— by Brian Shearer

B50 Note: Brian Shearer is a designer, cartoonist, and creator of Mr. Skully. As Brian mentions, the Denver Public Library has some great information on the areas cemeteries available online. Brian can be reached via email.

— by Keith Chamberlain

When Colfax Avenue was “Colorado’s Main Street,” a miles-long constellation aglitter with motels, restaurants and gas stations, Eddie Bohn’s Pig ‘N Whistle was its brightest star. Bohn was dubbed the King of West Colfax, and from his throne at “The Pig,” as regulars affectionately knew his motel and restaurant, he presided over an empire the likes of which North Denver will never see again. Visitors included Jack Dempsey, Roy Rogers, Babe Zaharias, Jimmy and Tommy Dorsey and Wally Schirra, to name but a few. For 65 years the Pig ‘N Whistle and its larger-than-life proprietor reigned on West Colfax, and North Denver basked in their reflected glory.

Earl W. “Eddie” Bohn, born in 1902, was the son of German immigrants who owned the J.J. Bohn Brush Company at Colfax and Wolff where they made corn husk brooms for industrial use. Eddie attended Sacred Heart School and early in life showed a head for business. As a youngster he launched the Rocky Mountain Skunk Company, with business cards promising, “There’s more profit in one skunk than there is in a dairy cow, with less work.” He persuaded his father to buy land at Colfax and Wolff. “I was 14 at the time and planning a boxing career and told him that when I got older, I’d buy back the land and build a car agency,” he told the Lakewood Sentinel in 1982.

“I never went very far in school and I didn’t learn very much when I was there, but I sure learned a hell of a lot on the way there and back,” he once said of his early interest in boxing. When he was 18 the six-foot, four-inch Bohn headed to California on a motorcycle to seek his fortune. He soon took up boxing and fought 64 professional matches, winning all but two bouts, which he tied. He was crowned Rocky Mountain Heavyweight Champion in 1924. He hired on as Jack Dempsey’s sparring partner, earning $100 for each round with the Manassa Mauler. “Each round he would tell you that he was going to throw one good punch, but he never told you when it was coming,” Bohn recalled. He and Dempsey became lifelong friends. “He was a helluva guy,” said Bohn.

With sparring proceeds for a grubstake, Eddie bought the four lots on Colfax from his father and in 1924 opened a gas station and barbecue joint there. He’d been impressed by a chain of West Coast restaurants named the Pig ‘N Whistle and adopted the uncopyrighted name for his own business. His timing was perfect. The Federal Aid Road Act of 1916 and the Federal Highway Act of 1921 called for creation of “an adequate and connected system of highways, interstate in character” and the nation embarked upon an era of highway construction. U.S. Highway 40, which transited Denver along Colfax and passed right by Bohn’s front door, was born of that legislation.

U.S. auto registrations tripled in 1920s as auto-oriented businesses blossomed. The Motel Inn, which opened in San Luis Obispo, California, in 1925, is generally considered the ancestor of today’s motels. Enterprises such as the Alamo Plaza Hotel Court chain in the South, began appearing in the 1930s. With money lent by his friend, U.S. District Attorney Tom Morrissey, Bohn built four motel units to make the Pig ‘N Whistle Denver’s second motel. The business drew nourishment from increasing traffic on Colfax and also attracted Denverites to its restaurant and bar.

Bohn loved people. “Eddie was one in a million,” chuckles Mike Scherer, longtime friend of the Bohn family. “He was a real character. A self made man. Just a people person.” Bob Slattery, another of Bohn’s lifelong friends, adds, “He knew everybody and everybody knew Eddie. He was very genial.” From his perch at the end of the counter, he greeted everyone who entered. “He’d come and join you and if you were settin’ there and had French fries, he’d probably eat half of ‘em. Then he’d order more for you,” laughs Slattery. “He was tougher than a three-dollar steak,” jokes Scherer. “Very outspoken. He had an opinion on everything. If you didn’t agree with it, he didn’t care. But he was very loyal to his friends.” Beneath that crusty veneer Bohn had a soft heart, says Slattery. “He was very charitable, and his wife was very charitable, too. He’d gripe about her giving food away to somebody but if she didn’t do it he would do it himself. They were wonderful people.” Eddie’s wife Janet, “was there full time right alongside my dad,” says their son Eddie “Punch” Bohn. “When you run a restaurant you have to do everything and she was the bookkeeper, bartender, cook and waitress.”

Bohn loved hunting and fishing and his favorite television show was “Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom.” “If that was on, Bohn would turn the channel to ‘Wild Kingdom,’” recalls Scherer. “Everybody knew not to say anything. If the people at the bar wanted to watch something else, he’d tell ‘em to go to somebody else’s bar.” The atmosphere was another attraction. “He had a sports bar before anybody ever heard of one,” says Scherer. “The walls were covered with photographs of people that you’d recognize. A lot of boxers. Another thing that he was known for, he had one of the best barbecues in town. His ribs were the best.”

The Pig was a mecca for pugilists. “Anybody that was in the boxing business, when they’d come through Colorado they’d be there,” says Scherer. Bohn dubbed Room 39 the “Jack Dempsey Room” to honor his friend and frequent guest. Other famous boxers who stayed there were Max and Buddy Baer, Primo Carnera, Gene Fullmer, Carmen Basilio and Gene Tunney.

The Pig attracted other big names. Before becoming manager of the New York Yankees, Billy Martin managed the Denver Bears and lived at the Pig ‘N Whistle during baseball season. After joining the big leagues, he often returned at season’s end to wind down for a week. Scherer, to whom Bohn introduced Dempsey and Basilio, also met Martin there. “When one of my kids was about 10 years old we went over there on a Saturday morning to get some breakfast and Eddie said, ‘Come on back and sit down. Billy’s here.’ It was Billy Martin. You could go in there and see somebody like a very prominent state judge or a politician. A couple of booths away would be a bunch of baseball players. Next to them might be a bunch of ranchers. That’s what made the place so interesting, people came from so many different walks of life. You never knew who you were gonna’ see.”

While in town to play at Elitch’s Trocadero or Lakeside’s El Patio ballrooms, big bands like the Vic Jurgens and Eddie Howard groups stayed at the motel. Jimmy and Tommy Dorsey once honored its owner with “Eddie Bohn Night” at the Trocadero.

The restaurant was also a favorite haunt of area notables. Governors “Big Ed” Johnson, Steve McNichols and his mayoral brother Bill were familiar faces at the Pig. Fred Dickerson, Tom Morrissey, Tony Zarlengo and Mike Pomponio, heavyweight North Denver Democrats, were regulars. Chet Nelson, sports editor of the Rocky Mountain News, and his wife Sammy were close friends of the Bohns and could often be found at the restaurant. Bob Palmer, long time news anchor at Channel 7, ate there frequently.

Although many guests belonged in Who’s Who, Bohn welcomed everyone on equal footing. “It didn’t make any difference whether a guy was the governor or a plumber. Everybody was the same to him when he came through that door,” says Scherer. His handshake was memorable. “He had such enormous hands he would just engulf your hand inside his. It felt like you had a bear wrapped around you.”

Bohn was active in many professional groups promoting travel-related business and Northsiders elected him to the state legislature in the late 1930s. It was his tenure on the Colorado Athletic Commission, however, that was his most famous public service. Appointed and reappointed by 15 Democratic and Republican governors, he served from 1934 until 1977 and was chairman for two decades of the body that regulated Colorado boxing and wrestling. “Being an ex-boxer, he watched out for the boxers,” recalls Slattery. “He wanted to be sure that everything was on the up-and-up. He wouldn’t allow things like they did in Las Vegas.”

Highway changes in the 1950s and ‘60s sent West Colfax into decline. The aging Colfax Viaduct was closed, severing the artery that delivered downtown diners and cross-town travelers. Colfax businessmen lost a battle with the Colorado Department of Transportation over what Punch Bohn calls “confusion junction,” the intersection that bends Colfax-bound traffic onto 6th Avenue Freeway. Interstates -25 and -70 were built without exits for West Colfax, choking traffic flow even further. A colorful chapter in North Denver history ended when the Pig ‘N Whistle closed in 1991, the year after The King of West Colfax passed away.

Article reprinted with permission of the North Denver Tribune.

The Rainbow Music Hall, located at Monaco and Evans in Southeast Denver, opened on January 26th, 1979 with a “Gala Opening” featuring Jerry Jeff Walker. For almost 10 years and over 1,000 shows the Rainbow offered up a wide variety of musical acts, including U2, Roxy Music, New Order, The Talking Heads, and many others. Underemployed and underfunded Denver music fans were fond of the frequent $2 ticket prices, including shows by Devo and the Police. The final show was Warren Zevon in November 1988. More on the history of the Rainbow can be found on the Twist & Shout blog, Spork.

B50 Note: Thanks to Kim Allen for providing the opening night program.

We patched a portion of oak floor laid nearly a century ago, and found these scraps of news tucked beneath the boards. The house that Henry Roth built is on the National Register, and continues to amaze us with its recycling ventures made into practical construction. Maybe the newspapers underneath our floorboards don’t suggest a sustainable index, but they record history and practice in one fell sweep. Here’s my take on these:

Amy Semple McPherson, the great evangelist of the 1920s, comes to Denver, coincidentally with the Greatest Stock Show ever; the French harp, or harmonica, makes a comeback; the hanging tree at Sixth and Walnut meets its doom; the stock pages and society columns mix for the Livestock show; the Vanderbilts and distance swimmers were hot news a few years before the collapse; putting a man on the moon was a foolish dream indeed – read all the details; on the same page that one of Custer’s troops is mourned, a Klan Cyclops runs for Congress; Clayton College, located at what is now Colorado Boulevard and Martin Luther King, Jr. Drive, helps half-orphans become useful citizens; America’s auto industry is growing, and car camping takes off for the hills on July 4, 1926; the Jazz Age has already become history; girls paint designs on their legs for the sake of allure; what we know as the Hagia Sophia was rumored to become a disco; Mutt and Jeff and The Katzenjammer Kids, with their German accents, ruled the funny papers, the only part of the news in color, Sundays only; Classified Ads still brought in the bucks; a trout-fishing resort on “4 acres, a nice hotel, a 5-room cottage, 9 cabins” all to be sacrificed for $6,500; and finally, what was cut out between “‘Billy’ Adams” and “Her Worst Worry”?

M Thornton

(more…)

— by Stephen Savageau

Come see some intriguing, accessible, beautiful art. The Denver Public Library opened a new show, honoring the founders of the Denver Artist’s Guild; it runs through August 29. See it early. There’s so much there and it highlights so many levels of interest, you’ll want to revisit it. Remember to pick up the impressive, fact filled, handout and marvel at the labor of love by volunteer curators, Deborah Wadsworth and Cynthia Jennings, You may even find yourself captivated by the art history of Colorado.

This show is:
Easy to view, engaging – it’s downright viewer-friendly. The library setting, with art hung on the ends of bookcases and in nooks throughout the room, gives the display a make-yourself-to-home informality. Some art shows try to awe the viewer with a mighty, expressive gestalt. This one invites an unhurried look with discoveries of surprise, insight, and thoughtfulness.

This show is:
Appealing to many different interests. There sure is uplifting beauty and style diversity here, but this comfortable gallery is the Western History Department, after all; the display has Colorado’s story laced through. Colorado’s story, era, context – that’s the stuff of this show mixed with the question: “Who were we?” This show is the truth about Colorado art eighty years ago, with real paintings, sculptures, prints, contemporary magazines, and ephemera. Both the show and the truth are long overdue. Let’s have lots more like this.

“Who were we?” has been the stock in trade of Western History since somebody first asked. Patrons come with a desire to read a story from a newspaper published a while ago, consult a city guide from the 1920s, find out when their parents first came to town and where they lived. Nowadays, examples of the question are everywhere and in new forms. The computer-accessed Facebook-driven “Buckfifty” examines the past 150 years of Denver from any contributor and in any form. Many have status “pioneer” license plates on their cars. The TV advertises genealogy resources for the ordinary viewer. PBS offers The American Experience, Baseball, the Second World War, and many other programs that mix revisionism with nostalgia, tall yarn with true account.

Although contemporary art lives in an eternal present, “Who were we” has a premier place. That’s what museums are all about. Although regional art has had a tough time gaining respect in the national arena, scholars come to examine the resources and tell the story. After all, there are only so many books that can be written about Jackson Pollack.

Don’t look now, but the internet has changed the entire outlook of history, art, region and popularity. It all began with ebay. Ordinary art lovers of all stripes, of all levels of education and understanding, see thousands of pictures every day. The patron numbers are growing exponentially, and so are the offering numbers. Newbies may not ponder what art is or even reflect on what they want, but they gain a better idea looking at picture after picture, click after click.

Ebay changed art and enjoys a vast following: Everyone wants to get in on the act. Every gallery and many artists have their own webpages. Art data sites like askart.com and artnet.com offer biographic material, price information, bibliography, and the opportunity to plug in, to those who are professionally part of the market as well as to others who share the passion.

Regional art scholarship continues to grow, giving collectors and armchair historians all sorts of new resources. In 1976 the Samuels’s book, Encyclopedia of Artists of the American West, pioneered new art history ground with a Western artist biographic work. Since then the newly published work about regional – and ever popular – art provides more no-nonsense information. Now desktop publishing enables more scholars to publish text, and the availability of cheaper printing methods make those texts attractive, illustrated with color pictures. Institutions have started showing the treasures of Colorado’s past. Every year, displays of art from public and private collections find enlarging audiences, and show catalogues and information sheets are added to lists of new-artist biographies to research.

Denver Artist’s Guild Founders at the Denver Public Library is an invitation to join in the contagious passion for art. We are who we were.

You may ask. “Which is your favorite?” I’m guilty of asking that same question of many attendees at the opening party. Here are five artworks not to be missed with some reason and insight why.

Gladys Caldwell (Fisher), 1906 – 1952. MOUFFLON, granite sculpture and MOUNTAIN SHEEP, Plaster sculpture.
Here’s a side-by-side-on-the-same-table study of maturity and mischievousness youth. The Denver Public Library is lucky to have the plaster studies for the celebrated post office big horns – a trademark symbol of Colorado. The works demonstrate all the natural, as well as 1930’s heroic, unities; solidity, staid strength, design, singularity. Here’s comedy and delight. In the 1920’s a very youthful Gladys made a similar work , the Moufflon, probably while studying with Aristide Maillol. The twenty-somethingth artist gave the sheep lots of personality and vitality, especially considering the unforgiving space of the smallish granite block. She made a fanciful pattern of the horns and set a broad grin on the sheep’s face. By 1936 Gladys was internationally known, in the 1920’s she showed a sense of devilish humor and playfulness.

Robert Alexander Graham, 1873- 1946. ROCKY MOUNTAIN NATIONAL PARK. oil on canvas

Say the magic words “American Impressionism” and summon the story (now a popular art book topic) of how America had our own impressionists, right here. Who’d a’thunk that little ole’ Colorado had vital impressionist painters of the first water amongst us?
Robert Graham was one of the best. He had a distinctive sunny palette and, I’ll bet, a happy heart. He used his J. H. Twachtman and Robert Henri training to show beauty and dignity of the Colorado landscape and he taught many in the same spirit. You cannot look at one of his works without a spirit-redemptive smile. I’m a sucker for Colorado skyblue – and I’m unashamed.

Anne VanBriggle Ritter, 1868 – 1929. LANDSCAPE OF TREE. oil on canvas
Here’s one enchanting, “arty”. work; it’s a painting about painting. Anne Ritter gave everything to it: sunlight, contrast, color theory, design … and real power. That power is the absence of specific mountain subject. One might ask about a Colorado landscape show, “Where would the artists be without Long’s Peak or Pike’s Peak?” This work is Anne Ritter’s answer. She made mystery, magic and pleasure from the ordinary.

Here’s a story of loss for you. In addition to marrying Artus VanBriggle and having distinction as a ceramic artist, Anne Ritter enjoyed a renowned painting career. She showed in many national shows, headed – and helped found – the Broadmoor Academy / Colorado Springs Fine Art Center, and taught. Sadly she had no children or local heirs. When she died, her estate was shipped to a niece in New York City. There, all her paintings were combed into the 1930s secondhand market, far from where they were created. This remaining known work may be the best to be seen.

H. David Spivak, 1893 – 1932. DENVER ROOFTOPS. oil on panel

There’s a lot of current mention of plein air painting in Denver; the DPL hosts an annual show of this art style every autumn. For all the artists of slavish sunlite flowers and random Denver street scenes I offer you Denver Rooftops, a plein air masterpiece. Here’s magic in commonplace and common feelings. Much of this magic is everybody has painted this work in their heads, looking out a third story window at the city below. We’ve all mentally organized the child’s blocks or patchwork pieces of the buildings beyond the window. The zig-zag snow and the overcast sky add to a feeling of introspection. The blowing steam pipe gives the only action to a building still life.

Let me throw a big, M-80-sized firecracker at the thought that history represents a sense of placidity and happy stillness. The contest between humanism and elitism ran bitterly and deep in little “D” even in 1928. Newspaper articles about the Denver Art Guild’s opening exhibit quoted David Spivak speaking about the inclusive force and redemptive power of art, and how he believed that art and beauty helped shape better citizens and better human beings. These opinions were quickly and publicly reviled by upper echelon Denver Art Museum personnel, who insisted that only the educated portion of the populace could appreciate art.

John Edward Thompson. 1882 – 1945. DECORATING THE DENVER NATIONAL BANK BUILDING. Oil on canvas.
Subject! That’s why I choose this painting for mention. Here are grown men with every type of tobacco product and with a yeomen artistic worker-bee look. They’re a’working on a massive art project. Not only does the painting debunk the ever popular and unstoppable “starving artist” mentality; it also shows that sense of urban optimism that Denver has spoken to the world. “Denver – The City Beautiful,” “Imagine a Great City,” and the next civic slogan are more than feel-good politics. The spirit of optimism and beauty must be in the water. Denver radiates it; always did.

B50 Note: Since 1972, Stephen Savageau has run the Savageau Gallery in Denver. Denver Artists Guild Founders: Fifty Two Originals is on display at the Denver Public Library, Level Five, Gates Reading Room Gallery, through August 29th, 2009. The Denver Artists Guild was founded in 1928. Renamed the Colorado Artists Guild in 1990, it is the oldest continuously active fine arts organization in the Denver area.