Blog
Innovation with the Fascination
Explore over 100 years of photographic history of Northern Colorado through the work of father and son photographers Lew and Denny Dakan.
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April Fools: A Bad Joke for a Good Cause
In 1918, the citizens of Greeley were doing all they could to contribute to the war effort. Those at home made a difference through rationing, fundraising, and a bad joke.
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Military WAVES in Greeley
In July of 1942, women officially made a splash into the U.S. Navy when President Roosevelt signed into law a newly formed division, the U.S. Naval Reserve (Women’s Reserve), unofficially called WAVES or Women Accepted for Volunteer Emergency Service.
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100-Year-Old Unsolved Robbery
On December 26, 1918, the Greeley Post Office was robbed almost without a trace. The robbers made off with about $69,300 and the post office became the scene of the third largest theft of a United States post office at the time.
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Out of This World?
Detective Work at the Museum: Researching the Past Using Historical Sources
Remember back to your high school days when you had to write that pesky research paper? Or maybe you’re still in high school and you have a history assignment due. It can be a long process combing through dozens of books to find useful information; and in today’s age...
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Drilling for Health – Greeley’s First Artesian Well
Drilling for Health – Greeley’s First Artesian Well The acquisition of safe drinking water for early Greeley was no simple task. Discussions began in early 1883 when G. Law wrote to the Greeley Tribune suggesting that a well providing potable water could be...
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Filmmaking and Cowpunching
As the nineteenth-century came to a close, a rush of nostalgia for the “Western Frontier” captivated America. Cowboy filmmaker Charles Camp is one example of this. The films he produced, the “first and only ones ever made of a real Wyoming round-up,” represent some of...
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Angels in Black: Victorian Women in Mourning
The death of loved ones has always been a difficult subject throughout history. During the Victorian period, however, it took on new significance. After Prince Albert died in England in 1861, Queen Victoria, his devastated wife, lived the rest of her life publicly...
read moreThe Beginnings of Bicycles in Greeley
During the 1870s the “high wheeled bicycle” was invented. It was also known as the “penny farthing” or the “ordinary”. While it had two-wheeled predecessors, the high wheel was the first all metal contraption to be dubbed a bicycle. Bicycles in the 1870s were rare in...
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In May 1936, George Hodgson, former county commissioner and pioneer of Weld County, was appointed curator of the Meeker Museum to succeed A. B. Copeland who had died in March. During the interim, Mrs. Mary Geffs was acting curator. Mrs. Geffs, a historian in her own right and author of the book “Under Ten Flags, A History of Weld County, Colorado” took the Denver Post to task for a news dispatch they published from Ignacio. Buckskin Charlie, of the Ute Indian Tribe, had died and it stated that he was the leader of the party that rescued the women abducted during the so called “Meeker Massacre.” Geffs refuted the Buckskin Charlie statement with documented information and then asked the question, “why did the dispatch speak of the White River tragedy as a ‘so called’ massacre? What did it lack of the real thing?” The so called “Meeker Massacre” controversy is still relevant to today‘s historians with many different and justified points of view. The Hazel E. Johnson Archives has documents, books, and photographs encompassing this 1879 episode in Colorado’s history that has a direct link to Greeley.
Pictured: Josephine Meeker, Flora Ellen Price, and her children, Johnnie and May, after the Meeker Massacre and their release.