Forney Museum puts Denver transportation history on more than four wheels

Image: Archival photograph of a fire vehicle at Forney Museum by Piotrus dated August 16, 2012; not a current exhibit layout or guarantee that this vehicle is on view.

A transportation museum can tell more than a story of increasingly fast cars. Denver's Forney Museum brings bicycles, carriages, locomotives, aircraft, fire apparatus and other material into the same collection, making it possible to compare very different answers to the problem of moving people and goods.

The museum traces its beginnings to a single 1921 Kissel and now describes more than eight hundred transportation-related artifacts. Rather than trying to see every object equally, choose a question: how a driver operated a vehicle, what a passenger could carry or how a machine served work rather than leisure.

Current hours at 4303 Brighton Boulevard are Thursday–Monday, 10 a.m.–5 p.m., with Tuesday–Wednesday and listed holiday closures. General admission is $17 for adults, $14 for ages 65 and older and $9 for children 3–12, with younger children free. Ordinary museum parking is free, although event arrangements can differ.

Check the current program calendar if a model-building activity or railroad layout is central to the outing. Those schedules are separate from general opening. The museum does not allow bags in its exhibit space and provides free lockers, so plan accordingly. A close comparison between two vehicles can reveal more about changing needs than a quick photograph of every machine.

Sources and visit details

• Forney Museum: collection range, origins and current program descriptions
• Forney Museum: current admission, hours, location, parking and lockers

Photo: myself (User:Piotrus) / Wikimedia Commons. CC BY-SA 3.0. Resized and converted to WebP; the site wordmark may be added in display.