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Alexander Guerrie talks about the life of his father Philip Guerrie, an Italian immigrant, pioneer and railroad worker in early Western Colorado. He also discusses his own railroad career and his immigrant family life. 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.
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Bertha Schlegel discusses growing up in Loma, Colorado and helping her family raise beets for Holly Sugar, and making sauerkraut, pickled apples, pickled watermelon and other ethnic food with her mother, who was a German immigrant from Russia. She also remembers her education and school activities throughout her childhood, including field days at the Fruita Central School and Grand Junction High School. She talks about obtaining a teaching degree,...
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In this recording, Alta Nolan reads the memoirs of Cordelia Files. Files talks about the history of her parents and maternal grandparents who homesteaded in the Fruita, Colorado area in the 1890’s. She describes the fruit growing operation on the homestead. She recounts seeing the Ute people and Chipeta when they came in the fall to dry fruit from the orchard. She remembers early Fruita, with its dirt streets and plank sidewalks. She speaks about...
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Frank Mancuso talks about his early life in the Riverside neighborhood of Grand Junction, Colorado after immigrating from Italy, and about Grand Junction’s Italian American community. He also discusses his long-time employment working for the Denver and Rio Grande Railroad, fires to the ice house, D&RG roundhouse and the freight depot, playing baseball under the Fifth Street viaduct, several local people and buildings, and other aspects of area...
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Dr. Russell Paige and Lillian (Drew) Paige discuss the history of veterinary medicine in the Grand Valley, including the role of Lillian’s father Alston P. Drew as one of the first veterinarians on the Western Slope. The Paiges also discuss their various hobbies and their community involvement. The interview was conducted by the Mesa County Oral History Project, a collaboration of Mesa County Libraries and the Museums of Western Colorado.
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Anne Beauvais recalls friendships and games from her childhood in Grand Junction’s Lincoln Park neighborhood. She talks about attending the Lincoln Park School and Grand Junction High School. She remembers spending summers at the Lincoln Park Pool, playing outside at night under the streetlamps, roller skating in the basement of her house, and skiing at the Mesa Creek Ski Area during the winter. She speaks about her engagement to Lester Beauvais,...
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Stephen Johnson talks about his education and background as a horticulturalist, and opening Johnson’s House of Flowers in Montrose, Colorado in 1919. He speaks about moving to Grand Junction, where he opened a florist business of the same name in 1937. He describes his love of practical jokes, shopping with his sons for school clothes on Main Street, and the different businesses there. He talks about his son Bob Johnson, his friendship with Al Look...
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William Ela talks about his family’s arrival in the Little Dolores River area of Mesa County in 1881 and their establishment of the 2-V Ranch. He tells stories about his grandfather, the pioneer rancher and Grand Junction town mayor William Phillips Ela. He remembers his grandfather’s horse Looney and his escapades. He speaks about the dangers of travel to and from Glade Park in the early days. He recalls stories passed down about his ancestors’...
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Vesta Fitzpatrick talks about her mother’s skill as a seemstress and how she made the family’s clothes. She remembers family life and entertainment during her youth, her parents reciting poems, and her father’s storytelling abilities. She recalls taking care of the family from a young age after her mother became ill. She speaks about seeing Buffalo Bill’s wild West show in Lincoln Park and going to chautauquas in Collbran. She remembers the...
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During a panel discussion of the Mesa County Historical Society, Kenneth Baird discusses the settlement and incorporation of Grand Junction, the creation of the Grand Junction Town Company, early city government, town building, and early municipal ordinances. Professor Don Mackendrick talks about James W. Bucklin’s draft of a new city charter in 1910, which established a commission form of government. He mentions progressive reforms that put the...
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Harvey Ball talks about attending Grand Junction Junior College (now Colorado Mesa University) during its first year of existence, about the early teachers at the school, and the school’s creation. He remembers his employment as a manager of Piggly Wiggly and Safeway grocery stores in Grand Junction and Western Colorado from 1925 to 1971. He speaks about the local truck farms, agricultural associations, and dairies that supplied grocery stores....
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Al Look talks about his involvement with the International Newspaper Advertising and Marketing Executives, about his On Guard column in the Daily Sentinel, about taking the first aerial photographs of the Grand Mesa, and about the history of the Avalon Theater. He also discusses getting lost while hunting agates, the Lincoln Park Zoo, John Otto’s construction of trails on the Grand Mesa, and other aspects of Mesa County history. The interview was...
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In a two-part interview carried out over two days, Howard Shults talks about his experiences as a rancher and auctioneer on Colorado’s Western Slope. In part one, he talks about the arrival of his parents in Mesa County in 1903, their teaching careers at Pear Park and in Fruita, and his father’s move to a career as an auctioneer. He speaks about his childhood in Grand Junction and Collbran, his graduation from Grand Junction High School in 1923,...
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In this interview with Agnes Wright, early Mesa County resident, she discusses growing up in Grand Junction, Colorado and working with her family at the Colorado Telephone Company. The interview was conducted by the Mesa County Oral History Project, a collaboration of Mesa County Libraries and the Museums of Western Colorado.
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Glenn McFall discusses downtown businesses and business owners in Grand Junction, Colorado, as well as the shoe store he worked at for nine years, McConnell-Lowes. Glenn also talks about the involvement of the Ku Klux Klan in the Grand Valley area, the Mesa County Pest House and Smallpox outbreaks, the social scene and where people went to go dancing, the Mesa County Fair, horse racing and gambling, bailing rowdy cowboys out of the local jail, Eddie...
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Wyatt Wood describes his time as the manager of the Grand Junction Chamber of Commerce and talks about the people he met there, including John Otto, who at one time was allowed to keep a desk in the Chamber office. The interview was conducted by the Mesa County Oral History Project, a collaboration of Mesa County Libraries and the Museums of Western Colorado.
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Early Fruitvale resident Velma E. Budin discusses the history of Fruitvale and Fruitvale High School, the extensive pioneering history of the Borschell family in the Grand Valley, the biographies of several prominent Fruitvale families, fruit farming, and early irrigation methods of the Grand Valley. The interview was conducted by the Mesa County Oral History Project, a collaboration of Mesa County Libraries and the Museums of Western Colorado. *Photograph...
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In the second 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 and 1960’s. He talks about playing the piano and touring the Western Slope with the Star Lighters, an orchestra from Grand Junction. He plays the piano piece, “Back in Your Own Backyard” and speaks about arranging music for other performers....
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In the third 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 and 1960’s. He talks about traveling to Black Canyon with his friend Al Look. He remembers many of the merchants that he met as an advertising salesman. He describes Grand Junction’s Diamond Jubilee celebration of its 75th anniversary as a city....
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Early Mesa County resident Virgil Hickman discusses farm life in Palisade and East Orchard Mesa, including irrigation ditches and dams, water rights of farmers and ranchers, hunting deer during the Great Depression, the methods used in keeping peach orchards bug-free, weekly band concerts, making apple butter, and the Palisade Peach Festival. He also talks about building Skyway Road on the Grand Mesa with picks, blasting powder and horses. This recording...