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6 unusual facts about South Platte River


1966 PGA Championship

A flash flood of the adjacent South Platte River in June 1965 caused significant damage to the course and forced a postponement.

1967 PGA Championship

Columbine was scheduled to host the championship in 1966, but flooding of the course by the South Platte River caused a postponement of a year.

Etheostoma exile

They are native in Colorado only in the South Platte River drainage, but recent research has also placed them in the Yampa River (Colorado) and the Green River (Utah).

John D. Henderson

In 1859, Henderson built a ranch, trading post, and hotel on Henderson Island in the South Platte River in Arapaho County, Kansas Territory.

U.S. Route 30 in Nebraska

Much of the route lies on an alignment next to the South Platte and Platte Rivers.

Wellington Webb

One highlight of his years in office was the South Platte River Corridor Project, involving commercial and residential redevelopment, as well as reclamation of park land, along the South Platte River in central Denver.


Camp Collins

The growing hostility of the Lakota to white encroachment further north had forced the temporary relocation of the Emigrant Trail from the North Platte River to the South Platte valley.

Colorado-Big Thompson Project

Prior to the Dust Bowl era, agriculture in this section of the state had relied upon sources such as Boulder Creek, St. Vrain Creek, Little Thompson River, Big Thompson River and the Cache La Poudre River, all of which are a part of the South Platte River basin and flow into the South Platte River before the South Platte reaches Greeley, Colorado.

Commerce City, Colorado

In 1859, John D. "Colonel Jack" Henderson built a ranch, trading post, and hotel on Henderson Island in the South Platte River in Arapahoe County, Kansas Territory.

LoDo, Denver

LoDo is located in north central Denver, directly northwest of the downtown CBD, near the confluence of Cherry Creek and the South Platte River.

Route of the Oregon Trail

Those traveling south of the Platte crossed the South Platte River with its muddy and treacherous crossings using one of about three ferries (in dry years it could sometimes be forded without a ferry) before continuing up the North Platte River valley to Fort Laramie in present-day Wyoming.

A branch of the Oregon Trail crossed the very northeast corner of Colorado if they followed the South Platte River to one of its last crossings.


see also

Pike's Peak Gold Rush

The first decade of the boom was largely concentrated along the South Platte River at the base of the mountains, the canyon of Clear Creek in the mountains west of Golden City, at Breckenridge and in South Park at Como, Fairplay, and Alma.