DU Stadium

The construction costs ran just under $571,000, with the project using one million board-feet of lumber, 7,000 cubic feet (200 m³) of concrete and 295 tons of steel. Gavin Hadden, an engineer whose office was in New York City, designed the stadium; he also designed the football stadiums at Cornell, Brown, and Northwestern.[2] The community called the new structure by the nickname “Monument to Concrete.” The famous sculptor Robert Garrison created two massive figures of athletes, one male and one female, for the stadium's main entrance as symbols of the value of coeducation and “the vitality, the vigor, and the strength of modern American youth”.

In the venue's first official game on October 2, 1926, DU defeated Colorado School of Mines 27–7.[3] However, no regional match-up overshadowed the annual rivalry game between DU and the University of Colorado, Boulder (CU) on Thanksgiving Day. This Front Range tradition came to end when CU moved to the Big Seven Conference in 1948. The facility also hosted other sports during its history, including soccer and track and field.

The use of Hilltop Stadium extended beyond the realm of athletic competition as well: aviator Charles Lindbergh visited the Denver landmark during a parade held in his honor in 1927, several months after his solo transatlantic flight.[4] Hilltop Stadium also hosted outdoor theater productions and DU commencement ceremonies for a number of years.

The U.S. Air Force Academy Falcons shared the stadium with DU until their new Falcon Stadium opened in Colorado Springs in 1962. Additionally, the professional Denver Broncos, a charter AFL franchise, played eleven pre-season and two early regular season games at DU stadium in the early and mid-1960s. Perhaps the most famous of those DU-hosted Bronco games was the 1967 pre-season game on August 5, when the Broncos beat the Detroit Lions in the first inter-league exhibition game.[5][6][7] The Broncos' home venue, Bears Stadium (later renamed "Mile High"), was shared with the Triple-A Denver Bears baseball club of the American Association (and Pacific Coast League).

The university decided to demolish Hilltop Stadium in 1971. The venue had started to crumble, and after the discontinuation of the DU football program in January 1961, a costly reconstruction of the main grandstand seemed unwarranted. Although the large crescent-shaped section on the west side was removed, the far smaller section to the east remained until 1974.

DU also needed the space for its growing intramural sports program: new plans included ten lighted tennis courts and three regulation-sized playing fields for a wide variety of sports. Today, the Benjamin F. Stapleton, Jr. Tennis Pavilion, Diane Wendt Sports Field, University of Denver Soccer Stadium and Peter Barton Lacrosse Stadium, all stand on the site of the old Hilltop Stadium.

A few remnants of the stadium remain today. The light towers now stand in working order at Englewood High School's football field, and the old line markers are housed at the Anderson Academic Commons, formerly the Penrose Library on the DU campus.