A History of the Highlands Neighborhood in Denver

The Highlands neighborhood in North Denver has a history that predates Denver itself. The Highland townsite was claimed in 1858 by the same land promoter who founded Denver City, and what followed was nearly four decades of independent civic life before annexation in 1896. The neighborhood built its own schools, churches, Town Hall, and water system. It attracted successive waves of immigrants who layered their own cultural contributions into the built environment. And it produced, in 1927, the Classical Greek Revival landmark at 3550 Federal Boulevard that remains its largest building more than nine decades later.

Founded	Town of Highlands incorporated April 8, 1875; annexed by Denver in 1896
Location	Immediately northwest of downtown Denver, bounded by 38th Avenue, Federal Boulevard, and the South Platte River
Notable landmark	Highlands Event Center at 3550 Federal Boulevard, listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1995
Character	Victorian-era homes, diverse cultural heritage, Federal Boulevard civic corridor, Tennyson Street commercial district

Jump to: Before Denver Was Denver | An Independent City | Annexation and What Followed | Cultural Layers | The Neighborhood Today | 3550 Federal in Context | FAQ

Federal Boulevard runs north through Denver as one of the city’s primary arterials, and the stretch of it through the Highlands neighborhood carries more history than its name suggests. It was once called simply The Boulevard, and before that it was the main street of an independent city that predated Denver’s growth northward. Understanding the Highlands neighborhood means understanding the people who built it, the civic ambitions that drove them, and the buildings they left behind.

Before Denver Was Denver: The 1858 Townsite

In December 1858, General William Larimer Jr. claimed the Highland townsite. Larimer had founded Denver City the month before, and he quickly turned his eyes toward the elevated ground northwest of the new settlement, across the South Platte River. The Rocky Mountain News described the location as having no more handsome position for residences, noting its views over Auraria, Denver, and the surrounding territory.

The South Platte River formed a natural boundary between Highland and the emerging Denver settlements. In 1859, the Highland Town Company formed and began planning a bridge across the Platte to connect the neighborhoods. Early settlers found practical advantages that went beyond the view: artesian water discovered near Federal Boulevard provided clean drinking water at a time when Denver residents were filtering debris from their taps, and the elevation above the Platte River valley offered air quality that was meaningfully better than the lower areas of the growing city.

These advantages became a selling point. While early Denver was a rough frontier town known for dust, saloons, and disorder, the Highlands positioned itself as something different. Residents planted trees. They maintained gardens. They invested in civic institutions. The town earned the informal designation of the Garden City of the Plains, a name that reflected both its physical character and its civic aspirations.

An Independent City: 1875 to 1896

The Town of Highlands was formally incorporated on April 8, 1875, and became a city in 1885. In the two decades between its incorporation and its eventual annexation by Denver, Highlands built the infrastructure of a genuine independent municipality. The neighborhood developed its first one-room schoolhouse in 1872, as well as banks, a firehouse, grocery stores, 13 churches, its own Town Hall at 26th and Federal, a newspaper, bakeries, and an amusement park called River Front Park.

The Town Hall stood at 26th and Federal, placing civic authority on the same boulevard that would anchor the neighborhood’s institutional presence for more than a century. Federal Boulevard, then known simply as The Boulevard, was lined with the residences of doctors, successful businessmen, and civic leaders. It was the address that communicated standing in the independent city of Highlands.

The Highlands also cultivated a distinct civic character. Liquor licenses were priced so high that saloons could not operate, a deliberate contrast with the Denver of the same era. Churches were embedded throughout every district, and the founding population approached tree planting and garden maintenance as civic duties. The town reflected the aspirations of its founders: a place apart from Denver’s rougher character, elevated literally and figuratively above the city across the river.

The 1896 Annexation and What Came Next

The 1893 Silver Crash ended the civic self-confidence that had defined Highlands through its independent years. The collapse of silver prices devastated Colorado’s economy, draining municipal funds and straining the infrastructure that the Town of Highlands had built over two decades. The independent city found it increasingly difficult to maintain the schools, streets, and services its residents had come to expect.

In 1896, residents of the Highlands, faced with rising infrastructure costs and waning political autonomy, voted to be annexed into the City of Denver. Denver’s threat to cut bridge access across the South Platte added practical urgency to what was already a financial necessity. The annexation ended Highlands’ run as an independent city but brought it into Denver’s expanding utility and transportation network, and the neighborhood’s development accelerated in the years that followed.

The architectural record from the two decades after annexation tells the story of who came. Streetcar lines connecting Highland to downtown brought waves of new residents. Wealthy early settlers had built ornate Queen Anne and Italianate mansions, many of which survive today in the Potter-Highland historic district. As the neighborhood grew more accessible, successive waves of immigration added new layers to the built environment and the cultural character of North Denver.

The Cultural Layers of North Denver

The Highlands neighborhood’s cultural history is not the story of a single community but of a sequence of them, each adding to the character of the place without entirely replacing what came before. The neighborhood’s position along the Platte River, adjacent to the railroad and manufacturing corridors that developed on the east bank, made it a natural destination for immigrant workers drawn to Denver’s industrial growth.

German immigrants came first in significant numbers, drawn to the breweries that operated along the Platte. Philip Zang’s Rocky Mountain Brewery was among the most prominent, and the German brewing community established households and institutions that left a lasting mark on the built environment. Irish immigrants followed, drawn by railroad work. By the early 20th century, Italian immigrants had established one of Denver’s most cohesive immigrant communities in North Denver, including two Italian churches, an orphanage and school overseen by Mother Frances Xavier Cabrini, and four Italian-language newspapers.

From the mid-20th century, Hispanic and Latino communities became the defining cultural presence in much of North Denver. The neighborhood’s Latino heritage runs deep: Federal Boulevard and the surrounding streets carry the cultural legacy of families who made North Denver their home across multiple generations. That heritage remains present and visible in the institutions, businesses, and community life of the Highlands today alongside the newer arrivals who came with the neighborhood’s more recent evolution.

The Neighborhood Today

The Highlands of the early 21st century bears the physical imprint of every era of its history. The oldest Victorian homes in Potter-Highland date to the 1870s and 1880s. The Craftsman bungalows and Denver Squares of the early 20th century line the residential streets between Federal Boulevard and Tennyson. The institutional buildings of the interwar period, including the 1927 Masonic Temple at 3550 Federal, anchor the neighborhood’s civic corridors.

Tennyson Street, running north-south through the West Highland area, has become the neighborhood’s primary commercial corridor and cultural gathering point. Independent bookstores, restaurants, art galleries, and community-oriented businesses line the street in a density that reflects the neighborhood’s walkable, residential character. The corridor connects the northern and southern ends of the West Highland area and gives the neighborhood a contemporary civic identity rooted in its historic character.

Federal Boulevard remains the neighborhood’s institutional spine. The largest buildings on Federal from 29th Avenue northward are civic and religious institutions, a pattern established in the independent city era and maintained through successive generations of development. The Highlands Masonic Temple at 3550 Federal, built in 1927 and listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1995, is the most architecturally significant of these institutional anchors and the largest building in the neighborhood.

3550 Federal Boulevard in Its Neighborhood Context

When Highlands Temple Lodge #86 commissioned architects Merrill and Burnham Hoyt to design a new building at 3550 Federal Boulevard in 1927, the Lodge was acting within a long tradition of Masonic civic investment in the Highlands neighborhood. The Masonic order had been present in North Denver from the area’s earliest decades, and the 1927 building was an expression of the organization’s commitment to maintaining a permanent civic presence on the neighborhood’s historic main street.

The building’s Classical Greek Revival design placed it in conversation with the civic buildings of the independent city era rather than the residential architecture that surrounded it. Its scale, a full city block, made it the largest structure in the neighborhood and gave it a visual authority that Federal Boulevard had carried since it was called simply The Boulevard. In that sense, the 1927 building was not a departure from the neighborhood’s history but a continuation of it: civic ambition expressed in permanent materials on the street that had always been the Highlands’ institutional center.

Nearly a century later, the building continues to anchor 3550 Federal as a civic and community gathering place. The story of Highlands Event Center is the story of a building that belongs to its neighborhood: built by an organization present in the community since its earliest years, designed in a style that reflects the civic aspirations of the interwar period, and preserved in a way that keeps those connections visible to the people who gather there today. The full history of the building itself is documented in the Highlands Event Center history guide.

“The Town of Highlands was intended to be a perfect Eden, a Utopia. The people of the town were a very proud people. They were proud of their homes, and there was to be no dirty industry in the town.”

Denver Public Library Special Collections and Archives
Potter-Highlands Neighborhood History

The Denver Public Library Special Collections and Archives maintains the primary historical record of the Highlands neighborhood, drawing on the research of historian Ruth Eloise Wiberg and other primary sources. Their neighborhood history guides document the Town of Highlands, the Potter Highlands historic district, and the civic institutions that shaped North Denver from the 1850s through the 20th century.

The Highlands neighborhood is one of Denver’s oldest communities, and 3550 Federal Boulevard has been part of it since 1927. Highlands Event Center hosts weddings, corporate gatherings, and social celebrations for up to 400 guests in a building that belongs to this neighborhood in every meaningful sense. Get in touch to learn more or schedule a tour.

Frequently Asked Questions