Garden of the Gods in Colorado Springs is a public park famed for towering red rock formations created when ancient sedimentary layers were uplifted, tilted, faulted, and later shaped by erosion and Ice Age processes. Long before its modern name emerged in 1859, Indigenous peoples visited and used this landscape for shelter and resources, and many nations maintain connections to it, especially the Ute. Preserved through land purchases and gifts to Colorado Springs, including the Perkins family donation in 1909, it remains a free public park. Today it is the city’s most visited park, valued for scenery, trails, wildlife, geology, and notable fossil discoveries.