Aspen

About Aspen

Aspen is the county seat and the most populous municipality of Pitkin County, Colorado. Its population was 7,004 at the 2020 United States Census. It’s located in a remote area of the Rocky Mountains’ Sawatch Range and Elk Mountains, along the Roaring Fork River at an elevation just below 8,000 feet (2,400 meters) above sea level on the Western Slope. Founded as a mining camp in 1879, today the ski town is a popular retreat for celebrities. Aspen became the most expensive place to buy real estate in the U.S. in 2011. Settled by the white man in 1879 as a mining camp during the Colorado Silver Boom and called Ute City, after the native Ute people lost their fight to maintain possession of their land and community. The town was incorporated on April 1, 1881 and renamed Aspen for the abundance of aspen trees in the area, and the new town boomed during the 1880s, its first decade, with a peak population of 5,108 in 1890. The boom ended when the Panic of 1893 led to a collapse of the silver market and its population dropped to 700 people by 1930. Aspen’s fortunes recovered in the mid-20th century when neighboring Aspen Mountain was developed into a ski resort. By the mid to late 20th century, the town became a popular retreat for celebrities. Under the Köppen climate classification, Aspen has a humid continental climate. The highest temperature ever recorded in Aspen, is 94°F (34.4°C), which occurred on July 27, 1917. The coldest reading was -37°F (-38°C), set on January 19, 1943. Aspen’s average annual snowfall is 171 inches (434 centimeters) in town, while the four surrounding ski mountains (Aspen Mountain, Snowmass, Highlands, and Buttermilk) receive around 300 inches (762 centimeters) per year. Unofficially, the most snow from a single storm in town took place in March of 1965, when more than 65 inches of snow fell in one week.