50 Years at MSU Denver

Videos Celebrating 50 Years

Celebrating 50 Years of Transforming Lives: videos made exclusively for MSU Denver's 50th Anniversary!

50 Photos for 50 Years

The MSU Denver choir singing proudly in their custom-embroidered robes in the 1960s.

Before online FAQs and before email inquiries, there was her.

This Roadrunner can't be slowed down!

State Representative Paul Schauer poses with an elephant to promote MSU Denver's Plain & Fancy Ball, one of the most popular events in University history.

Halloween at a younger MSU Denver was just as festive.

A quality Aviation and Aerospace education has long been a high priority at MSU Denver.

Qualified, passionate, attentive professors have played an essential role in MSU Denver's history.

MSU Denver students of the 1960s got their groove on at the Student Center on Bannock Street.

Patience was key when waiting on the dot matrix printer.

MSU Denver President Richard Fontera, Ph.D., with the coach of the Roadrunners showing off some new MSU Denver T-shirts.

Kayaking in the pool was cool, as long as it was for a class.

Two important women cherished by MSU Denver: Rachel B. Noel (left) with Edna Mosley (right).

Former associate professor of Spanish Olivia Hartenstein was associate dean of the School of Letters, Arts and Sciences when she retired in 1999. She then funded a scholarship at MSU Denver for Spanish majors.

The "333" Building was one of MSU Denver's many downtown locations prior to moving to the Auraria Campus.

Student Activities has always been inclined to provide - and participate in - a whole bunch of good times.

The University's reel-to-reel tape recorder was the height of technology in the 1970s.

Music has always been in style at MSU Denver, even if fashion has changed since the 1960s.

Omar Hurricane got his bachelor's degree in physics from MSU Denver in 1990 and went on to make important energy breakthroughs in hydrogen fusion using lasers at Lawrence Livermore's National Ignition Facility in California.

On the hunt for a text in MSU Denver's first library.

An MSU Denver gym floor in the late 1980s, bearing a short-lived logo and color scheme.

Early in MSU Denver's music program, a Roadrunner plays sweet music on the flute.

Getting help in the lab is a little easier when everyone wears plaid.

Ben Monroe, Ph.D., was a Human Services teacher who served as the African American Affairs Council chair from 1996-2002.

Were you there the night composer Marvin Hamlisch first performed the school song "Fire of MSC"? This guy was.

MSU Denver has never lacked an engaging curriculum.

Political Science Professor Norman Proviser, Ph.D., in the middle of a lecture.

A reverse layup for MSU Denver in the 1980s.

High level perspective: MSU Denver has impacted the lives of many children through teacher training, not to mention its on-campus child care center.

Antonio Esquibel, Ph.D., was the founder of Chicana/o Studies at MSU Denver.

Kenn Bisio is a world-renowned photojournalist who takes his students on trips and teaches them to shoot photos like this one by Sara Beets.

Reflecting on the past - the door of MSU Denver's Center for Visual Art at its first location.

These students had better make this conversation quick, since students were only allowed 60 minutes maximum at each lab terminal.

Professor Emeritus Nancy Frontczak breaks it down on the chalkboard. She would go on to win the Alumni Association’s 2003 Most Loved Faculty Award and also to be named Marketing Educator of the Year for 2005 by the national Marketing Educators’ Association.

Safety first! These students are exemplifying the importance of goggles in the lab.

Alain Ranwez, Ph.D., who taught French at MSU Denver, is seen here at the University's 25th anniversary celebration - obviously a three-tie affair.

This sign for a 1970s music performance indicates the use of brass instruments, but not much else.

Their futures - like a rocket - are aimed for the stratosphere.

Then-Vice President George Herbert Walker Bush takes a jog on MSU Denver's track during his 1980s visit to campus.

Roadrunners enjoying some Colorado sunshine on the Auraria Campus.

Ricard T. Castro was an alumnus, instructor, and powerful force for justice in Colorado.

The Roadrunners are on a Tivoli Trolley car. Your argument is invalid.

The line at this counter is long because making college education affordable is kind of our thing. For the 2015-16 school year, it was estimated that MSU Denver students would receive more than $67.3 million in tuition credits, grants, scholarships and other forms of financial aid that do not have to be repaid.

MSU Denver professor Annjanette Alejano-Steele, Ph.D., is a powerful combatant to human trafficking.

The diversity of MSU Denver brings people from different backgrounds together.

A young Rowdy Roadrunner goes through his own stash of classic MSU Denver photographs.

Denver Mayor Frederico Peña (right) signs a proclamation making September 21st through October 6th of 1986 "Metropolitan State College 21st Anniversary Week".

A group learns Taekwondo on the north side of the Tivoli in the 1990s.

Graduates seated at MSU Denver's first commencement on June 1st, 1969.

Whatever the weather, it's always a great day to be a Roadrunner!