Archive Search Results

Veda McBeth talks about people and places of Mack, Colorado, where her family owned and operated the general store in the early Twentieth century. She describes in detail the colorful hobos that she encountered along the railroad, the thousands of sheep in the Mack stockyards, and large sheep drives to Grand Junction. She also speaks about catching the Denver Rio Grande train from Mack to Grand Junction, the Uintah Railway, and the loneliness of homestead...

Howard McMullin discusses the history of early Grand Junction businesses and buildings, and biographies of early Grand Junction business people. The interview was conducted by the Mesa County Oral History Project, a collaboration of Mesa County Libraries and the Museums of Western Colorado. *Photograph from the 1916 Grand Junction High School yearbook of Howard McMullin as a sophomore.

William Raber talks about his family’s ranch in the Kannah Creek area of Mesa County, Colorado, and about the development of reservoirs and water projects, beginning with the city of Grand Junction’s diversion of water from Kannah Creek around 1910. He also talks about traveling by train with cattle that he intended to sell in Los Angeles, and about discrimination that he experienced during World War I as the son of German immigrant. The interview...

Lyn Lampert lectures about the Little Book Cliff Railway before a meeting of the Mesa County Historical Society (MCHS). In addition, the MCHS votes affirmatively on two resolutions to aid in the preservation of important local history sites. In the first, the MCHS votes to aid in the preservation of the Handy Chapel in Grand Junction, Colorado (the only surviving church building from the 1880s and the longtime home of the African Methodist Church)....

Glenn McFall talks about his various jobs around Mesa County and about witnessing the unveiling of Christo’s Valley Curtain installation in Rifle Gap. He also discusses fishing and battling snow storms on the Grand Mesa, the deer population around Mesa County, his experiences during childhood growing up in Clifton, the old Midland Trail automobile route, drinking and making bootleg whiskey, Italian-Americans making bootleg wine, the Book Cliff Railway,...

Gilbert Limberg talks about growing up in Grand Junction, Colorado in a boarding house run by his mother, and later on a small farm on Old River Road. He also discusses his career as a boilermaker for the Denver and Rio Grande Railroad, his ownership of the Artesia Motel on Orchard Mesa, his work repairing machines that were used to first pave Grand Junction’s streets in 1925, and the Uintah Railway. His wife Loretta Limberg also offers her occasional...

Dave Hinkle talks about coming to Western Colorado in the 1920’s, riding the rails in search of work, dealing with the railyard “bulls,” working the peach harvests in Palisade, and working for the railroad in ice cars packed with peaches. He recalls other jobs he held, including the Star mail route from Dragon Mountain to Somerset, ranch work for the D.R.C. Brown Ranch on Muddy Creek, and herding sheep on the Uncompahgre. He speaks about the...

Frank Simonetti Sr. talks about his arrival in the United States from southern Italy in 1914 and his eventual arrival in Grand Junction, Colorado in 1918, where he began a long career with the Denver & Rio Grande Railroad. He remembers a fire that burnt down the D&RG icehouse, the railroad shop strike in 1922, and working a seven-day work week for thirty years. He recalls different kinds of locomotives. Angela Simonetti recalls growing up in the...

Theodore Simineo talks about the history of violence between sheep and cattle ranchers near Whitewater, Colorado. He remembers helping to drive cattle over the Grand Mesa at the age of six, other aspects of cattle drives, and his life as a cowboy. He describes community dances that took place in Kannah Creek schools or community halls. He speaks about the transportation of cattle by rail from Gunnison and Whitewater. He talks about working as a coal...

In a Mesa County Historical Society lecture, Joshua Paul Britton and Charles Teed speak about the history, development and impact of the Uintah Railway, which had its headquarters in Mack, Colorado. 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.