by Megan Schmidt
​
​When most people think of Colorado, a few things come to mind: skiing in the majestic Rocky Mountains, enjoying one of its 350 breweries or maybe its Gold Rush and Wild West heritage.

People might not know that Colorado is an aerospace hub, home to 400 companies and 25,000 employees in the industry. Some of the industry’s biggest names — Ball Aerospace and United Launch Alliance — as well as dozens of start-ups — are headquartered here.

But despite a soaring aerospace industry, Chuck Stout is a little worried. Interest in the field at the roots of the aerospace industry — aviation — is “losing altitude” among youth in the United States.
​
“Aviation has lost its gloss,” said Stout, the exhibits manager for Wings Over the Rockies Air and Space Museum located on the former Lowry Air Force Base in Denver. “People aren’t training to be pilots like they were in the 1950s and 1960s.”

by Megan Schmidt

April is Fair Housing Month. It commemorates the landmark legislation signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson on April 11, 1968—just days after Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated on April 4.

The act prohibited housing discrimination based on race, color, religion and national origin. Discrimination based on sex was added in 1974. A 1988 amendment added important protections for people with disabilities and familial status.

Legacy of MLK
King, who had been on the front lines on the fight for fair housing, believed that open housing was the foundation for a truly integrated and equal society. Throughout the 20th century, racially restrictive covenants, deeds and leases were used to prevent people of color from renting and purchasing homes in white communities. Redlining—the refusal to back mortgages on properties located in or near black communities—was another common practice.