On October 29, 1858, the first store opens in a small frontier town in       
Colorado Territory that a month later will take the name of Denver
in a shameless ploy to curry favor with Kansas Territorial Governor James W. Denver. The town was a  brainchild of a promoter and real estate salesman from Kansas named William H. Larimer Jr.

James William "Jim" Denver
(October 23, 1817 – August 9, 1892)