Speakers thanked the country's first responders and Aurora Mayor Steve Hogan told a crowd of hundreds Tuesday that "senseless acts of violence do not define us." 

Steel from one of the World Trade Center towers was on display with a U.S. flag draped over the material. 

Ladders from the Colorado Springs and Poudre fire departments held up the U.S. flag and Colorado flag over a main stage near the state Capitol. 

Twelve people were killed and 58 others wounded in the theater shooting July 20 and several hundred homes were destroyed this summer in wildfires in Colorado Springs and west of Fort Collins.

(Copyright 2012 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)