A lonely marker off 44^th Avenue between Wheat Ridge and Golden is all that is left of one of the first towns organized in Colorado. Settled in 1858, the ghost town once called Arapahoe City lasted only about a decade.

Even before Pikes Peakers founded Arapahoe City, the first mining claims were marked on the spot way back in 1834 — 24 years before the Pikes Peak Gold Rush. These early diggings were the work of the Estes Party (presumably the same Estes who later founded Estes Park). The markers were discovered in 1858 on Coal Creek (originally called Arapahoe Bar and Vasquez Creek) by Colorado pioneer and prospector Marshall Cook.

In November of 1858, that same Marshall Cook and his comrades organized Arapahoe City, with Cook as president. Other prominent pioneers who lived there include Thomas Golden, namesake of the city of Golden; pioneer George B. Allen; John Hamilton Gregory, who discovered the Gregory Lode at Central City; and George W. Jackson, who discovered placer gold at Chicago Creek, today’s Idaho Springs.

Accounts vary about the population of the town during its short history, but in 1859 about 200 people were placer mining the creek. The Rocky Mountain News mentions the town in October of that year as a place of “much doing,” and a stage coach ran between Auraria/Denver and Arapahoe City every Monday and Saturday, returning the same day.

On December 8, 1859, the Rocky Mountain News announced that the residents of Arapahoe City had finished building a ditch that could be used for sluicing (a mining method):  “The ditch taps the river near Golden City, and is carried along a bench between the table mountains, emerging into the plain at their eastern base. A great number of claims have already been made, and work on them has been commenced for some two miles along the line of the ditch.”

Although an Arapahoe City post office operated during 1860 and 1861, the settlement failed to develop into a regular town. A good 70 log and frame cabins had been built on a platted grid, but nobody got around to constructing any churches or schools. In the late 1860s, the town faded away and vanished almost as quickly as it appeared. Some historical records indicate that many of the buildings may have been disassembled and rebuilt in the rival town of Golden.

This area later became part of the Wanamaker Farm, run by Jonas Everett Wanamaker. Pioneer Wanamaker became a wealthy and prominent citizen of the region who made his fortune in farming and hauling freight between Denver and Central City. He is also known for digging one of the first irrigation ditches in the region, the Wanamaker Ditch.

If you want to visit the Arapahoe City marker, you can find it by plugging these coordinates into your GPS or mapping software: 39°46′30″N 105°10′42″W.

A century ago, Denver was a notorious haven for a well-organized machine of hucksters, thieves, and bunco artists. When summertime hit, thousands of tourists came to Colorado, looking for sunshine, recreation and fresh air. These folks were followed by dozens of crooks who wintered in Florida and migrated to Denver at the invitation of the local kingpin, Lou Blonger.

Each summer’s fresh supply of “suckers” was scoped out by the gang. Those with the right amount of gullibility and greed were befriended by a “steerer,” who then introduced them to a “spieler,” or “mysterious stranger,” who then offered the tourist an amazing win-win proposition, usually involving a phony stock exchange or betting parlor in an office space rented and furnished by Blonger. These elaborate schemes were highly scripted, and often relieved the mark of tens of thousands of dollars (think back to the film, “The Sting.”)

Blonger’s buddies in city government, the police department and even among the city’s press were well paid to protect his “business,” and he operated for years without trouble.

That is, until 1921, when voters elected a new district attorney named Philip Van Cise. The story of how Van Cise brought down the Blonger gang is a fascinating tale of extreme secrecy, outside operatives, moles, bugs, and a clandestine jail created in a church basement. It also involves a couple of prominent citizens with ties to Broomfield – Philip Zang (of Broomfield’s Elmwood Stock Farm) and John K. Mullen (of Broomfield’s Colorado Milling and Elevator Co). So many Denver officials were on the take, Van Cise trusted almost no one, but he secretly raised money for his operation by canvassing a group of 50 or so honest citizens. This was no easy task — even the owner of the Denver Post, Harry Tammen, was a “best friend” of Blonger, who also claimed close relationships with the mayor and police chief of detectives.

Both Zang and Mullen contributed generously to Van Cise’s efforts. Furthermore, Lou Blonger kept his office in the same building where Philip Zang had an office. Van Cise wanted to install what was then called a “Dictaphone” (a bug) in the overhead lights of Blonger’s office. Zang, who had once managed the building, gave Van Cise a passkey to all the offices and introduced him to the janitor, who was recruited to swipe and deliver Blonger’s trash. Van Cise’s men also used Zang’s office as an entry point to access the wiring in Blonger’s office on the lower floor. The bug remained in place through most of the trial and when it was finally revealed during testimony, detectives were waiting in Zang’s office to pull the equipment out at a moment’s notice.

Lou Blonger’s mugshot

At the end of Van Cise’s carefully orchestrated attack, pulled off without the aid of the police department, Blonger and most of his henchman were escorted down to Cañon City for a long “vacation.” You can read the whole amazing tale in Van Cise’s well-written and sometimes hilarious, “Fighting the Underworld.”

The “Old Broomfield” area bordered by U.S. 36 and 120th Avenue is dotted with remnants and landmarks of historical interest, making life a bit difficult for those managing the 120th Avenue Connection project. The most prominent of these is the pair of grain silos on either side of West 120th Avenue at Old Wadsworth.

The silo south of 120th Avenue, now occupied by Randy`s Auto Service, was built in 1916 by J.K. Mullen, owner of the Colorado Milling and Elevator Co. The mill produced the company`s well-known specialty, Hungarian high-altitude flour.

The mill was managed by Fred Harrison from 1917 to 1941. When the Harrisons arrived from Kansas in 1917, Fred`s wife, Nina, must have been thrilled to live in a tent for an entire year. They brought their two young children, Merwin, 2, and Gerald, a baby. Fred finally created a living space in the mill`s warehouse, and eventually the company built them a home next door.

Mill owner Mullen enjoyed a reputation as a philanthropist, an “old school gentleman” and a generous employer, who enjoyed giving bonuses to his workers. He had five daughters and lived in a beautiful mansion at 896 Pennsylvania St. in Denver. Already a “millionaire miller” when he built the mill in Broomfield, Mullen made headlines in August 1906 after a somewhat scandalous melee with a wealthy neighbor.

On a Sunday afternoon, July 29, 1906, a relative staying in the Mullen mansion suddenly became ill. Mullen grabbed the phone to call a doctor, but he shared a party line with the Tyson Dines family. Dines was one of Denver`s most prominent attorneys.

When Mullen picked up the phone, Virginia Dines, a beautiful debutante of considerable reputation, was on the line talking to a young man. Mullen explained to Dines that it was a matter of life and death that she get off the phone for a moment and let him call a physician. Dines “answered him impertinently and told him not to ‘butt in.’” She carried on her conversation for another half-hour or so. Mullen`s entreaties grew more emphatic, to the point the poor lass wailed to Papa that Mullens had said she was “no lady.”

Papa Dines marched over to the Mullen home with something called a “dog whip” and a large revolver. He burst in and whipped the 60-year-old Mullen, knocking him down and pummeling his face. Nina Mullen and the five daughters jumped on Dines. The lawyer`s revolver dropped to the floor and he picked it up and waved it around the room. Nina Mullens screamed there was a man dying upstairs. Dines said he “did not give a **** if there were four dead in the house,” but strode out.

Dines was briefly arrested and his social position suffered considerably. Mullens sued for $50,000, but later withdrew the suit when Dines publicly apologized. It`s unknown what happened to the sick relative.

If you’ve ever wondered what life was like in the front range a century ago, you can poke around in the online Colorado Historical Newspaper Database or browse through old newspapers at the Mamie Doud Eisenhower library. You’ll find that at least a few things haven’t changed. For example, around New Years Day, 1913, Golden’s Colorado Transcript reported that a “monster” windstorm ripped through the area at “a velocity of at least a million miles an hour,” breaking windows, pulling down chimneys and uprooting trees.

     Other aspects of life are quite different: in 1913, the Golden Steam Laundry ran a wagon from village to village, picking up laundry from busy households. Hacks and livery stables continued to thrive, as did sellers of coal and wood. Broomcorn (Broomfield’s namesake) was big in the local economy, and farmers were encouraged to ship their crops off to Chicago by train, where the Coyne Brothers would sell the broomcorn on commission for a much better price than local buyers paid.

 Local papers printed a surprising number of health-related articles and ads. One notice reported that the new “cereal beverage” called Postum had cured all sorts of terrible ailments in a surgeon, making his hand “steady” again. Invented in 1895 by C.W. Post of Post Cereal Company, Postum is a caffeine-free coffee substitute, made from wheat and molasses. (You can buy it today on postum.com.)

1910 Ad for Postum

Plenty of cure-alls were available to those who believed, including Mrs. Winslow’s “soothing syrup,” which addressed the problem of teething children. According to the ads, the syrup would “soften the gums, allay all pain, cure wind colic and also cure diarrhea (and it’s absolutely harmless!).”

 Dr. Price’s Cream Baking Powder advertised itself as a protection against “alum food,” warning that the stuff is “not healthful.” Alum is a chemical that was used by bakers in the 1800s to make bread whiter. Today, it’s used in pickling and in deodorants. It has been approved by the FDA but is reportedly toxic in large doses.

Samuel Hahnemann

 Homeopathic medicine was widespread in those days. Invented by Dr. Samuel Hahnemann, a German physician who died in 1843, its aim was to replace the “purging, bloodletting and use of toxic chemicals” commonly employed by doctors. Early homeopathic physicians had success in treating scarlet fever, typhoid, cholera and yellow fever. Around the turn of the century, there were 22 homeopathic medical schools and 100 homeopathic hospitals in the USA, but most later closed under the influence of the American Medical Association and with the advent of pharmaceuticals.

 Denver city planners wanted to get city folks outdoors, and with this in mind they began developing the Denver Mountain Park system. They purchased chunks of federal land, declaring that they would preserve our natural forests and provide easy access for those seeking respite in the wild. Today there are 22 such parks. The first was Genesee Park, which hosts a small herd of bison, which you can often see when you drive into the mountains on I-70.

Bison in Genesee Park

The tom-cats squalling through the street,

At once have sought their still retreat—

But house dogs make the scene replete,

Growling o’er their rivalry!

You get the gist.

Christmas pyramid and Advent wreath (courtesy Wikimedia Commons)

Only a couple years later, in 1862, as civilization made its slow inroads, at least one merchant seemed determined to make something out of the holiday. In between the war news, notes about  the arrival of fresh supplies from the east, and an important announcement about the refurnishing of the Criterion Saloon, a shop called Floorman’s Confectionery offered “fancy toys for Children,” along with such delights as “pyramids or ornaments, creams, jellies, of every description.” It’s not clear what they meant by “creams and jellies” but I bet they were pretty tempting at the time.

In case you’ve never heard of it (I hadn’t), a Christmas pyramid is a contraption of varying degrees of complexity that originated in Germany. It is held together with a central axle to which are attached one or more platforms. Each platform is decorated with holiday displays (angels, nutcrackers, tiny gifts and so on) and a series of candles. The whole thing is topped by a propeller. Here’s the cool part: When you light the candles, the rising heat causes the propeller to turn, which turns the axle, which turns the entire apparatus. Very charming (and very expensive to purchase today).

Another thirty years later, Colorado was a state, civilization had arrived and the holiday season was celebrated properly, with Christmas trees, lights everywhere, and all kinds of fattening treats. Customs popular at that time included burning a Christmas candle in one’s front window, and lighting a yule log. In addition to being a yummy chocolate sponge cake rolled up in the shape of a log, a yule log is a large log that you were supposed to fetch from your own land. Custom dictated that you save a bit from last year’s log (wrapped up under your bed) and this piece was used as a sort of kindling to get the new one started. Once it was going, the yule log was to burn for 12 hours while folks huddled around the fire spinning yarns and drinking cider. According to legend, failure to correctly perform any of the yule log rituals would bring an entire year of bad luck to the hapless household.

Not surprisingly, although frontier Colorado was home to plenty of Jews and a good number were prominent citizens, Hanukah was largely ignored by the newspapers of the day.

Giant Christmas Pyramid in Dresden, Germany (Courtesy Wikimedia Commons)

We’ve all heard of the classic one-room school houses that dotted the mostly uncivilized landscape of the Old West, and Broomfield was no exception. In our earliest days, we had two such schoolhouses, both built sometime in the 1880s. The first was the Broomfield School; the second was the Dry Creek School, which was subsequently renamed the Lorraine School. The Broomfield School was located around today’s East 10^th Avenue and Main Street. The Lorraine School sat on today’s northeast corner of 112^th and Pierce Streets.

Schools in those days were about as low-tech as you can get – there were no laptops or iPads, and nobody was texting their friends. Students either walked to school or rode a horse, which they stashed in the shed out back during the school day. Since plumbing hadn’t quite made its way west yet, the kids used an outhouse – as they likely did at home. In winter, a pot-bellied stove probably provided heat for the classroom.

One early teacher at the Lorraine School was Miss Katherine Jones, who taught there in the 1890s. In 1892, she married Frank Church, the son of local pioneers George and Sarah Church. Frank and Katherine’s son, Marcus Church, attended the Lorraine School from 1906 to 1913.

A few decades later, another Lorraine schoolteacher was Miss Emily E. Kruegel. In 1923, she married early Broomfield beekeeper, Miles Crawford. Apparently, Miss Kruegel used the standard disciplinary tool favored by teachers of the era – a sharp whack on the knuckles with a ruler.

In the 1930s, the Lorraine School was moved to West 119^th Place.  It was later either moved again or destroyed. In 1952, the white Broomfield School was moved by Miles Crawford to 11975 Vance Street. There it still stands today, now used as a residence. The town then built a new brick school at the old location but that building was destroyed in 1958.

One interesting note about these schools is that they served kids only up to the eight grade. If you were free to continue your education through high school, you headed to nearby towns such as Louisville or Lafayette.

Another early school in the region was the Mandalay School at 10290 Wadsworth. The Mandalay was built by locals in the 1920s on land donated by the Church family. It was reportedly built using wood from the Bullwhackers’ Bunkhouse, which was part of the old Church’s stage stop. A local coal miner named Frank Miller dug the school’s basement by hand.

This school remained in use until sometime in the 1950s when the Juchem School was built at 9555 Yarrow Street. The Mandalay School building then became a community center and later the Mandalay Bible Church. Over the years, community activists and history lovers have rallied around the building and protected it from destruction and decay. It still stands today at the corner of Wadsworth and 103^rd Avenue in what is now Westminster.

In late September a small crew from the City of Broomfield was out at the pond with a truck. They pulled out a blue spruce that had died because of the drought and replaced it with a piñon pine. The tree was part of a memorial dedicated to the pond’s namesake, a young lad named Josh Cassell.

Memorial at Josh’s Pond. Photo by David R. Jennings of the Broomfield Enterprise

With the crew was Josh’s dad, Ron Cassell. Folks from the City had phoned him and let him know about the tree, so he drove down from Fort Collins to take part in this quiet and touching gesture.

Josh Cassell was born in 1981 with a heart defect. At only four months old, he endured heart surgery, then went through another surgery at two years old, during which he was given a new heart valve. As a boy during the 1980s, he lived with his parents in a house overlooking the pond, which at that time was called Lac Amora Pond. Josh and his best friend, Reed Ferrari, spent long happy days at the pond, fishing and chasing frogs.

When Josh was ten years old, something went wrong with his heart again, and the young boy passed away in the hospital. A couple years later, in 1993, a neighbor who had befriended Josh passed a petition around the neighborhood and presented it to the Broomfield City Council. The Council passed the petition and, as a result, the City renamed the pond “Josh’s Pond,” installed the memorial to Josh and planted the blue spruce nearby. A few years later, Josh’s mother also died, and Josh’s dad moved out of town.

Josh Cassell. Photo courtesy of Ron Cassell

Josh Cassell has not been forgotten by those who knew and loved him. Ron Cassell says that, years later, Josh’s friend Reed won a trophy in a state wrestling championship and dedicated it to Josh. Recently, Councilman Mike Shelton noticed that the blue spruce did not make it through last year’s dry winter and notified folks at Broomfield Park Services.

The new tree will need to be nurtured for a few years by way of a water truck, and they hope the more drought resistant piñon pine will fare better than the spruce. In all, the tree, the memorial, and the pond itself are a fitting tribute to a young boy who loved the outdoors.

A century ago, the labor union was much more pervasive in American society than it is today. Not surprisingly, Labor Day was a very popular holiday, celebrated with big events in just about every town in the Front Range.

Denver traditionally hosted a big Labor Day parade. In 1903, the parade featured 7,000 union members, all dressed in uniforms made specifically for the event. The frontier Denver department store, Daniels & Fisher (precursor to May D&F) awarded a banner to the best looking group of marchers, in this case the Painters and Decorators union. Second prize went to the Plasterers’ union.

Labor Day poster from 1909 New York

A list of the special mentions handed out at the Denver parade provides a fascinating peek into the broad array of occupations that were unionized in those days: the “Typographical Union, the Allied Printing Trades, Carpenters and Joiners, Tile Setters, Job Pressmen, Theatrical Union, Bill Posters, Boiler Makers, Book Binders, Blacksmiths, Brewers, Stationary Engineers, Stonecutters, Plumbers, Lathers, Electrical Workers, Building Laborers’ Union, Stone and Granite Cutters, Steam Fitters, Butchers, Tailors, Horseshoers, Machinists, Roofers, Retail Clerks and Mattress Makers.” (Colorado Transcript, September 10, 1903.)

At Lakeside Amusement Park, Labor Day in 1908 saw a “monster barbecue” designed to feed 40,000 hungry visitors in honor of organized labor, hosted by the “White City management” (among whom were the Zang family).

In 1914, the city of Golden paid tribute to the labor union with all sorts of amusing events, including a race just for “fat men,” chasing a greased pig, a burro race, “ball throwing for ladies,” “broncho” and steer riding, plus a dance in the evening at the Armory, featuring “Biddy’s Golden orchestra.” (Golden Transcript, September 3, 1914). These Labor Day events were organized by the Woodmen of America, a fraternal organization whose main purpose was to supply life insurance to its members (the death benefit included those strange tree stump gravestones you see in the old section of cemeteries).

Women’s typographical union

In 1903, the Labor Day parade in Pueblo saw nearly 15,000 union members marching, a parade so long it took an hour to pass a single point. The town of Loveland still hosts its traditional Labor Day corn roast. Colorado Springs 1902 boasted a parade of 2,500 unionists, all wearing “elaborate” uniforms or badges that represented their livelihood, watched by 30,000 spectators. The Painters and Decorators won first prize in this parade as well.

In 1892, Lafayette celebrated Labor Day with a “trotting race,” where the horse pulls the driver around in a two-wheeled cart, called a “sulky.” In a trotting race, the horse must trot in a particular way – usually the right front leg in unison with the left rear, and vice versa.

The town of Louisville, historically a hotbed of mining labor unions, still hosts Labor Day parades that attract more than 25,000 people, although nowadays it’s billed as a “Fall Festival – Labor Day Weekend,” rather than a celebration of organized labor.