In Colorado, most of us love our Denver Broncos football team: cheering them when they are winning and chiding them when they are not. The Broncos and Colorado have a long history together, going back more than 60 years.

Bob Howsam, a successful minor league baseball owner, founded the Denver Broncos when he was awarded an American Football League (AFL) charter franchise on August 14, 1959. The Broncos won the first-ever AFL game on September 9, 1960, and became the first-ever AFL team to defeat a National Football League (NFL) team on August 5, 1967. Aside from these few bright spots, Denver’s performance in the AFL, before it united operations with the NFL in 1970, was mostly bleak, concluding with the worst record of any of the original eight AFL teams.

The year 1973 was the Broncos’ first winning season and since 1976, the team has won 15 American Football Conference (AFC) Western Division titles and eight AFC Championships. They became one of only five teams to win back-to-back Super Bowls when they won in 1998 and 1999. When the Broncos advanced to Super Bowl 50 in 2015, they became one of only four teams to have made eight Super Bowl appearances, and they won their third Super Bowl that year.

Here are some fun Broncos facts:

The team’s original home uniforms were mustard-yellow and brown, with brown and yellow striped socks. The uniforms were so hated that the team burned them in a public bonfire in front of a cheering crowd, and the orange and blue uniforms officially premiered on September 7, 1962.

The horse statue atop the scoreboard was first placed there in 1975. Called Bucky, or sometimes Bucko, the statue was made from a mold of Trigger, Western star Roy Rogers’ famous palomino costar. The mold was only used twice before being destroyed: first for the fiberglass recreation of Trigger for the Roy Rogers-Dale Evans Museum in California, and then for Bucky.

“Orange Crush” was the nickname for the dominant Broncos defense of the late 1970s.

The team has two official mascots: Miles, the white stallion costumed character in a Broncos uniform; and Thunder, the white Arabian horse (pictured above) who has led the Broncos onto the field for more than 30 years. Miles became a regular at Broncos games beginning in the early 2000s. Four purebred Arabians have filled the role of Thunder, who debuted on September 12, 1993. Thunder celebrates each scoring drive with a run from the south end zone to the north.

The Denver Broncos Cheerleaders have cheered the team from the sidelines since 1993, when the team brought them back after a 17-year absence. Each year more than 200 individuals audition for the 28 cheerleader positions. The cheerleaders have three different uniforms to accommodate Colorado’s rapidly changing weather.

“Rocky Mountain Thunder” refers to the home-field advantage given by the Broncos fans, who “bring the Mile High Thunder” by stomping on the metal flooring at Empower Field at Mile High stadium.

For more information and this season’s schedule, visit denverbroncos.com. For more information about Thunder, visit broncosthunder.com.

 

By Susan Helton; photos courtesy of the Denver Broncos