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Ditty dazzles CRES students Her dad helped settle Aspen
Sun
Volume 6, Number 35 | October 2, 2014
Ride ’em!
By Debbie Bruell Sopris Sun Correspondent
T
he third graders in Danny Stone’s classroom at Crystal River Elementary School received a special treat for their Carbondale history lesson last week: a visit from one of the student’s 95-year-old great-grandmother, Ruth “Ditty” Perry. The children gathered at her feet as she told stories about “the old days” in the Roaring Fork Valley. Ditty’s father, David Brown, was born in 1856. He moved from Denver to Aspen in 1880 when “there was nothing there.” Brown built the first building to stand in Aspen: a two-story structure, with living quarters upstairs and a general store on the first floor. His initial trip from Denver to Aspen was quite a challenge. He travelled by horse-drawn wagon, camping out along the way. There were no roads and sometimes not even a trail. Once he got to Taylor Pass above Ashcroft it took him three months to get all of his things down to Aspen. The terrain was so steep he had to unload the wagon, load up the horses, ride them down to Aspen, then repeatedly ride back up to get more of his belongings and supplies from the wagon. Once he had emptied out the wagon, he had to lower the wagon itself down by rope. After Brown married and began raising a family they lived part-time in Aspen and part-time in Denver so that the children could be educated in the city. Brown eventually bought a car to make the trek, although it still took up to two days to travel between Aspen and Denver. The car had no windows in the back of the vehicle where the children rode. “No matter where we lived we had a milk cow,” Ditty told the children. “Even in Denver we had a ranch outside of town so that my parents could provide us kids with fresh milk.” Ditty married her husband Bob in 1940. They moved to Carbondale in 1942 and began ranching, which they continued to do for the next 67 years. She described what Carbondale was like in those days: “When we first came the only things here were one tiny grocery store that just sold essentials, one drug store with an ice cream fountain, a little cafe that operated on and off, a store called Bob & Jenny’s that sold the bare essentials
Michael Adams got on his low horse to help the Pour House win the traveling first-place trophy in the commercial division at last Saturday’s Potato Day parade. The morning was parade perfect, with blue skies and not-too-warm temperatures. After the half-hour parade on Main Street, the Potato Day action rolled into Sopris Park and later in the afternoon to the Gus Darien arena for the unaffiliated Bareback Bonanza. For more Potato Day pictures, and more parade results, please turn to pages 14-15. Photo by Lynn Burton
DITTY PERRY page 3
FIRST FRIDAY: CELTIC FEST Carbondale is Calling!
An evening of bagpipes, beer, and the “Best Legs in a Kilt Contest” Festivities kick off Friday, the 3rd at 5pm in the 4th Street Plaza!