July 30, 2015
THIS WEEK IN
LIFE
LOCAL
Fishing brings families together in Colorado’s waters A R A P A H O E C O U N T Y, C O L O R A D O
A publication of
Page 15
SouthPlatteIndependent.net
WHAT’S INSIDE
Touring for kids: Courage Classic helps raise money for Children’s Hospital Colorado. See Page 5
In bloom: Denver Art Museum opens floral exhibit. See Page 20
Debbie Merrick flips through old photo albums chronicling 25 years of block parties in her hometown neighborhood, the Happy Homes subdivision. Photos by Jennifer Smith Your best shot: What does it take for a hole-in-one? A single swing. See Page 25
Flood bonded neighbors West Powers Avenue Block Party first to be sanctioned by city By Jennifer Smith
jsmith@colorado communitymedia.com
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Old friends gather at Sterne Park to celebrate the 50th anniversary of their first block party, held on Goddard Hill as they watched the Flood of ‘65 approach their homes.
Hiner battled grief after tragedy, gained recognition By Jennifer Smith
jsmith@colorado communitymedia.com
WEBSITE: SouthPlatteIndependent.net
After Sarah Hiner’s friend Karl Pierson killed himself and their classmate Claire Davis right outside the door to the physics class she shared with him, she knew she had to find a way to reclaim her life. “I was super traumatized,” said Hiner, who graduated from Arapahoe High School in May. “We had to run out of the classroom over the blood in the hallway. … I was having hallucinations and nightmares. I took it really, really bad.” Even before that day — Dec. 13, 2013 — Hiner had been having her own struggles. She lived in Capitol Hill with her parents and a sister two years her junior. Attending East High School was comfortable for her, but she wanted a better education than she felt she was getting. An
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Party continues on Page 12
Arapahoe High grad finds strength in focus
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It was an unconventional way to begin a tradition. It was June 16, 1965, and residents of the Happy Homes neighborhood weren’t particularly happy. They’d been evacuated to the top of Goddard Hill, where the middle school would be built three years later. They were watching a wall of water roar slowly but thunderously toward their homes, north of Bowles Avenue between Federal and Lowell boulevards. “It came within four houses of ours,” said Frank Stasko, who lived on West Powers Avenue back then. “It was very intense. The Bowles
bridge was flood-proof, but all the debris jammed under the bridge and the water went around and into the neighborhood.” None of their homes endured irreparable damage, but they were without power, telephone service and water for a couple of weeks. Stasko remembers having to lug water home from Harlow Pool, which was on Denver Water before the rest of the city was. His wife, Barb, remembers that her dad had a racehorse at the Centennial Race Track up the street on Federal. He went to try to save his and any others he could grab, blindfolding them so they wouldn’t see the danger they were in. But there was a bridge they wouldn’t cross, and her dad had to run to higher ground without them. The way the Staskos tell it, the horses were found the next day in the Woolworth’s drugstore, safe
adult mentor guided her to Arapahoe, and she began taking an RTD bus down University Boulevard every school day, 45 minutes each way. “I had a hard time fitting in,” she said. “I was taking the bus, which the Arapahoe kids would never set foot in, coming from what was, in their minds, the ghetto.” She needed a little help in physics, and Pierson spent some time with her. “He was a different kid,” she said. “He was very smart, and kind of an outcast. Kids were mean to him … But I tried to open up to him, because sometimes when you do that, people open up to you. “You never know what people are going through, or what will make or break them. … I’m mad at him, but I know he was hurting.” Hiner was involved in the school’s Future Business Leaders of America club and was chosen to be its social media director. She had also been accepted to California Polytechnic State University, but she knew her family couldn’t afford it. Hiner continues on Page 12
Sarah Hiner worked through her grief over the Arapahoe High School tragedy to emerge the winner of a scholarship for her website design. Courtesy photo