Turn on the tap, water pours out. We take it for granted. But our water was hard-fought in the early 20th century by some of the Roaring Fork Valley’s legendary champions of water rights. In the late 1880s, Glenwood Springs attorney Edward T. Taylor dealt mainly with cases involving land and water issues. Particularly concerned […]
History
Posted inBusiness
Crystal Valley Echo flips the page
Just up the Crystal Valley, in a cabin on Redstone Boulevard, Gentrye Houghton has kept busy behind the keyboard, often basqued in the blue light of her laptop late into the night to get The Crystal Valley Echo to print. While the winds of the Pacific have whispered in her ear that it’s time to […]
Posted inColumns
Historiography: The last picture show
“Carbondale History, 1887-1976,” by the Carbondale Study Club (1976): In the early days of the town, there was a motion picture theater on the north side of Main Street [351 Main, now The Pour House]. Every week there was a show … on Wednesdays and Saturdays. Admission was 10 cents for children and 15 or […]
Posted inColumns
CVEPA Views: Earth, water, fire and air!
Woe is us. Yes, the millions of people in the Great American West who depend on the snowpack for 80% of our water. This year has shaken us to the bone. Apparently, there was a warmer and drier year, winter 1980, that we are competing with. Oddly, more prominent in people’s memory was the terrible […]
Posted inNews
Thompson House gets some TLC
The Thompson House is of particular significance to Carbondale, being the only structure in town on the National Register of Historic Places and the home of the homesteading Thompson-Holland family, including Hattie Thompson, who passed away in the house in 1944. Setting foot inside is like stepping back in time, with many items of the […]
Posted inNews
Local time capsules preserve Valley histories
… Time, flowing like a river Time, beckoning me Who knows when We shall meet again, if ever But time keeps flowing Like a river to the sea … ‘Til it’s gone forever … Unless, of course, it’s properly preserved, to counter that line from the 1980 Alan Parsons Project song, “Time.” Indeed, time does […]
Posted inNews
Year in Review 2025
For many, 2025 was a challenging year. Institutions, identities, entire industries were foundationally rocked. Notably, the list of obituaries was exceptionally long and included many community staples. For months, there were protests nearly every week. From outer instability, we were challenged to draw on inner strength and the Roaring Fork Valley rose to the occasion. […]
Posted inColumns
For What It’s Worth: The Sopris Sun continues to be community journalism at its finest
Community journalism has been the very definition of my more than three decades in the trade. And I couldn’t love it more than in my current role as one of the many freelance correspondents for The Sopris Sun. My very first byline, aside from student publications, came as a young journalism major in college, when […]
Posted inColumns
Historiography: Bountiful ladies of Carbondale
Alma Osgood, the wife of mining magnate John C. Osgood, founder of Redstone, was known as “Lady Bountiful” by the town’s residents because she lavished them with gifts, especially during the holidays. Carbondale’s equivalent was Mary Jane Francis, a wealthy widow from Philadelphia who bought the Bull Dog Mine on Avalanche Creek. She helped found […]
Posted inColumns
CVEPA Views: McClure lore and the road to power
At a town hall-style meeting in late 1971, the White River National Forest (USFS) presented its vision to designate the Chair Mountain-McClure Pass area as “primitive.” The area was basically untouched save for a horse and foot trail starting at the top of the 8,755-foot pass and an annual sheep grazing permit. There was, however, […]