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BROMWELL ELEMENTARY SCHOOL (214)
2500 East
Fourth Avenue,
80206-4214
(Columbine Street at East Fourth Avenue)

Telephone:
(303) 388-5969
Fax: (720) 424-9355
E-mail: Bromwell@dpsk12.org

Mr. Jonathan Wolfer, Principal

The Story of the Harman Kindergarten Club

Introduction
Today we celebrate the 75th anniversary of the Harman Kindergarten Club, later known as the Columbine Mothers Club, which was first organized in 1895. In telling the story it is nice to remember a little about this part of our city and how it grew.

There are just a few of us left out of the first group of Kindergarten children. Erna Gunther Dee, Sarah Winfield Plaisted and her brother George, Agnes Holm Davis and her sister Dagmar Holm Root, Sue Boot Johnson, Ivy Hurst Dorst, and myself, Lida Lamont Brown.

Our Old Neighborhood
How many of us remember the old Calvary Cemetery at Ninth and York? I think H.A.W. Tabor was buried there, about where the new Tropical House is now. There were many Chinese buried there, too. A big prairie grass fire destroyed many of the markers and the frame house where the records were kept. When this property was made a part of Cheesman Park the bodies were moved to Mt. Olivet, Fairmont, and Riverside Cemeteries.

Grandpa Wiggins lived in the gray house at Fifth and Josephine. He was a real Indian Scout and helped guard the covered wagons across the prairie. He could tell true stories about the Indians and his weather forecasts were carried in the old Republican and The Rocky Mountain News, and hit it more often than our instruments do. Annie Heffner, his grand-daughter, and his great grand-daughters were Kindergarten children at Harman School.

Then there was the lovely grove of cottonwoods at Cherry Creek and York, with buffalo grass for a carpet. It was a wonderful place to swing or for a potato roast. The water in the creek was clean, clear and cool and it was fun to wade on hot summer days, catch minnows or greeny frogs, or pick watercress on the edge of the old city ditch. In winter it made a wonderful place to skate, with fires along the way to get warm. I think winters must have been colder then, for we skated from Thanksgiving until February. A clear spring furnished water to drink. It is now on the Country Club golf links.

Real Gypsies camped in the grove, too, in their colorful dress, until the town Marshall ordered them out because they had "Chicken Pickin' Fingers." In summer some of the churches held camp meetings there. Whole families lived in tents, cooking out of doors. Their hymns and prayers filled the air.

The city later used the grove for a dump, and killed all the trees. The Cherry Creek Shopping Center moved in later. They call it "progress!"

In those days two big red water pressure tanks stood on the hill at about where the Evans home was located at Alameda and Vine, and on Sunday afternoons we pumped our bikes up the hill, to race around the tanks on their cement foundation.

Do you like Westerns? Well, Old Smoky Hill Trail from Dodge City to Denver ran over the prairie near the grove. I remember as a little girl seeing the hard-packed ruts the wagons trains made on the prairie at about where Safeway is now. The trail crossed Colorado Boulevard where the big boulder and the bridge are now, then east past Booth Homestead at Quebec Street, then over the hill past where Etta Flogel used to live, to Kiowa and on to Dodge City.

What wonderful years we lived through! Mr. Wadding lit the old carbon lights on the corners and we played under one at Second and St. Paul. At nine o'clock Mr. Bradley blew a whistle. It meant it was time for all kids to go home... and we did! We were not afraid to be out after dark, and most folks didn't even know where their door keys were. In summer we walked to City Park to hear John Philip Sousa conduct the band, which he did for many summers.

The Town of Harman
In the beginning we were a town of our own with a mayor, a marshal, and a town council. They named it "Harman." We had our own Town Hall at Fourth and St. Paul. It housed the town marshal's living quarters, the Volunteer Fire Hose Cart, and a bell, which called the men to come pull the cart and put out the fire. There was a corral in the yard to round up stray horses and cows until their owners claimed them, and a small room with bars to hold offenders. I don't think it ever had many customers! On the second floor was a big room where the lodges met and the volunteer firemen held their ball, and where we had graduations and amateur shows that delighted the audience. They would probably seem corny now, but we loved them and we had some guests of exceptional fame. I remember hearing Douglas Fairbanks recite "Casey At The Bat" long before movies, and before he became a star. Elections were also held at the hall.

The first St. John's Catholic Church met in a small frame building on Third Avenue, between Detroit and Fillmore Street, and with old Fourth Avenue Congregational Church, it filled our spiritual needs.

There was a shopping center at Third and Detroit Street, the end of the streetcar line, with Dr. Tom Hopkins and Kent's Drug Store, where ice cream sodas were five cents. There was a dry goods store, a grocery and feed store, a blacksmith and carriage shop, and Mr. Shuester's. I think his real name was Frank Groose. He mended our soles for twenty-five cents a pair with real leather. There was also Mr. Holm's barber shop. Peter Holm was later our Assistant Superintendent of Denver Schools. He attended Harman Kindergarten.

Then there was the most important place, the Harman Post Office, with Mrs. Walker, Postmistress. This was the gathering place at about 4 p.m. to pick up your mail, and hear the latest news from near and far. There were no t.v.'s or radios and very few telephones. The Hall's telephone was "York 75," and folks used the public phone there when anything big happened. Newsboys rode out from the presses calling "Extra! Extra! Read all about it!" This was the way we got election news, and the news of President McKinley's assassination. Rollie Masters and Uri Walker, who worked there, helped raise the flag at San Juan Hill under Theodore Roosevelt.

Our School and the Kindergarten Club
Old Harman School was built in the 1880's and when an addition was added in 1895, the Harman Kindergarten was opened. The mothers of the children formed our association, called the Harman Kindergarten Club, to help the teacher buy books, pictures, etcetera, to beautify the school, and to purchase materials needed by the children but not provided by the school's budget. Once they bought a stuffed squirrel for half price ($1.50) because it had been shot through the head, but if turned right the hole wouldn't show.

The mothers of the Kindergarten children were entitled to membership by paying ten cents initial fee and once cent a week for the year. They were also asked to give one cake or its equivalent once a year. The object of the club was to promote educational, cultural, patriotic, and civil affairs and enrich our own lives. We have continued to do this through the years. Mrs. Robert (Lizzie) Lamont was the first president and Miss Fannie Johnson the first teacher. She loved children and they loved her. She wore a long black or brown dress with Leg O'Mutton sleeves and a long white apron trimmed with lace and a little white ruche at her neck.

Edith Boot was an assistant volunteer helper and played the piano when we sang "Here's a Ball for Baby" or "Come Said the Wind to the Leaves One Day." Susie Boot sang "The Sparrow" at the November meeting in 1896 and Charles Hayden, later a Catholic priest, gave a recitation. We sent a Thanksgiving basket to the Arlington Orphanage at Fourth and Downing. Later an A.A. building, it formerly had been the headquarters of the Gentlemen's Riding and Driving Club, who held Saturday races at the City Park race track. No gambling, just men who loved horses!

At the December meeting that same year we gave a ton of coal, priced at four dollars, to a destitute family living in a tent in the grove. The children's Christmas tree was decorated with paper chains and baskets, popcorn and cranberry strings, and the boys received bags of marbles, and girls little dolls dressed by Edith Boot.

We paid the taxes of eight dollars (what a change!) for an elderly couple who were ill, and gave poor little Mrs. Bates five dollars and an Easter lily. I think it was probably the only flower she ever received in her life! People helped each other in sickness or need and took care of their children if they had to go to a hospital.

A different chairman was chosen for each meeting. That gave everyone experience as a presiding officer and drill in parliamentary law. Each meeting was followed by a program of school talent or a speaker from the city or schools. I noted often the names of Lois and Bryan Clover, and many other familiar names as well. There was a piano duet by Mary Lamont and Tinsa Lawson, a reading by Mamie Dinnen, a vocal duet by Mabel and Ruth Boot, solos by Sue Boot, a recitation by Winifred Boot, readings by Mamie Dennen and Bessie McComb. I remember many duets both piano and vocal, and times when a group of mothers swung dumbbells to music -- and I don't mean their kids!

Calamaties... and Politics
In 1897 a fire destroyed one wing of the school and the beautiful inlaid floor of the Kindergarten. Thanks to modern fire regulations a furnace can't be put under the stairway now, but not then. The kids walked through the smoke and were out in two minutes. The big kids got fooled on the "no classes because the school burned down" idea. The Madlongs, M.L. Smith, Will Walters and the Boots all opened their homes for classes. The Kindergarten met at the Boot's and Mrs. Boot gave us cocoa and cookies at recess.

Our school was at first a part of Arapahoe County, and the district was known as School District #4. When Harman became a part of the City of Denver we became a part of the Denver Schools, and our school became Bromwell Elementary. In 1905 we were told we were no longer needed in the school, so our group became the Columbine Mothers Club, and our meetings were held in the homes of our members. In 1911 the school had another fire which destroyed the old Harman schoolhouse. The reason the fire got out of control was that the fire department was sent to Columbine School in north Denver instead of Bromwell School on Columbine Street.

Ruth Anderson said she got out all right but left her new coat in the building, so she went in to get it and Miss Nellie Fullman had to shove her out the window. One of the nice things we did for our Nellie was to buy a beautiful statue called "The First Lesson," a memory to her. Mrs. Blunt found it one day chipped and dirty under the stairs. She took it home and cleaned it but the principal (not the present one!) didn't want to place it in the school again, so it was voted to place it in the home of Maude Young Denton, where I am sure it still receives tender loving care.

Our Work in the Community
Most of us joined the Bromwell P.T.A. when it was organized in 1918. Mrs. Clarkson was the first P.T.A. president. In the First World War our group gave many hours in voluntary hospital work, in making bandages and knitting. Dr. Tom Hopkins organized a group of young men, mostly from our neighborhood. They formed Base Hospital #29 and were stationed in England. Major Robert Crosby, one of our first Kindergartners, was stationed in France. Mrs. Blunt was our prize winner, giving over 300 hours in service to hospitals and 9,420 hours to the Red Cross.

In the Second World War, Lester Smith was a prisoner of war. Many of those who served are on our honor roll, including my own Virginia, who was with Colonel Hess in Japan and Korea, when his group flew the medicine and clothing to Chea Dow Island. We sent money for medicine and clothing to this group. June Siems was also in the Marine Corps. Lester Schulz, a Bromwell student who was chosen for Annapolis, is now a Rear Admiral in our Navy.

Our Memory Book contains lots of interesting articles about our group and their children in civic, patriotic and charitable good deeds. The Adult Blind Home is one of our favorites and Mrs. Blunt and Mrs. Anderson are on their Board.

Conclusion
In bringing you this story of old Harman and the Columbine Mothers Club, I hope I have not bored you, but have rather brought many happy memories of good friends and good times. One of the problems of free modern society is the individual who can find no obligation to those who built his freedom. May we never be like that, and may we continue to shine by being patriotic loyal Americans, ready to serve our neighbors, our country and our God.

Now let us enjoy our refreshments. Sometimes I think we should be re-named the "Meet and Eat Club," because the minutes through the years always end with the same note: "Delicious refreshments were served by our hostesses!"