History Colorado Looks Back At Mile High

By Alan Gionet

DENVER (CBS4) - History Colorado will bring out some rarely seen relics for exhibit on Monday. They come from the old Mile High Stadium.

The stadium has been gone now for 13 years. It was torn down after the construction of Invesco Field at Mile High, which was recently renamed Sports Authority Field at Mile High.

On Monday at 11:30 a.m., some pieces of the old stadium and mementos of those golden days will come out of storage for a big reveal at History Colorado Center. That includes seats, signed photos, schedules even an Orange Crush can!

Mile High was constructed as Bears Stadium in 1948 for the baseball team, the Denver Bears. The Broncos took up residence in 1960 and played some of the most famous games in Denver history there.

The exhibit may reveal some things even big fans may not have known; like the origins of the Orange Crush nickname.

"Over time they got to see the Orange Crush team which was actually a partnership between a local distributor, a bottling company and the NFL to focus on the Broncos and it really became a nickname for them," said Alisa Zahller, senior curator for artifacts at History Colorado.

The exhibit is part of the "Who Knew!? Everything Old is New Again" exhibit, which has experts taking rarely seen items out of storage and revealing them anew each week.

Alan Gionet is anchor of the CBS4 Morning News and reports on a wide variety of issues and "Good Question" stories. He started at CBS4 in 1994. Follow Alan on Twitter @AlanGTV.