Tour of Historic Downtown Golden
Everett Block
1200 Washington Avenue
Built in 1873 (Everett Block), 1883 (Globe Building, annexed in 1920), 1961
(Ashton Block annexed in 1985)
Designed by James B. & Henry C. Baker (Everett Block)
Constructed by John H. Parsons (Everett Block)
Stonework by George Morrison (Everett Block)
Historic Entity - Metropolitan Barber Shop (Established
by Richard Lichtenheld in 1880)
Site of Remington Building (1864-1867)
Francis E. Everett, who once guarded the collection of the Mines Geology Museum with a saber, built this place to guard his bank's fortune in 1873. With one of the finest examples of stonework ever crafted by George Morrison in its arches, this building housed Golden's first bank (founded in 1868 by T.J. Carter) until its spectacular demise in 1884, when sitting mayor Everett committed suicide rather than face justice for losing the bank's money on the Valley Smelting Works. It became the dry goods store of John W. Prout, a noted miner throughout North America, who in 1915 rediscovered the famous lost Puzzle Vein at Rico, Colorado. In the early 1900s the building became the clothing store of Richard Broad Jr., another Golden Mayor, State Senator and personal representative of the Guggenheim family. In 1920 he expanded the building to engulf the Globe Building (809 12th Street), long the home of the Golden Globe newspaper under such prominent editors as Lt. Governor William Grover Smith, famous writer Edgar Watson Howe, Oscar Webb Garrison, and John W. Arasmith. The Globe, founded by John Sarell as the Golden Eagle in 1872, lasted until Arasmith was tragically killed with his family in an automobile-train accident in Nebraska, after which the paper spiraled into oblivion in 1919. After Broad retired, Ralph Ashton opened a Chevrolet dealership inside in 1930, which today still operates as Stevinson Chevrolet near town. Later Ashton tore down part of the addition and built the new Ashton Block, later assimilated into the rest of the building, which housed the venerable Metropolitan Barber Shop. After years of operating as Jack's (Owens) Pharmacy and Lilly Langtree's restaurant, the Everett Block nearly met a spectacular demise in 1984 when its central support wall collapsed on a noontime restaurant crowd during renovation. Heinie Foss rescued the teetering landmark and restored it as the H.J. Foss clothing store, named for his father, and it remains preserved today. (Images from left, top to bottom - Everett Block under construction in 1873, courtesy Ronzio Collection, Golden Landmarks Association Collection; Everett Block in 1880s, courtesy Denver Public Library Western History Department; Globe Building in 1898, courtesy Colorado Transcript; Ashton Block in 1961, courtesy Colorado Transcript; Francis E. Everett, from "History of Clear Creek & Boulder Valleys", 1880; Richard Broad Jr. in 1905, courtesy Colorado Transcript; William Grover Smith, courtesy Golden Globe)
Harrison Block
1206 Washington Avenue
Built in 1867
Constructed by Duncan E. Harrison (probable)
Historic Entities - Creekside Jewelers (Established by G.L. Muffley in 1902); Avenue Vision (Established by E. Ames Bader in 1949); Del's Tonsorial Parlor (Established by O'Brien in 1957)
Charter Jefferson County Commissioner Duncan E. Harrison, the contractor who built the Loveland Block, ambitiously built Golden's first triple-storefront block for his own in 1867. He opened his own drugstore in the central storefront of what was then a one-story tall building with a tile roof, set back from the street. He added a second floor late in 1867, and expanded the building to the Avenue, making it a handsome building topped with Italianate arched windows looking out from a public hall. Harrison's drugstore operated for over a century, while his storefronts changed from central doors and plate glass to a façade tiled in Modernist style by Darrell Hudson in 1947. Creekside Jewelers is the longest-operating place in the building today, opening at this location in 1902, departing for Denver and back and passing through two generations each of the Tierney and Plummer families. (Images from left - Duncan E. Harrison, courtesy Colorado Transcript; Harrison Block in 1880s, courtesy Golden Pioneer Museum; Harrison Block in 1893, courtesy Golden Globe; Harrison Block in 1940s, courtesy Denver Public Library Western History Department)
Opera House Block
1212 Washington Avenue
Built in 1879
Constructed by Robert Millikin & D.K. Lee
Historic Entities - Ace Hi Tavern (Established circa 1945); Foss Building Wine & Spirits (Established by E.L. Gallinger & Fred M. Root in 1903)
When Golden citizens clamored for a public hall worthy of their community in 1879, prominent businessmen Thomas Ward, James Kelly, John S. Moody, Leander Smith and Albert Townsend responded by forming the Golden Opera House Company and building Golden's grandest edifice to date. The Opera House Block was Golden's first 4-storefront building, with 80 x 60-foot opera hall above, led to by a wide staircase at the building's south end. Its auditorium and gallery seating 600 on wooden benches led to the kerosene lantern-footlit stage at the north end with a beautiful mountain scene curtain, a hall which in time became opera chairs, electric lights and a curtain of local advertisements. Here under longtime proprietor John Nicholls' leadership many Golden social events, graduations, rallies and fundraisers were held, stage performances from comedy to grand opera performed, and politicans as famous as Eugene Victor Debs and William Jennings Bryan spoke. Shakespeare tragedian John Shanks Lindsay met with bad audience luck here and went broke, but Seth Lake, an avid fan of the arts, set aside his bill and loaned him money. Lindsay paid him back, after going on to become a famous actor in the American west and south and author of "The Mormons and the Theatre". George M. Kimball, traveling actor and playwright for the King Kimball Komedy Kompany, met and fell in love here with audience member Margeurite West, daughter of George West, and an actress herself. The Opera House Block's ground floor, originally a row of plate glass storefronts, includes the Ace Hi Tavern, started as the Opera House Restaurant in 1879. Overall the building was originally Italianate styled, its upper floor windows all tall with flattened arches, topped by an ornate metal cornice. However, time took its toll on this landmark, the opera house closing in 1947, its cornice peeling off, and a main support truss breaking in 1956, causing a near collapse and fracture down the façade still faintly visible above the 4th window from the right. Repaired over time, the Opera House Block remains as one of Colorado's oldest entertainment landmarks, and one may still see the original pressed metal ceiling inside its northern storefront that was originally home to Sarell (now Meyer) Hardware. (Images in from left - Opera House Curtain, courtesy Colorado Transcript; Opera House Block in 1880s, courtesy Golden Pioneer Museum; John Nicholls, courtesy Colorado Transcript; building damage in 1956 with arrow pointing to facade crack, courtesy Golden Outlook)
Foss Building
1224 Washington Avenue
Built in 1913 (Foss Building), 1917 (Hertel Building, annexed in 1972), and
1934 (Safeway, annexed in 1951)
Constructed by H.W. Axtell (Foss Building); Charles J. Buckman (Hertel Building)
Historic Entities - Foss Building Wine & Spirits (Established
by E.L. Gallinger & Fred M. Root in 1903)
Site of Sancomb Building (1873-1910); Tramway Depot (1904-1959); Cox Building
(1910-1917)
What now comprises one of the largest commercial blocks of downtown Golden was originally three different buildings. The northern two were Spanish Mission Revival style storefronts, the central built in 1913 and northern in 1917 by Nicholas Koenig as speculative ventures; they became the drugstore of Henry Langenhan and clothing store of Luther Hertel. The southern building was also built speculatively, by Joe Pearson in 1934, and it became the first home of Golden's Safeway grocery store (southern 2/3rds), established by O.A. Nelson, and new home of the Colorado Cafe (northern 1/3rd), run by Chester and Mrs. Beckner. Henry J. "Heinie" Foss bought the drugstore after Langenhan's death in 1913, later to be claimed himself by the Great Flu Epidemic of 1918. His dying wish was for his wife Dorothy to save the store for his son, the younger Heinie (Frederick Allen Foss), who took the reins in 1937. Under his leadership the store in the tiny center building grew to engulf the Safeway Building (1951), renovating the whole to the Art Deco appearance the original store took on in 1941, and then to a contemporary Western appearance in 1961, with an upper floor restaurant that had long been his mother's dream. The Hertel Building was acquired by Foss in 1964 and renovated to the same Western appearance, becoming the Golden Squire clothing shop, and in 1972 the now-Cottrels clothing store moved a block west and Foss engulfed the building to become the largest store of its kind in the West. Safeway still operates elsewhere in Golden in its 4th home as well, having moved out of here in 1951. In 1993 the unified Foss Building was remodeled to reflect the appearance of the originals, complete with a mural by Robert Dafford depicting a number of places and people from Golden's past. In the early 2000s the upper floor was remodeled to become the Miners Alley Playhouse, which moved here from its original home in Morrison and is the first resident theatre company in downtown's history, right next door to the old Opera House. After Foss ceased being a drugstore and contracted to a purely liquor store in 2007, the building was re-divided into largely its original spaces with new entries installed where the original Foss and Colorado Cafe entrances were. (Images in rows from left - Safeway Building in 1940s, courtesy Gardner Family Collection; Foss Building in 1910s, courtesy Foss General Store; Hertel Building in 1932, courtesy CSM Prospector Yearbook; Foss Building in 1940s, courtesy Foss General Store; Foss Building in 1950s, courtesy CSM Prospector Yearbook; Foss Building in 1960s, courtesy Gardner Family Collection; Hertel Building in 1964, courtesy Colorado Transcript; Foss Building in 2000s, courtesy Gardner Family Collection; Dorothy Foss O'Byrne and Frederick Allen "Heinie" Foss, courtesy Golden Transcript; Foss interior with soda fountain around the 1930s, courtesy Gardner Family Collection; Foss interior with soda fountain around 1942, courtesy CSM Prospector Yearbook)
Linder Block
1215 Washington Avenue
Built in 1873
Designed by James B. & Henry C. Baker (original); John H. Linder (1902);
OZ Architecture (2007)
Constructed by John H. Parsons (original); John H. Linder (1902); Neenan Archistruction
(2007)
Stonework by George Morrison (original form); Chris Wolfe (2007 reconstituted
form)
The Lazarus facade of Colorado takes its form in the Linder Block which may be the only storefront around built from the ground up in three centuries. The gifted building team of the Baker Bros. architects, contractor John H. Parsons and stonemason George Morrison created this as their first work for owners Jonas M. Johnson, Thomas Crippen and James T. Smith early in 1873. Originally it was an Italianate building twice its present size, featuring great stone arched doorways corresponding to the windows still remaining above. Smith owned the north half of the building, while Johnson and Crippen owned the southern half, and it was originally known as the Smith Block. In 1878 H.S. Van Gorder established a hardware shop inside, which would continue to operate here for 83 years. In 1887 John H. Linder bought into the enterprise, buying it out in 1895, and soon eyed annexation of the Loveland Block to the south (a 2 1/2-story double-storefront block built by Loveland and Harrison in 1867). In 1902 Linder made his dream a reality, spending $10,000 to rebuild the facade and craft the two buildings into the Linder Block, a grand Neoclassical building standing 96 feet long with 4 storefronts, featuring plate glass storefronts and upper floor windows divided by Ionian pilasters topped with a great bracketed metal cornice. Over the years the hardware store took over most of the main floor, in later years owned by Mayor Joseph M. Kellogg, Oyer A. Saunders and Kellogg's brother Robert (a City Councilor), and the store's motto was "Variety and Quality." The northernmost part of the building long housed power company offices, starting with the Colorado Central Power Company in office in the 1930s. After the hardware store went out business 3/4ths of the Linder Block was destroyed in 1962 for an expansion of the Hesteds Department Store to the south. After serving a variety of purposes in the ensuing years, what remained of the building was taken down in 2006, save for the north wall and the facade which was salvaged, to be rebuilt a second time. Upon a new steel skeleton core structure the Linder Block was resurrected in 2007, and the facade which had been built in the 19th Century and rebuilt in the 20th was rebuilt again in the 21st, restored to its prior appearance with the addition of complimenting lighter brickwork which frames it. (Images from left and top to bottom - Linder Block in 1870s, courtesy Denver Public Library Western History Department; Linder Block in 1903, courtesy Golden Pioneer Museum; Linder Block in 2008, courtesy Gardner Family Collection; Interior of Colorado Central Power Company in 1930s, courtesy Colorado Transcript; Interior of Linder Hardware in 1920s, courtesy CSM Prospector Yearbook; Councilor Robert M. Kellogg, courtesy Colorado Transcript; Mayor Joseph M. Kellogg, courtesy Colorado Transcript; John H. Linder, courtesy Jefferson County Republican)
Ashworth Building
1213 Washington Avenue
Built in 1906
Constructed by Perre O. Unger
Listed on the Golden Historic Register
Site of Avenue Saloon (1875-1906)
Father and son Avenue Hotel proprietors William H. and Clyde L. Ashworth tore down the original hotel saloon and built this much more substantial replacement in 1906, fulfilling the plans laid out by previous owner Carlos Lake the year before. The Ashworth Building is the first place made of Golden-manufactured gray brick, and served as the saloon on the first floor with hotel rooms above. The saloon went down with the Colorado advent of Prohibition in 1914, and Fred Reimer replaced it the next year with his grocery of the Red & White chain of individual affiliates. After housing the historic Strawn bookstore in the 1950s-60s owned by Frank W. Strawn, this building has since housed Image Hair Designers, and its remodeled first floor storefront awaits restoration. (Images from left - Clyde L. & William H. Ashworth, courtesy Colorado Transcript; Ashworth Building in 1910s, courtesy Gardner Family Collection; Ashworth Building today, courtesy Gardner Family Collection; Frank W. Strawn, courtesy Colorado Transcript)
Avenue Hotel
1211 Washington Avenue
Built in 1870
Constructed by John H. Parsons & William H. Curry
Listed on the Golden Historic Register
Italian immigrant Charles Garbareno, seeking to have his own hotel apart from operating with his brother Louis, built this place as the City Restaurant hotel in 1870. Originally it looked much different, with a Second Empire-styled triple arched design of lower floor doors and upper floor windows with fanlights above. In 1871 Garbareno handsomely endowed this design with an ornate balcony made from eastern lumber. As the hotel, famous for Charley's pasta and ice cream, it passed through prominent hands like Archie M. DeFrance, John Chiovenda, and onetime Jefferson County Sheriffs Sidney S. Poe and Carlos W. Lake. The hotel balcony was used for many public speeches and events, until its final orator, City Councilor William Sweetser, went down with it in 1910. Lake, the son of Astor House builder Seth Lake, and partner Wells renamed this the second Avenue Hotel in 1904, and envisioned an expansion and renovation that afterward created the Ashworth building next door. During the 1910s the hostelry was renamed the Cody Hotel, after its most famous guest Buffalo Bill, who stayed here in 1907. This hotel operated for 67 years, until recently the longest tenure of any Golden hostelry. In 1937 Jack Rose remodeled it with its distinctive premodernist façade of yellow and brown brick with decorative patterns. Today the historic hotel rooms remain upstairs, now accessed through the Ashworth Building, while downstairs holds the safe of latter-day tenant World Savings. The first Downtown storefront to have trees planted in front (1871), the Avenue got them back in 1992. (Images from left - Avenue Hotel in 1871, courtesy Golden Pioneer Museum; Avenue Hotel in 1930s, courtesy Denver Public Library Western History Department; Avenue Hotel today, courtesy Gardner Family Collection)
City Tailor Shop
1209 Washington Avenue
Built in 1906
Constructed by Perre O. Unger
This little building started out a false front story shorter, built by Ashworth & Son as a companion to their Avenue Hotel to the south. After temporarily serving as the hotel bar until the Ashworth Building was finished, this became the home of the Metropolitan Barber Shop, ran here by Charles Herdic, which continues to operate at 807 12th Street as one of Colorado's oldest barber shops today, founded in 1880 by Richard Lichtenheld. In 1909 Harold Fremont, known best as Harry the Tailor, opened the City Tailor Shop here, a shop which continued in the hands of German immigrant August Berninghausen for over half a century. In 1963 the building's façade was remodeled and extended upward with Downtown's first false front built in nearly a century, and it became a furniture store. Today it serves as a gift shop. (Images from left - Charles Herdic, courtesy Colorado Transcript; City Tailor Shop in 1910s, courtesy Gardner Family Collection; Williams Building today, courtesy Gardner Family Collection)
Williams Building
1207 Washington Avenue
Built in 1901
Judge David L. Williams built this place in 1901, originally a rowhouse type building featuring a 3-sided bay window projecting from the upper floor residence. The building was first used as the Oxford Bar, run by John S. Gardner, among whose most notorious customers was friend and cannibal Alferd G. Packer. After the Oxford was busted for gambling, the Williams Building was a jewelry shop for many years, established by Clyde Gregory and later becoming Glenn Jewelers. In 1975 government agent Tom Lehmann opened Joyce's Subs here, once having to drop a half-made sandwich to respond to a bombing at the Denver Customs House. Over the years Joyce's ran successfully until it became the last of the Aurora, California-based chain of submarine sandwich shops. In 2000 Joyce's was renamed D'Deli, where it continues to serve subs today. (Images from left - John S. Gardner, courtesy Colorado Transcript; Williams Building in early 1900s, courtesy Richard & Heather Eckels Collection, Gardner Family Collection; Williams Building today, courtesy Gardner Family Collection)
McGee Building
1205 1/2 Washington Avenue
Built in 1901
Constructed by Perre O. Unger (probable)
This little hole in the wall was built by banker Jesse W. Rubey to fill the hole between his and Judge Williams' buildings. Its original tenant was Golden's first watchmaker, James A. McGee, the last home of a business that was a Downtown mainstay since 1874. Throughout its existence the McGee Building has served many niches for downtown, including the Western Union office and Golden Time Shop. Today it still reflects most of its original appearance, though the unique star-shaped ornamental woodwork is presently concealed by a modern front canopy. (Images from left - McGee Building in early 1900s, courtesy Richard & Heather Eckels Collection, Gardner Family Collection; McGee Building today, courtesy Gardner Family Collection)
Rubey Block
1201 Washington Avenue
Built in 1873
Designed by James B. & Henry C. Baker (original); Thomas, Dryden & Thomas
(1901); Eugene G. Groves (1931)
Constructed by John H. Parsons (original); Perre O. Unger (1901)
Site of Ward Building (1873-1901)
For 84 years this edifice served as Golden's bank, originally the Jefferson County Bank built by Louis J. Smith from Plymouth, Pennsylvania. Originally the northern 2/3rds of the present building, it was at first an Italianate structure, the third built by the noted team of Parsons, Baker and Morrison. Originally the building had a lower floor of stone arched openings corresponding to the windows above, elevated above a full basement that became the "cave" home of the Golden Globe newspaper. The bank outlasted its Everett competitor across the street but went down with the Silver Crash (governmental devaluation of silver, key to the Colorado economy) in 1893. It was succeeded by the bank of Woods and brothers Harold M. and Jesse W. Rubey that same year, and became the Rubey National Bank, a revival spearheaded by Jesse who was only 20 years old. In 1901 the Rubeys hired the prominent Denver firm of Thomas, Dryden & Thomas to add to and redesign the building into a grand Neoclassical style, replacing the arches with plate glass, turning the brick pilasters into fluted Corinthian design, and topping it all with a heavy zinc cornice of brackets, swags and shields, installed by John H. Linder. From 1903-13 the new southern addition housed the Golden Post Office. Over time crooks tried many times to rob this place, and in 1916 succeeded, only to find very little money available. Outraged, they set fire to the building, causing its main floor to collapse into the basement. Jesse Rubey rebuilt the interior, and in 1931 successor Edward A. Phinney remodeled the storefronts with Indiana limestone. That year the bank went down again with the Bank Holiday during the Great Depression, taking much of Phinney's personal fortune with it as he tried to rescue it for his customers. However, government-appointed bank trustee John Q. Adams so won the admiration of Goldenites that they begged him to stay and start the successor First National Bank here in 1937. The bank left for its present location at 13th and Jackson in 1957, and in 1968 this long-vacant space was renovated to its present appearance. The historic banking establishment still operates today as Wells Fargo. (Images from left - Rubey Block in 1898, courtesy Colorado Transcript; Rubey Block in 1901, courtesy Golden Pioneer Museum; Harold M. Rubey, courtesy Colorado Transcript; Rubey Block in 1931, courtesy Colorado Transcript; Jesse W. Rubey in 1905, courtesy Colorado Transcript; Bank tellers in 1931, courtesy Colorado Transcript; Post Office interior in 1903, courtesy Colorado Transcript; John Q. Adams, courtesy Colorado Transcript)
Loveland Cottage
717 12th Street
Built in 1859-1860
Constructed by James A. Dawson (probable)
Listed on the Golden Historic Register
This historic home is one of the rare remaining Gold Rush buildings of Colorado, built starting in 1859 by pioneer Justice of the Peace Reuben Borton. As later reminisced by George West, this home was "a rather recherche affair", made completely of cut boards, in an L-shape, and with ornamented eaves designed in the styling reminiscent of Greek temples. While Borton lived here he was also elected to the Common Council and helped establish Colorado's first Masonic lodge in Golden, in addition to renting out part of this house for the millinery store of Diantha Ferris in 1860. Borton soon sold this Gold Rush equivalent of a mansion to William A.H. Loveland, who brought his family here, and his wife Miranda put on airs for laying out the first carpet in town. After Loveland's ownership this cottage went into other prominent hands, including hotel keeper Charles Garbareno, Col. Parker B. Cheney, Sheriff Sidney S. Poe, and more. In 1892 a disastrous fire gutted the pioneer structure, but being one of the few fully and reliably-insured early places it was fixed up good as new. In 1941 the home became a business once again when Maurice and Joy Reagan built its small storefront addition for the Reagan Shoe Repair shop. This historic establishment continues today after some 75 years in business as the B&BE Shoe Shop in south Golden. Today the Loveland Cottage stands as Golden's oldest building, Colorado's oldest frame building, and likely the state's oldest home of a woman-owned business. One may still see the 1892 replacement oak floors and charred horsehair plaster walls inside. (Image - Loveland Cottage in 1983, taken by Richard J. Gardner, Gardner Family Collection)
Banks Insurance Agency
711 12th Street
Built in 1864
Listed on the Golden Historic Register
Historic Entities - Banks Insurance Agency (Established by Frederick B. Robinson in 1893)
Probably the oldest remaining brick residence in Colorado, this place was built as the cottage of blacksmith Joseph Charles Remington in 1864. It appears to be the first Golden structure built with a basement, a cellar made of cobblestone. Originally this place featured flattened arch windows and an ornamental front porch, and although looking like a house it has been commercial ever since Marcella Ayres converted it into her renowned bakery in the 1870s. In 1950 the historic Banks Insurance Agency, founded in 1893 by Frederick B. Robinson in the aftermath of the Silver Crash, moved in. The place was partially converted to a Modernist appearance, still retaining some of its Victorian look, and exemplifies the midcentury transition between old and new in Downtown Golden. Today Banks Insurance operates with its 3rd generation, and is among the oldest insurance agencies in Colorado. (Images from left - house in 1930s, courtesy Denver Public Library Western History Department; Banks Insurance Agency today, courtesy Gardner Family Collection)
Post Office
621 12th Street
Built in 1940
Designed by Louis A. Simon
Constructed by Neal A. Melick
Historic Entities - Golden Post Office (Established by Dr.
Isaac E. Hardy in 1859)
Site of Douglas Shoe Shop (1865-1892); King Residence (1866-1940); Hotel La
Veta (1892-1940)
Golden’s first true post office building was a project of the Works Progress Administration, the federal program made to help alleviate the unemployment of Great Depression. WPA architect Louis A. Simon created this design which other post offices share across the country. Inside, high up on the west wall of the lobby, is its WPA-commissioned mural, "Building the New Road", painted by Colorado Springs artist Kenneth Everett to commemorate the construction of the highway up Clear Creek Canyon during the time this building was being built (the road was another federal works project). This building has served as the longest home of the Golden post office, one of the first post offices in Colorado, established in 1859. (Images - Post Office architectural design by Louis A. Simon, courtesy Jefferson County Republican; Post Office in 1940s, courtesy Gardner Family Collection)