Part 2

By Sandi Cameron

Cultural interests were catered to early on with plays, musical performances and other entertainment. The town also hosted traveling professional performers. The Floradora Girls and Harry Houdini were particularly popular acts staged at the Park Opera House, with tickets priced between 50 cents and $1.50. Organizations such as the Coronet Band, 20 plus men who performed around the Western Slope, and the Amazon Guards, obvious in local parades as an all-woman auxiliary of Grand Junction’s local chapter of the Colorado State Militia, formed. The Modern Woodman Military Band was composed of union members: printers and railroad men. A uniformed Ladies Columbine Band was also a popular attraction. The Independence Day parades, as well as others, were well attended. Many cultural and educational venues were direct results of the establishment of schools.

Competitions of hose cart companies from area towns were favored entertainment. Grand Junction’s volunteer firemen were first sponsored by James Cameron in 1889. Sporting elaborate uniforms, the men competed in races with the hose carts, ending with a showing of sprayed water. The first actual fire they fought was in 1889 at the Denver and Rio Grande repair shop, but few fires posed problems in the first few decades of the town’s history. In 1895, the team set a world record in Telluride, pulling the cart 150 yards, connecting the hose to a fire hydrant, and bringing water to the spout in 16.4 seconds.

Recreational and competitive sports have been popular throughout Grand Junction’s history. A photo of men ice skating in 1892 is owned by the Museum of Western Colorado. Baseball was then America’s most popular sport, so the Grand Junction civic baseball team was highly favored. In 1895, the high school football team was organized. The YMCA, housing a gym and dining hall, opened its doors in 1908 and sponsored a variety of healthy activities. At least two bicycle clubs participated in organized activities. Holiday tug-o-wars were common. Hunting, fishing, picnicking, camping and hiking excursions were popular for locals and visitors alike.

Two small trolleys were in use from 1890 to 1903, conveying passengers on a narrow-gauge rail system from First to Seventh Streets, with a few perpendicular side street routes. By 1909, an electric interurban street car system was in place, serving the “Fruit Belt” route from Grand Junction to Fruita until 1935.

Many denominations, such as Baptist, Catholic, Congregational and Methodist, served the community during the first few decades. Churches were central to inspiring quality living standards and giving assistance where needed. Small, well-built houses, sometimes with Victorian style-trim, were in vogue in Grand Junction by 1900. By 1901, with the assistance of Scottish-born philanthropist Andrew Carnegie, Grand Junction had its first public library. The Daily Sentinel, founded in 1893, became the dominant newspaper.

The Grand Valley National Bank, later the First National Bank, was an impressive stone building created in 1887, which boasted the first electric elevator (1910). The building was not unlike the older towered banks still standing in Delta and Telluride. Also begun in 1887, the County State Bank, later the U.S. Bank, was situated in the Canon Block. “Ollie” Bannister opened what would become the multi-generational Bannister Furniture Company in 1897. By 1900, Grand Junction was home to 2,500 citizens, while the Western Slope boasted a population of 4,000. The Mesa Flour Milling Company was established in 1906, selling flour under the brand names of Mesa and Imperial. By 1906, the first automobiles were seen driving through the town. Electricity and telephone service were introduced, with a couple hundred homes benefiting in Grand Junction. Still a favorite, Benges Shoe Store began operations in 1911.

During this time period, a thousand railroad cars full of local fruit were shipped annually to many major cities. Because the local cherries, peaches, pears and apples were becoming well-known through good advertisement and awards in agricultural competitions around the country, fruit-growing was a major industry of the valley. Well-developed orchards were selling for $300-$1,000 per acre in the 1890s. Annual fairs became the norm, and President William H. Taft, on his way to dedicate the Gunnison Irrigation Tunnel in 1909, crowned Grand Junction’s “peach queen.” Within two years of this visit, he established the Colorado National Monument under the Antiquities Act. (Their Centennial celebration continues throughout 2011.)

Photo Gallery

Historic Grand Junction 2

In general, business was booming. A community with a great heart was continually developing a rhythm, a style. Who might have dreamed while staying at the roughly constructed Grand Junction House in 1882 that such a town would exist in a mere 30 years? Dreamers become doers, and Grand Junction became a reality.

(Author’s note: With thanks to Dave Fishell’s The Grand Heritage, Carl Ubbelohde’s A Colorado History, The Museum of Western Colorado, and the National Park Service for dates and information contained within this article.)

All photos courtesy of the Museum of Western Colorado.