Sports, Old Engines, BBQ Fest, 5k Run: 6 Things To Do In Denver Area To Celebrate Dad 2022

DENVER, CO — Before you wish him a happy Father's Day, you'd better strategize a plan. Where are you going to take Dad on Sunday? Instead of just sitting and watching TV together, take Dad to do one of these fun activities to show him you care.

The Six Best Things To Do With Dad On Father's Day 2022 In The Denver Area

Go to a baseball game. The dads of Denver are in luck. The Rockies play the Padres Friday, Saturday and Sunday at home, so you still have plenty of opportunities to watch a ballgame with Dad. Friday night's special theme is MSU Denver night, so if you or Dad are an alumnus, buy the special ticket for a limited edition MSU Roadrunners-themed Rockies T-shirt. On Saturday, the first 15,000 fans receive a Germán Márquez Commemorative 2021 All-Star Game bobblehead, and on the special day itself, the first 15,000 fans receive a Father's Day trucker hat. Find all of the special theme information and purchase tickets on the schedule here.

Watch a Colorado Summit doubleheader. Sports, all sports. Dads like them all. The Denver-based professional Ultimate Frisbee team is in the American Ultimate Disc League West Division, and it plays against the Seattle Cascades on Saturday. Summit games are usually later in the evening — this one starts at 4 p.m. — and typically include a pre-game party. Instead of canceling the pre-game festival, the team just made it earlier, so you can pre-Frisbee party with Dad at 3 p.m. The reason for the time change is that this game is followed by the Western Ultimate League Colorado Showcase game.

According to the Summit website, the Showcase game includes many of the starts from the first season of the Western Ultimate League. "The Western Ultimate League was established to advance the sport of ultimate by showcasing and amplifying women and non-binary athletes. Fans who attend this game will have an opportunity to watch star WUL players from all seven teams across the league playing together for this event." Find more information about both games and buy tickets here.

Run, then feast on all the food. Whether you bond through the pain of the exercise or the pleasure of the pork, the Run for the Ribs 5K is an event for you and Dad. It's a part of the Denver BBQ Festival, which takes place all weekend at Empower Field at Mile High. The 5K is Sunday morning and circles the grounds of Empower Field at Mile High, using whatever pace you would like — a run, walk or jog. The fun stuff comes next; participants in the 5K gain free access to the festival, a "Breckenridge Brewery Finisher Beer," a medal, a serving of ribs and discounted rates on VIP pit passes for the Sunday VIP sessions at the fest. Learn more about the 5K and register for it here.

Enjoy the Denver BBQ Festival by skipping the run if you don't want to sweat for your supper. The event is family-friendly, and nobody will leave hungry. General admission is free by registering for a grounds pass, which is required for everyone 12 years and older. Register for a grounds pass here. Alternatively, Q pit passes are the other ticket option, which include access to any of the "four exclusive Q Pit Lounges along Pit Row." Splurge on Q pit passes for you and Dad for 2.5 hours of all-you-can-eat barbecue and free signature cocktails, beer and soft drinks, as well as no waiting in lines and private bathrooms. The only day still available for grabbing a pit pass is Sunday, so act quickly and buy here. Regardless of passes, you can expect live music, demonstrations and more. Everyone who's anyone in the barbecue world — pitmasters from Denver; Kansas City, Missouri; Texas; St. Louis; New York and more — will be there, so you may have to keep Dad from getting too starstruck. Learn more about the Denver BBQ Festival here.

Visit the Colorado Railroad Museum. It's a scientific fact that Dads like vehicles and motors. On Saturday and Sunday, Dad can go wild at the Colorado Railroad Museum's event that includes "antique tractors, hit-and-miss engines and early diesel engines, Model A and Model T cars, and even a Fire Truck." Ticket options include a train ride, which is "a ride behind our diesel engine-powered locomotive, looping around our 15 acre railyard," according to organizers. Come on, take Dad on the train. You know he wants to go.

The event also includes local food, Spike the Railroad Dog and turntable demonstrations. Purchasing tickets in advance is recommended. Activities and train rides on both days are from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m., and the museum grounds are open from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. If you really have a locomotive-loving Dad, don't miss the special screening of a new production about the history of the electro-motive division at 2 p.m. Sunday. Find all tickets and more information here.

Take Dad to a special dinner — or bring it to him. Maybe all Dad wants is to spend some quality time and relax on his day. Some spots around town are having great celebrations that will make your meal one to remember.

Eddie V’s Prime Seafood has a unique Father's Day menu that will show Dad how much he means to you. Created just for Father's Day, the 11-ounce Snake River Farms gold label wagyu strip steak is available exclusively for dining in the restaurant. Everyone knows dads drink bourbon. Well, luckily the restaurant has Eddie V’s single barrel select Blanton’s bourbon available as an enhancement. Dad can also take home a collectible Blanton’s topper. The restaurant opens for Father’s Day at 12 p.m. and will have live music in the V Lounge from 4 p.m. to 8 p.m. More information on the special menu is available here, and you can make a reservation here.

Seasons 52 is offering their Green Box, so you can take the special meal to Dad. The box is a three-course Father’s Day dinner to go that serves four to six. Options for the main part of the meal are a whole side of cedar-plank-roasted salmon or wood-grilled beef tenderloin. The box also includes salad, a choice of two sides and "mini indulgences." The regular menu is still available in the dining room if your Dad would rather go to the restaurant. Place a Green Box order here; they must be placed 24 hours in advance.

The Capital Grille is helping you give Dad the best cookout he has ever had. The restaurant is offering a selection of uncooked signature cuts of steak through what it is calling The Capital Butcher. The menu consists of individual steaks and Steak Grille Boxes, which include four steaks, seasoning and steak sauce. Box options include dry-aged bone-in New York strip, bone-in prime ribeye or a combination of the two. The boxes can be ordered with accompaniments to share, such as lobster macaroni and cheese and Sam’s mashed potatoes. All you need to do is be the hero of the cookout and make Dad some delicious food. Find more details and how to order the uncooked meat here. The restaurant is also serving the regular menu for dining.

Still looking for a last-minute gift for Father's Day? Check out Patch's Father's Day Gift Guide 2022.

A Brief History Of Father's Day

It wasn’t a #MeToo movement that made Father’s Day a national holiday on equal footing with Mother’s Day in 1972, about six decades after President Woodrow Wilson proclaimed the holiday celebrating America’s mothers in 1914.

In fact, it was the opposite, something akin to a #NotUs movement in the more patriarchal family structure in the early 20th century.

The whole idea of a day to celebrate fathers for simply doing their duty — providing for their families — struck men as silly and trite when it was the nation’s mothers who were underappreciated, Lawrence R. Samuel wrote in “American Fatherhood: A Cultural History.”

Men “scoffed at the holiday’s sentimental attempts to domesticate manliness with flowers and gift-giving, or they derided the proliferation of such holidays as a commercial gimmick to sell more products — often paid for by the father himself,” according to one historian’s account shared by The Old Farmer’s Almanac.

The first Father’s Day observance was held on June 19, 1910, in Spokane, Washington, and it was organized by Sonora Smart Dodd, one of six children raised by a widowed Civil War veteran.

Dodd thought fathers such as hers should be honored in the same way mothers are. So she set out on a campaign to make it happen, convincing local churches, civic groups, shopkeepers and governmental officials of the idea’s merit. Accordingly, on the third Sunday of June in 1910, preachers across the state of Washington gave sermons honoring fathers.

In the years following, U.S. presidents and other politicians nudged the idea forward that Father’s Day should be made a federal holiday.

In 1916, Wilson used telegraph signals to unfurl the flag in Spokane when he pressed a button in Washington, where he celebrated Father’s Day with his own family. In 1924, President Calvin Coolidge asked state governments to observe Father’s Day.

Even though Father’s Day was an unofficial holiday, families around the country celebrated it. Silk neckties became the go-to gift for dads and were mass-produced in the 1920s to meet the demand, according to Good Housekeeping.

Father’s Day survived a movement in the 1920s and 1930s to do away with and decommercialize the individual observances and celebrate Parents’ Day instead. Pro Parents’ Day rallies were held in New York City’s Central Park during those years to raise awareness around the idea that, in the words of Parents’ Day activist and radio performer Robert Spere, “Both parents should be loved and respected together,” according to History.com.

During the Great Depression, retailers and advertisers overcame many Americans’ hesitance to part with their money with promotions to make Father’s Day “a second Christmas” for fathers, according to History.

When World War II came along, marketing efforts shifted, according to Good Housekeeping. Father’s Day became another way to honor U.S. troops and support the war effort, though some dismissed that as propaganda, according to Good Housekeeping.

Still, Father’s Day was firmly institutionalized, even if it wasn’t the official holiday Wilson had hoped for.

In the 1950s, Sen. Margaret Chase Smith of Maine pleaded with Congress to make Father’s Day official, arguing that Congress “has been guilty now for 40 years of the worst possible oversight against the gallant fathers of our land.”

“Either we honor both our parents, mother and father, or let us desist from honoring either one," she wrote.

In 1961, Republican Rep. Walt Horan, whose district included Spokane, gave a speech on the House floor in support of an effort to make Father’s Day an official holiday. The 11-term congressman didn’t live to see it happen; he died in 1966.

That year, President Lyndon B. Johnson, who reportedly was keen on the idea of a national Father’s Day holiday, issued the first-ever presidential proclamation honoring fathers.

Johnson’s successor, President Richard M. Nixon, made Father’s Day a federal holiday in 1972, writing in a proclamation the following words.

"In fatherhood, we know the elemental magic and joy of humanity. In fatherhood, we even sense the divine, as the Scriptural writers did who told of all good gifts coming 'down from the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning' — symbolism so challenging to each man who would give his own son or daughter a life of light without shadow.
“Our identity in name and nature, our roots in home and family, our very standard of manhood — all this and more is the heritage our fathers share with us. It is a rich patrimony, one for which adequate thanks can hardly be offered in a lifetime, let alone a single day. Still it has long been our national custom to observe each year one special Sunday in honor of America's fathers; and from this year forward, by a joint resolution of the Congress approved April 24, 1972, that custom carries the weight of law.”

Father's Day may be on equal footing with Mother’s Day as an official U.S. holiday, but consumer spending for Father’s Day doesn’t come close to matching the amount of cash Americans lay out to celebrate their mothers.

This year, Father’s Day spending was expected to be about $20.1 billion, according to the National Retail Federation. That compares with about $32 billion spent on Mother’s Day.

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