When my family and I ar-rived at the Birmingham, Ala., airport on the July

4th we imme-diately noticed two things drastically dif-ferent from Colorado — a serious slow-down in the pace of life and the sticky hu-midity.

The speed of things isn’t what we are used to. Speech is sluggish, move-ment is relaxed

and even the highway speed limit is only 65 mph. You’d expect drivers to push that, but the opposite was true. Most didn’t even approach the maxi-mum.

After a 90 mile drive we reached

our destination.In north east Alabama, in Chero-

kee county is the city of Centre (pronounced center). It’s near Wiess Lake, a large manmade chocolate milk colored body of water.

My maternal grandparents live there in a modest home on a grass covered piece of lake-front property.

Each year their seven children and some of my many cousins try and vis-it around Independence Day for days fi lled with boating, eating, jet skiing, giant-slip-and-sliding, huge fi reworks and other assorted adventures.

While driving around and visiting Centre, the similarities it shares with Berthoud quickly became obvious.

Both places have a serene, calmer way of life. Things aren’t as rushed. There is also a sense of community pride. Everyone seems to know and care for each other and agriculture is an important economic driver.

Although Centre has a Wal-Mart at the end of town, the Piggly Wiggly is the place to grocery shop, similar to Berthoud’s Hays Market.

Each city also has several cute, pri-vately owned retail shops. However, Centre has four different “dollar” stores, the kind where everything is a buck or less. I’m not sure why a small town needs four, and I assume it’s a “southern thing.”

Like Berthoud’s “Fickel” name here, there they have “Pruett.” An island on Weiss Lake, a gas station, restaurant and other establishments carry the locally recognized name.

Fishing is a constant in Centre. Here we have Carter Lake and many travelers can be seen heading that way, driving west on Mountain Av-enue with their boats in tow to hope-fully catch something.

Although the two towns share sim-ilarities, there are clear differences.

A big one is in the attitude toward exercise and healthy eating. Colorado is ranked high on the lists of healthi-est states. Alabama is not, and it shows.

I found myself quickly falling vic-tim to the delicious allure of deep fried everything, including catfi sh and hush puppies, also the buttery tart goodness of collard greens and for some reason Little Debbie Zebra Cakes. I know they aren’t exclusively southern, but those things beckoned me like a seductive nymph during our stay.

Here in Colorado we are usually offered assorted vegetarian and low calorie menu options and a large se-lection of salads, which guilt us into eating healthier. Not so much there.

Of course after attempting to blame my overindulgence on lack of

choice, it was time to run off the calo-ries. I headed out one morning in an effort to run a few miles.

Bikers or joggers in Berthoud are a common occurrence; nothing about seeing them is too surprising. They have specifi ed paths, back country roads or at the very least courteous drivers that share the road with them on main streets.

But in Centre runners have no specifi ed paths, very little sidewalk and drivers don’t know how to react when sharing the road with some-thing other than a vehicle. Mostly they offered strange looks and their thoughts seemed to resonate with a strong southern drawl, “Now what’s he running from?”

After days of torrential rain, bug bites, strange rashes and discovering bizarre unidentifi able creatures, as well as lots of tiring fun, packing up and returning to the Birmingham air-port was a welcomed experience.

The south was my home all the way through high school graduation. While it was good to visit again, at the end of the day we were all ready to return home.

Both here and there are unique, and still share many likenesses. But no matter how much they have in common, there’s no other place we want to live like our Colorado home.

To the editor:I want to publicly thank my entire

group of sponsors: Brick Oven Pizza, Whistle Stop, Lonetree Mechanical,

Jamie & Friends, Aslan Construction, RE/MAX Town & Country, Blondie’s Place, Gage Electri-cal, Da Bean, Home Town Liquor, my mom and dad, and brother Justin.

Although I didn’t win Miss Colorado Jr. Pre-Teen 2013,

I had so much fun and I learned a lot about the pageant and about myself. I also got to meet many of the 113 other contestants. I made many new friends.

Thank you again,

Paige BauerBerthoud

To the editor:A newcomer’s view of Berthoud - OK

so we are not newcomers … we are old timers, of sorts, who have become newcomers. I remember my fi rst real experience of being a newcomer in a town in Colorado. It was in 1983 and my husband and I had just purchased a new home in Louisville. The interest rate was 12.5 percent. The excitement about our new home was something we rejoiced in everyday. We would go and see our vacant lot and imagine where the trees would go, how we would add sod and decks and make it our own and imagine with great joy what our family would be like. We had found the great

dream of home ownership in our late 20s and early 30s. Life progressed and time passed. We made other moves in Boulder County, ultimately raising our two children there.

I grew up in the village of Proctor, Ver. It was and still is a true New Eng-land Village of 2,000 people. I go back at least once a year. I see the same beautiful and charming old homes that were there when I grew up. I remember the families who lived in the homes and I walk the solid marble slab sidewalks that I walked as a child. I al-ways go for a walk around town when I am there and although it is still the same village, a few of the faces have changed or the elderly members of the families I grew up around have passed away and the family may have sold the property to a young new family. The schools are excellent and the children in general, excel at their education because of the strong support from the community. I know in my heart, I was always wishing that at some time in my future I would fi nd a place like my home village in Vermont; somewhere in Colorado.

By chance, magic and grace we found our home in Berthoud many months before we actually decided to make an offer to buy it. We didn’t do much research about Berthoud before we closed on our property; it was really our “gut” feeling that buying here and the decision to live here was the right thing to do. Berthoud and the agricul-tural land around it are more like my home town in Vermont than anywhere I have seen in all the years I have lived in Colorado. We closed on our home

here in late May and then we discov-ered more and more magic when we moved in … the brewery in town, the shops on Mountain Avenue, the swim-ming pool where I can swim laps on a summer morning, the nice and polite teenagers in town who seem to be an included and a vital part of Berthoud, the A & W drive -up with service at the window of our car like the 50s when we were growing up, the local farmer’s market, Darlene’ s pies … great coffee, easy access to everything and the very best of all: free and easy parking!

On Berthoud Day, 2013, I had lived here only a few days. I went into town and I didn’t know a soul. I saw so much pride, interaction and excite-ment about the event. I was glad that day that I wore my sunglasses because my eyes welled up with tears as every

fl oat, scout troop, baton twirlers, young dancers, World War II Veterans, descendents of the town founders, old cars and John Deere displays went by. I knew on that day that I was home … I found a real home in real Berthoud, Colo. I found my village!

Our family took a vacation last sum-mer to Camden, Maine where some of my ancestors are from. We kept seeing the saying on t-Shirts and memorabilia from the area … “I wasn’t born here but I got here as fast as I could.” I defi -nitely feel that way about Berthoud, Colo. I didn’t really know what I was looking for, but ended up fi nding it …

I wasn’t born here, but I got here as fast as I could!

Ann FairProudly from Berthoud

Page 6 Berthoud Weekly Surveyor August 1, 2013

A large number of early resi-dents of Berthoud and the Lit-tle Thompson Valley came to

the region during the Pikes Peak gold rush of the 1860s. While only a handful of them uncovered mining claims that yielded riches many remained to fi le homestead claims and pursue business opportunities in the Colorado Territory. Berthoud’s Peter Turner, among many other local residents, was among the gold seekers who settled in towns and

on farms after it became ap-parent that they weren’t likely to get rich by pan-ning for gold or sinking a mine shaft. Turner who founded the town of Berthoud in 1883 was one of the few who prospered as a miner and a businessman.

While Colo-rado’s mining camps were gen-

erally located in the mountains in 1879 there was a gold rush to the foothills of the Little Thompson Valley. In January of that year the Fort Collins newspaper reported, “On Saturday last we made

a visit to the new mines on the Little Thompson. Great excitement prevails and at least fi fty men were there, all with fond hope of striking something. The town of Berthoud was represented by J.W. Everhard, John Ish, Lewis Cross and two of his sons. Headquar-ters seem to be at David Lykens’. Judge Owens, of Boulder, was on the docket. Mr. Lykens conducted a party of us to his claim about a mile above his ranch on the Little Thompson. Mr. Lykens is an old California miner of ’49 but after all his experience he says that over this discovery he is non plussed. He & Co. have taken the above claim of fi fteen hundred feet square. The lead is some fi ve or six feet in thickness and above the ore is found a covering of decom-posed mineral matter which resembles chalk ... We also visited Wildcat mine in Wildcat Gulch owned by H. Kruger and Chas Meining. Some of the ore looks well but as yet nothing defi nite is known as to the richness of it, until the assay is made by Mr. Hill, which will be done this week.”

In 1879 David Lykens’ ranch was located on the south bank of Little Thompson creek behind the fi rst few ridges of foothills and the fl edgling town of Berthoud was the Lewis Cross homestead cabin, a train depot and a log school house on the river bottom.

One month later in February 1879 the Denver Daily Tribune debunked

the local gold rush when the newspaper noted, “In a conversation with Judge Owen, who has been investigating the Little Thompson excitement, we learn that the thing is a fraud. He says that Holland and Crocker of Longmont, made an assay, giving $8,991 per ton. A piece of identical rock assayed by Lawrence Thompson of Boulder, gave a trace of gold and one in silver. The excitement was undoubtedly gotten up by some Longmont fellows, by way of diversion, as a relief from the monotony of pitching quoits and whiskey.”

In the 1880s many miners-turned-farmers, including Peter Turner, fi led homestead claims in the Little Thomp-son Valley. Turner, who had struck pay dirt on claims near the Sunshine min-ing camp northwest of Boulder a few years earlier, came to the Little Thomp-son Valley in 1877 when he heard there was land open for homesteading along the course of a proposed railroad that would connect Longmont with the transcontinental railroad at Cheyenne. For his homestead Turner chose a 160-acre parcel that within a few months was intersected by what was known as the “Longmont-Cheyenne extension of the Colorado Central Railroad.” Even though Turner raised wheat on his homestead he frequently broke from farming to keep track of his mining in-terests near Sunshine where his claims were named the Golden Eagle, Hawk-

eye, Old Dominion and Emancipation.While there’s much more to Turner’s

role in Berthoud’s history, in 1890 when the town he founded needed fi rst-class accommodations, Turner built a hotel at the northeast corner of Fourth Street and Massachusetts Avenue with money from his mining days near Sun-shine. For that reason the two-story brick building that is now known as the

City Apartments has a direct connec-tion to Turner’s good fortune during the mining area.

There were, of course, other local residents such as F. Irving Davis and Fred Hartford whose successes at the Sunshine mining camp launched them into business in Berthoud in 1886. That, of course, is a tale for another day.

Photo courtesy of Berthoud Historical SocietyThe Turner House at the northeast corner of Fourth Street and Massachusetts Avenue in Berthoud was built by town founder Peter Turner in 1890 when the town needed a fi rst class hotel. Turner who had mining claims in the Sunshine mining district northwest of Boulder, used his wealth to improve the town.

Photo courtesy of Berthoud Historical Society

AND COMMENTARY

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Here and There

BERTHOUDWEEKLY

SURVEYOR“Covering all the angles

in the Garden Spot”

Volume 10, Number 31ISSN #1556-1585 USPS 023-132

Periodical postage paid at Berthoud, Colo., post offi ce

440 Mountain AvenueBerthoud, Colorado 80513

970-532-2252970-532-5424 fax

www.berthoudsurveyor.com

Publisher/Managing Editor Becky Justice-HemmannProject ManagerRudy HemmannAccount ManagerEli HopkinsGraphic Designer/Assistant Editor Susan RichardsSports EditorsJohn HallJan DowkerOffi ce ManagerJo BuckridgeContributing Writers & PhotographersCaroline CreagerKathleen DonnellyDebbie DraperSandy EllisMark FrenchJohn GardnerRudy HemmannMike HotkaDan Karpiel Heidi Kerr-SchlaeferKristi LeonardAnastasia MarcheseBob McDonnellStefani MessickSusan RichardsJames SkeenPublished weekly in Berthoud, Colorado, by the Berthoud Weekly Surveyor. The publishers reserve the right to edit, classify or reject any advertising or news copy. Liability for any newspaper error in an advertisement shall not exceed the cost of space oc-cupied by error. The publishers assume no liability for any ad-vertising which is not published for any cause. The publishers as-sume absolutely no obligation or responsibility for subject matter in copy placed by its advertisers or their agents. It is also under-stood that the advertiser and the agency placing such advertising jointly and severally agree to indemnify Berthoud Weekly Sur-veyor, LLC against all expense, loss or damage sustained by reason of printing such copy.Subscription rates are $32 per year to residents of 80513 and $42 per year to zip codes other than 80513. Postmaster: Please send ad-dress changes (Form 3579) to the Berthoud Weekly Surveyor, 440 Mountain Ave., Berthoud, CO 80513.

A LOOK AT BERTHOUD

The historical society and Mark French are interested in obtaining and copying old photos from Berthoud’s past. Please contact Mark at 532-2147 if you have any photos you would like to share.

Mining profits helped build Berthoud hotel in 1890

Surveyor Columnist

Mark French

Surveyor Columnist

Eli Hopkins