seemed to be slightly prevailing in its battle over the irrigated cornfields, and definitely feeling different than running through the prairies and soybean fields of Illinois - the West was beginning, so to speak.

I grew up in that area, and you nailed it! Nice post there.

I'd like the OP to go to Gillette, WY, or Santa Fe, NM, walk into a diner there, and tell everyone they're in the Midwest. Gillette, in particular. Report back how that went.

rdoner wrote:

As someone who has lived in Colorado my whole life, Denver, Boulder, Fort Collins, or anywhere in Colorado is never considered or ever referred to as being in the midwest.

What is the nickname of the Denver airport?

Wondering - I assume your post wasn't directed at me - the immediate post above was my first post on the matter. And I think if intelligently discussed, the topic of where the Midwest ends and the West begins is a time honored and good one. Recall that for years people believed the West began in St. Louis - hence the Gateway Arch. I don't think that anyone would make that case today, for either St. Louis or the Mississippi River. In any event, Denver is not the Midwest, and is a hard to qualify exception to the Great Plains and Mountain West. And running some of the relevant terrain does indeed give one a feel for the relevant differences at hand.

Umm, nobody from Colorado defines themselves as a Midwesterner...

And ummm, nobody from Pittsburgh defines themselves as being from the east coast....

Are you severely under medicated or something?

I’m cornfused.

Love the history and pageantry of the Maryland v. Indian football game. That is a Midwest Classic! Divides families and neighborhoods. Is that the Old Oaken Bucket game or the Old Broken Pedpan game?

You hit the nail on exactly the part exactly, the part of the nail where it’s supposed to be hit at, OP.

Denver is a lot more like the Midwest, than a lot of places in the Midwest that are like the Midwest at all. Do you like especially Iowa? There are places in Iowa, or if you stand there, there are a lot of places in other states that are a lot more like Iowa then the place you were standing right now.

And that’s a fact. It really is a fact. So many people know this, and they tell me this. Smart people. Really, really, really, smart people. Believe me, I know. I’m really, really, smart, stable, genius. Believe me.

kyoto wrote:

I've grown up now and moved to a major east coast city (Pittsburgh) but I cherish my time spent in Denver as a child. The Midwest is a great place to grow up.

Denver is NOT in the Midwest.

East Virginia is south of the Northern Lights so i'd consider Northern Colorado its own state in the same way that downstate Illinois is Midwest but Chicago should be a separate state while Southwest Missouri State is a "directional" college that is actually in the Mid South.

That should clear things up.

flmw wrote:

Footlocker Midwest participating states:

Colorado, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, South Dakota, Wisconsin, and U.S. citizens in Overseas Military Installations

http://www.footlockercc.com/midwest/

I think we finally got our answer to what the Midwest is: "U.S. citizens in Overseas Military Installations."

Hardloper wrote:

kyoto wrote:

Sorry John I'm gonna have to respectfully disagree with you here. Denver is NOT in the intermountain west. The great plains are literally right next to the city. Midwest.

I know what you mean OP. Having lived most of my life in Michigan and Washington, I'm very nostalgic about Canada. I mean it's right next door, eh!

Not to mention Sarah Palin's feelings for Russia ("I can see it from my house"). The truth comes out, after all these years, with the 2016 election.

There are no hills between Omaha and Canada. Omaha is in Canada.

Denver is NOT in the midwest.

The Census Bureau's definition of "Midwest" consists of 12 states in the north central United States: Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, South Dakota, and Wisconsin.

Denver is NOT in the midwest.

this is a great post and probably a troll.

the midwest is tough to quantify by some people, but Colorado is definitely NOT midwest. I grew in wisconsin and always have this discussion with people nowadays

minnesota

wisconsin

michigan

iowa

illinois

indiana

ohio

north dakota

south dakota

nebraska

sometimes: (it really varies)

missouri (because of southern missouri)

kentucky

kansas (it's kinda far south, but very "midwestern" and agrarian)

kyoto is a gerrymanderer.

Awesome thread, kyoto. You're actually sorta right. First the Pittsburgh part, a LOT of people from PA consider it an east coast state, even though it has no real coastline or beaches on the Atlantic. So Pittsburgh is basically as East Coast as Philly is. And Pittsburgh used to be considered the western frontier for a long, long time. These things are not set in stone, they're fluid with the movement of people and culture. Kansas was the western frontier at one point, too, and actually still has a lot of that western plains feel, like Nebraska and Oklahoma and the Dakotas. It didn't stop with the end of train robberies. You might find more people agreeing that those are all western states on the high plains than you will that Denver and the Front Range are midwestern. That doesn't mean there's no truth to the latter, these are not absolute nore mutually exclusive distinctions.

Now for Denver, as others have pointed out it has maybe more in common with San Diego or Sacramento than it does with Durango, Pueblo, or even Colorado Springs. Go to a baseball game at Coors Field in LoDo and from your immediate surroundings going to and from the stadium you feel way more like you're in downtown Lincoln or KC than in downtown Leadville or Steamboat. Being able to see mountains from within city limits doesn't make it a mountain town, necessarily. Ask anyone who's lived a long time in Alamosa, Gunnison, Montrose, Glenwood if they consider Denver to be a mountain city. You'll probably get laughed at. People in mountain towns look at the Front Range as little more than where the major airports are and where the affluent recreational skiers almost exclusively reside. Sure, there's a big difference between western and mountain, but this is simply analogous. Denver grew and prospered because it was located on the plains, not the mountains or even the foothills, and could serve well as a supply depot for mining industry up in the mountains. Same for Boulder and other Front Range cities. Wyoming has amazing mountain ranges in it, too, but nobody would consider Cheyenne or Laramie to be anything but midwestern flavor plains cities.

While some of the earliest leaders were East Coast hucksters, Denver was originally founded and settled primarily by midwestern types (look up the name Larimer, for starters). Same for Boulder, Greeley, and Ft. Collins. That flavor took root and has maintained. Outside of Chicago, you probably won't find more transplants from Ohio, Indiana, Wisconsin, Iowa, Illinois, Michigan, Minnesota (i.e. midwestern states that don't share a border with CO) in one place combined than in Denver. They bring their midwestern ways with them, even if they came looking for things that are distinctly different. Once CA residents started arriving in waves, their west coast ways came right along with them even if they didn't have a beach to ride a cruiser bike down to. Denver became more liberalized with so much brain drain from these other midwestern states coupled with the Cali influx. Denver wasn't always liberal, Boulder was pretty conservative too until the government labs opened in the 1950's. Nobody's publicly assembling to protest WalMart stores in Littleton, Aurora, Golden, or Castle Rock. In fact, city leaders in Denver were hoping to lure the Amazon 2.0 campus. The eastern half of the state retains the conservative feel that it once shared strongly with Denver for a long, long time. You know that as recently as 1972, not a terribly long time ago even if it was before most on this board were born, Colorado citizens used the initiative process to reject the already-awarded 1976 winter Olympics? Conservative NIMBYism still calls the shots, even in crunchy, hippy Boulder. Things change and Denver metro today probably has more in common with the Inland Empire than it does much anywhere else.