Aspen is the home rule municipality that is the county seat and the
most populous municipality of Pitkin County, Colorado, United States.
Its population was 6,658 at the 2010 United States Census. It is 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 m) above sea level on the Western Slope, 11 miles (18 km) west
of the Continental Divide.Aspen is the home rule municipality that is
the county seat and the most populous municipality of Pitkin County,
Colorado, United States. Its population was 6,658 at the 2010 United
States Census. It is 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 m) above sea level on the Western Slope,
11 miles (18 km) west of the Continental Divide.Founded as a mining
camp during the Colorado Silver Boom and later named Aspen for the
abundance of aspen trees in the area, the city boomed during the
1880s, its first decade. The boom ended when the Panic of 1893 led to
a collapse of the silver market. The city then entered a half-century,
known as "the quiet years", when its population steadily declined,
reaching a nadir of fewer than 1000 by 1930. Aspen's fortunes
recovered in the mid-20th century when neighboring Aspen Mountain was
developed into a ski resort, and industrialist Walter Paepcke bought
many properties in the city in the 1950s and redeveloped them. Today
it is home to three institutions, two of which Paepcke helped found,
that have international importance: the Aspen Music Festival and
School, the Aspen Institute, and the Aspen Center for Physics.In the
late 20th century, the city became a popular retreat for celebrities.
Gonzo journalist Hunter S. Thompson worked out of a downtown hotel and
ran unsuccessfully for county sheriff. Singer John Denver wrote two
songs about Aspen after settling there. Both figures popularized Aspen
among the counter-cultural youth of the 1970s as an ideal place to
live, and the city continued to grow even as it gained notoriety for
some of the era's hedonistic excesses (particularly its drug
culture).[citation needed] Aspen, Colorado Top Movies & Young Movies