Memorial Day 2012

The rumble of freight trains and trucks is constant and the smell of diesel and the nearby refineries competes with that of the native flowers. But when Riverside Cemetery opened in 1876, Denver was a young city hoping to appear civilized by dedicating a park-like setting to remember its dead. In 1876, Decoration Day was also a relatively new observance, created to honor soldiers killed during the Civil War. 
Today, Riverside Cemetery is home to over 1,200 Civil War veterans, both Union and Confederate, who came to Colorado after the war to seek their fortunes in the gold fields, homestead, ranch or farm. Others found work on the railroads, as storekeepers, tradesmen, lawmen, politicians and preachers. Block 27, the Grand Army of the Republic (GAR) Block, is the location of the majority of Union soldiers buried at Riverside. 
The Grand Army of the Republic (GAR) was a fraternal organization open to all men who had honorably served in the Union Army or Navy, regardless of race. The motto of the GAR was "Fraternity, Charity and Loyalty" and the organization lived up to its ideals, with members looking out for former soldiers in the area. A needy veteran and his family might find a box of groceries or a load of coal on their doorstep. The fraternal was instrumental in obtaining increased government pensions, the creation of federal and state veterans' homes and government-supplied headstones. In Denver, any veteran who was financially unable to afford a funeral was given one paid for by the post.
As the veterans of the Civil War passed away, the GAR also faded into history. There are many ways to hear their stories at Riverside Cemetery, including several self-guided tours and booklets.
(Information about the GAR can be found in a booklet by Raymond C. Thal "The Civil War at Riverside" available from the visitor's center at Riverside, open Thursday and the 1st Wednesday of each month from 10:am to 3:00 pm. 5201 Brighton Blvd. Denver, CO 80216    303-293-2466) 
http://fairmountheritagefoundation.org/

Decoration Day 2012

Once a Major Employer...

ASARCO's Globe Plant, once a major employer in the Globeville and surrounding neighborhoods, is now vacant. According to Globeville I, LLC, remediation of the environmentally contaminated site is on schedule, with the demolition of the external buildings completed in March 2012. Once cleaned up, the site will be home to a new "Globeville Commerce Center" with a potential 1.1 million square feet of commercial space. Although restoration of the area has been a goal of the community for a long time, it is hoped that the stories of the men who worked there will not be lost. 

51st and Logan, October 2011

51st and Logan, January 2012

51st and Logan, May 2012

55th and Washington, July 2016

John and Katherine Peketz

The story of John and Katherine Peketz is one of opportunity and upward mobility in America. An immigrant from Slovenia, John Peketz is listed as a laborer in the 1905 edition of the Denver city directory, but by 1911 he is recorded as working as a bartender at John Predovich's saloon. In 1915, Peketz opens his own tavern at 4511 Washington Street.
Before Prohibition (Colorado went dry in 1916, four years before the rest of the nation) immigrant saloons operated as banks, social clubs and clearinghouses for newcomers where a recent arrival could get a drink, a good meal, news from the Old Country, a place to stay, a loan, and advice concerning jobs and meeting other young and single people from home. Tavern owners like Peketz knew everyone and everything happening in Globeville.
By Globeville's standards Peketz was prosperous, owning his own home and operating a successful business, but he never forgot his humble beginnings. Peketz helped found the Western Slavonic Association (WSA), a fraternal organization that provided financial help to families in case of sickness or injury. Katherine Peketz then formed a women's branch of the association, Holy Rosary Lodge, Number 7, which focused on service to the community. Using their business and fraternal connections, the couple then worked to raise money to build Holy Rosary Church in 1919. Their lives and contributions can be remembered in two windows in the church that feature St. Catherine and St. John the Baptist.
Top photo: John and Katherine Peketz in their grocery store. After Colorado went dry in 1916, many former taverns became grocery stores. Photo used with written permission from Don Snider
Second photo: 4511 Washington, site of the Peketz Saloon
Third photo: Location of Western Slavonic Hall, today the McDonald's on Washington Street. Photo used with written permission from Joe Sadar
Bottom photo: Peketz windows in Holy Rosary Church.

Western Slavonic Association
Holy Rosary Church

Commemoration of Holy Rosary School

The original photo is 24 inches long and shows Father John Judnic and 152 students posing in front of the Holy Rosary School building in September 1930. Completed in September 1928, the school was the dream of Holy Rosary parishioners, Slovenian and Croatian immigrants who sought to preserve the faith and heritage of their homeland.
Southern Slavs had arrived in Globeville during the 1890s and worked 12-hour days in the smelters, railroads and meat packing plants in hopes of building a better life for their families. Hard working and painfully frugal, they built their parish church in 1919, a handsome brick rectory in 1921 and began to collect funds for a parish school in 1927.
The school opened in September 1928, on the eve of the Great Depression, but was sustained by volunteer labor, bake sales, choir performances, raffles, and the dedication and perseverance of the Slovenian and Croatian community. For 40 years, Holy Rosary School provided a faith-based education to the Catholic children of Globeville.
The construction of two interstate highways through the neighborhood and industrial encroachment forced many residents to move from Globeville, and enrollment at the school dwindled. The school was forced to close in May 1969. 
Photos of each of the 40 graduating classes of the school were discovered in the former rectory in February 2010 and have been assembled, along with the students' names, in a small booklet. The publication is a touching tribute to the faith of these immigrant families and is available from the parish for a donation of $10.
http://holyrosarydenver.com
303-297-1962

                                       1929: Mary Marolt, Ignatius Mearsha, Rev. John J. Judnic, 
                                        Amelia Lesser, Lenore Theisen

Ironton

The 1880s were a heady time of optimism and expansion in Denver. The arrival of the railroads in the 1870s had fostered a sense of permanence - the rough frontier town was here to stay. Industries sprouted along the rail lines, and men looking for jobs followed. As the city's population exploded, real estate developers set to work.
William D. Todd, a prominent businessman who had extensive real estate holdings in Denver’s Five Points neighborhood, platted the Ironton Addition in 1881. Bounded by the Platte River on the west, Union Pacific rail lines on the east, 38th Avenue to the north and 32nd Avenue to the south, Ironton featured small plots for houses close to the factories, foundries and rail yards. In an era before streetcars or automobiles, it was a selling point that a person could walk to his job. Blocks of neat, cozy homes lay adjacent to heavy industries - 
Denver Fire Clay (33rd and Blake), Colorado Iron Works (34th and Wynkoop), the Ironton Machine Company (36th and Wynkoop) and the Union Pacific
It wasn't all work - the Ironton Social Club is listed at 3419 Delgany. 
A handsome school building was constructed at 36th and Delgany in 1890, part of the Denver Public School system, and some children attended Annunciation School in the Cole neighborhood (34th and Humboldt).

The industries that attracted workers eventually overtook the neighborhood, and families moved away. 

Today, the area is undergoing a metamorphosis with former factories and foundries being adapted by artists for studios and living spaces. Ironton is now part of the vibrant River North District, or RiNo, adjacent to Globeville and Denver’s Five Points neighborhood.
RiNo Neighborhood

This jewell on Brighton Boulevard, photo 

Swansea - a Real Estate Development

Smelting (separating the valuable metal from the ore) was the Holy Grail of economics in Colorado during the 1870s, holding out the promise of untold riches and prosperity to those who could make the process profitable. A new smelter gave rise to the village of Swansea, a real estate development relying on the promise of jobs in the smelter and affordable housing. 
The Denver Smelting and Refining Company was incorporated in 1872 by Hiram C. Bond, Mein Fisher and Charles Reuter near the junction of the Colorado Central and Kansas Pacific tracks (about 40th and Josephine). Promoters set to work immediately, laying out parcels for home sites and, in anticipation of growth, Episcopalians dedicated the cornerstone for a church. Bishop Randall gushed, “…we see the walls of the church rising almost simultaneously with the wall of the laboratory which is to detect and develop the hidden riches of the land.” * The city directory for 1877 lists several employees of the smelter, but by 1880, the business was foundering, while the Boston and Colorado Smelter was a resounding success at nearby Argo. Although the settlement of Swansea had a town council in the 1870s, and was partially annexed to Denver in 1883, the community never formally incorporated.

Nonetheless, the area grew. Cheap housing was available for men who worked at the industrial jobs in the area: railroads, packinghouses and the Argo, Grant, and Globe Smelters. Yet the neighborhood retained its bucolic setting with a sparse population, modest homes, small farms, dairies and ranches. As the population increased, the Swansea School was built in 1890 and served children from both the Elyria and Swansea neighborhoods. The Mt. Olivet Baptist church was built in 1891 on the 4500 block of Thompson Court and there was the 7th Day Church of God on the 4300 block of Clayton Street. A period of growth in the 1920s produced more opportunities for jobs with the Eaton Metal Works, Ralston Purina, Rocky Mountain Paper Company, Colorado Serum, Denver Serum, Sunshine Biscuit, and Brannon Sand and Gravel Company. The increase in families with children prompted the construction of an additional building north of the original Swansea School in the 1920s.

Today, the Swansea neighborhood is referred to as Elyria/Swansea and struggles to survive amid industrial encroachment, deliberate neglect by the city of Denver, and the proposed widening of I-70. 
(The citizens of both Elyria and Swansea came from a variety of ethnic backgrounds, but didn’t settle in ethnic enclaves. Both neighborhoods were annexed to Denver in 1902.)

*Rocky Mountain News, May 14, 1873

Affordable houses in the Swansea neighborhood

Eaton Metal Products still provides jobs in Swansea

The Purina Plant looms over the highway.

Elyria

Most people in Denver only know Elyria by the odor produced by the Purina Chow facility and only see the area from the highway that decimated the neighborhood. None of these current views does justice to the area.
Once a bucolic suburb marketed to people escaping the grime and industry of Denver, Elyria was platted on March 29, 1881 by Archie C. Fisk, President, and C. F. Leiman, Secretary, of the Denver Land and Improvement Company, who promoted “A Plan Whereby Every Man May Become a Householder.” * The company’s goal was “buying up cheap tracts of land adjoining the city and platting them into town lots, or garden patches.” The promise of horsecar lines with cheap fares attracted men who worked in the smelters, railroads, factories, and meat packing plants but who wanted to raise a family in a rural community away from those industries. The northern boundary was Adams County at 52^nd Avenue, the southern boundary was 38^th and 40^th Avenues, the western boundary was the Platte River, and the eastern boundary was Josephine, now extending all the way to Colorado Boulevard to include the Swansea neighborhood.

Although the settlers of Elyria objected to the smoke and soot from the industries in Denver and Globeville, they embraced any activity that would provide revenue - gambling, prize fights and around-the-clock drinking in 17 saloons. Elyria was a wide-open town.

As more families moved to the area, signs of civility began to appear. The Pilgrim Congregational Church was dedicated in 1884, the Elyria School built in 1885 and the town trustees set aside land for a park. A desire to improve city services and negotiate water, sewer, lighting and transportation convinced a majority of villagers to vote for incorporation in August 1890. An impressive town hall and fire department was constructed in 1894 with a large auditorium where plays, concerts and boxing matches were held.

Elyria’s residents thought of their town as a suburb, but the area was surrounded by the industries that provided jobs: the smelters, railroads, stock yards and meat packing plants. Although many of its citizens were immigrants, there was no concentration of any one group and no ethnic churches.
As Denver plans to widen the highway that destroyed the neighborhood, it might be worthwhile to look at what has been lost.

*Prospectus, Denver Land and Improvement Company, Rocky Mountain News, 1880

A great book about the area is Elyria: Denver's Forgotten Suburb 1881 - 1941 by Elizabeth L. Macmillan.

Matt Sadar Saloon 3rd and Powell Streets in 1903

photo used with written permission from Joe Sadar

4601 Race Street about 1960

photo used with written permission from Betty Macmillan

Modest homes 4736 Vine Street about 1960 

photo used with written permission from Betty Macmillan