DRIVE-THRU / CURBSIDE PICKUP

Passwords are now required to access your account. To create a password, select "Reset my Password" from the Login screen (email address required). For further assistance, please visit the Library Account Passwords FAQ page for instructions or call the library at 970-243-4442.

The Central Library will be closed March 31 for Easter Sunday. View all holiday closures.


Showing 1 - 16 of 16 , query time: 0.02s
Cover Image
Format:
Compound
Harriet “Muzz” Northrop Webster Johnson recalls growing up in Grand Junction, Colorado and discusses the schools she attended, her father’s job at the Holly Sugar Company, her jobs after high school, her marriages, and the history of St. Matthew’s Episcopal Church. She also talks about starting over as a 58-year-old widower, when she lived and worked as a house mother at the Hawaii School for the Deaf and Blind. The interview was conducted...
Cover Image
Format:
Voice Recording
To mark the centennial celebration of the town of Grand Junction, Colorado in 1981, the Mesa County Oral History Project wrote and recorded several radio plays about local history. Beginning on September 26, 1981, local radio stations KSTR, KREX-AM, KREX-FM, and KMSA broadcast the plays. Authors of the plays used interviews recorded by the Mesa County Oral History Project as inspiration. This archival recording contains the play Sousa Day in Grand...
Cover Image
Format:
Voice Recording
In the first of nine recordings, John Goulet, a former advertising salesman with the Daily Sentinel newspaper, relates his experiences and travels in Grand Junction and Western Colorado in the 1950’s. He talks about his arrival in Grand Junction from Boston, meeting H. Blake Manuel of Manuel’s Department Store, and his friendship with Al Look of the Sentinel. He describes trips that he and his wife took with Look and his wife around the Western...
Cover Image
Format:
Voice Recording
Winifred Bull discusses her education in Grand Junction’s schools, her career teaching Latin at Grand Junction High School, the medical career of her father, Dr. Heman R. Bull, the life of her uncle Edwin Price (founder of Grand Junction’s first newspaper), and the Spanish Flu epidemic of 1918-19. The interview was conducted by the Mesa County Oral History Project, a collaboration of Mesa County Libraries, the Museums of Western Colorado and the...
Cover Image
Format:
Compound
Mary Cox talks about her education at the Bryant School and elsewhere in Grand Junction, about corsets and other aspects of school fashion, the history of the Riverside Neighborhood, attending community dances and Glenwood Springs’ Strawberry Days, and boys swimming in the Colorado River. She also discusses old downtown businesses, going to movies at the Majestic Theater, a brothel that advertised at the Mesa County Fairgrounds during a baseball...
Cover Image
Format:
Compound
Marie Treece describes running Grand Junction, Colorado’s community concert series and the many famous musicians who visited Grand Junction during the early to mid-1900’s. She recalls the difficulty that African-American musicians, such as Roland Hayes, had in finding a place to stay. She talks about her experiences teaching and travelling with a Mesa College choral troop. She discusses directing a choir in one of the area’s CCC camps, hosting...
Cover Image
Format:
Compound
Grace Wade talks about her childhood growing up in Cripple Creek, Colorado. She goes into detail explaining the layout of the town, the street car system, the red light district, her school, and her home. She mentions her studious piano practice that led to her advanced playing ability, her yearly trips to Texas and Denver to see her family, and her family’s tradition of going to University of Texas. She describes her teaching career in Cripple...
Cover Image
Format:
Voice Recording
Dick Williams talks about the games he played with children as a boy in the downtown area of Grand Junction, including hide and go seek and kick the can. He remembers playing sandlot baseball and other games in a vacant lot on 9th Street between Grand and White Avenues. He recalls swimming in ditches and canals, and ice skating in what is now Lincoln Park. He speaks about competing in athletics in high school and college, and in Pioneer Clubs, which...
Cover Image
Format:
Compound
Helen Johnson talks about helping teach a WPA-funded dance class during the Great Depression. She speaks about other government programs, such as the Civilian Conservation Corps, and how they helped the people of Mesa County, Colorado during the Great Depression. She describes working for Douglas Aircraft in Los Angeles to manufacture airplanes during World War II, where she became the lead in her section. She talks about her brief career teaching...
Cover Image
Format:
Voice Recording
Al Look talks about singing in a quartet, publishing books on Mesa County history, and fishing. He also discusses various people and places of the Western Slope. The interview was conducted by the Mesa County Oral History Project, A collaboration of Mesa County Libraries and the Museums of Western Colorado.
Cover Image
Format:
Voice Recording
An interview with Carl Smith, who grew up just south of Delta and moved to Grand Junction later in life. He learned to play several instruments at an early age, and later played music in circus bands and in a military band during World War I. The interview was conducted by the Mesa County Oral History Project, a collaboration of Mesa County Libraries and the Museums of Western Colorado.
Cover Image
Format:
Voice Recording
Reuben A. Pitts talks about wars between cattle and sheep ranchers, about rural school life in Plateau Valley, Colorado, and about the Big Creek Reservoir flood. He also discusses his job as a typesetter for his father’s newspaper, The Plateau Valley Voice, in Collbran. The interview was conducted by the Mesa County Oral History Project, a collaboration of Mesa County Libraries, the Museums of Western Colorado and the Mesa County Historical Society....
Cover Image
Format:
Voice Recording
Armand de Lavillette de Beque lectures about the history of theater in Mesa County, Colorado in a meeting of the Mesa County Historical Society. He talks about productions put on in DeBeque and Fruita, and about the general audience. He discusses his teaching career and how many plays he directed as an educator. This interview also includes speeches from Nina Brouse and Hellen (Hawxhurst) Young. These ladies talk about how they helped produce plays,...
Cover Image
Format:
Video
This piece was included in the 2017-2018 Art on the Corner Temporary Exhibit.
Cover Image
Format:
Video
This piece was included in the 2017-2018 Art on the Corner Temporary Exhibit.
Cover Image
Format:
Voice Recording
Citizens of the De Beque, Colorado community provide a program on the music of pioneers for the Mesa County Historical Society. Participants play exemplars of pioneer music, and talk about De Beque’s pioneer musicians and the music they played. This recording is made available via signed release by the Mesa County Oral History Project, a collaboration of Mesa County Libraries and the Museums of Western Colorado.