George and I arrived in 1964, a few years after Bill Markel and a few others arrived in this small burb of 7,000 people.
We needed a home, and it was our luck, that George's college roommate and ski instructor buddy lived in Broomfield and encouraged us to settle here.
Purchasing a 'Cinderella' model home of which there were blocks of the same floor plans, only the brick color and roof line was different. As it worked out my kids could go in any house and know where the bathroom was.
Noone locked their doors, even at night and there were no rules of other kids finding themselves welcome in any home.
Our neighborhood was all young families, just having graduated from college, marrying and having a couple of kids. The men were on the bottom of the corporate ladder and George taught school and instructed skiing at A-Basin. Very few extra bucks for entertainment or maintaining our new home.
Four of our neighbors including us put in a fourth of the cost of a lawn mower. Each weekend, the husband would mow their small family 'estate' and then deliver the lawnmower to the next owner of the lawn mower. They shared the duties of filling with gasoline and maintaining it. It was the beginning of the community spirit we came to know has Broomfield today at over 70,000 residents.
It was a long-distance call to Westminster or Boulder and maybe it is what kept our friendships in town and going to a doctor, shopping elsewhere. Of course, now we have the internet and online shopping is the preferred way to shop.
There was no hospital close by, and in an emergency this small and growing community, had to depend on a neighbor who had two cars during the week. A luxury not many of us had.
Being resourceful, we started a fund to purchase and take care of the expenses of maintaining an ambulance. Each year in the fall, I went door to door, collecting $5.00 for the ambulance. This also insured we would have free service if our family had an emergency, for that year.
This was the beginning of a community who took care of each other.
Next week I'll share some more of the Broomfield community years ago.