Editor’s note: This is part of The Know’s series, Staff Favorites. Each week, we offer our opinions on the best that Colorado has to offer for dining, shopping, entertainment, outdoor activities and more. (We’ll also let you in on some hidden gems).
The flat, concrete lands encircling the National Western Complex just north of downtown Denver can be vexing to navigate, given their twisting, occasionally dead-end routes.
But lo and behold, we have smartphone apps to guide us, which makes finding the Forney Museum of Transportation a snap. Housed in an unassuming but sturdy, brightly lit warehouse, it boasts 800 or so immaculate examples of transportation history that bring to life humanity’s technological expansion.
As my wide-eyed kids have learned, they range from lovingly restored, turn-of-the-century (19th, that is) buggies, wagons and carriages, to their signature Big Boy 4005 locomotive — seeing the massive machine in person takes your breath away — and early coupes, hot rods, motorcycles, bicycles, model trains and more.
Fort Collins-based automotive parts boss J.D. Forney incorporated the museum as a nonprofit in 1961 to showcase his increasingly weighty car collection. Since then, it’s moved locations (Englewood’s defunct Cinderella City mall, the Denver Tramway Powerhouse) and settled just south of I-70 along what’s now the River North Arts District.
It’s more prominent these days thanks to neighborhood upstarts, like Mission Ballroom (less than two blocks away), and the increased pedestrian traffic they create. But Forney’s always been a destination for culture-hunters. The shining collection is dotted with wax mannequins, secured from Denver’s former wax museum that closed in 1981, in period-appropriate garb. (They left impressions on my kids that won’t soon fade, for better or worse).
Neatly organized, easily accessible and deeply rooted in history, Forney’s unique collection is a gem that doesn’t always shine as brightly as it should in Denver’s hectic urban core. But it’s there, waiting to show you all of its incredible facets.
Forney Museum of Transportation. Open 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Thursday-Saturday and Monday; noon-5 p.m. on Sunday. Closed Tuesdays and Wednesdays. Admission: $15 for adults, $13 for seniors, $8 for kids, and free for 3 and under. 4303 Brighton Blvd. in Denver. 303-297-1113 or forneymuseum.org.
