Dale borrowed a photo collection from Wayne Nelson. The photos belonged to Wayne’s parents, August and Freda Nelson. The Nelsons used to live on Road 13, just north of the St. Vrain River – the old house that Dale grew up in.
These photos were taken on a fall afternoon at the corner of present-day Weld County Road 7 and Welker Avenue. It looks as though beets are being piled on both sides of Welker Avenue, and the photos are taken from some sort of grain elevator that would be located near today’s Post Office. Some photos are looking east toward Guardian Angels Church, and some are looking north toward what would today be the Co-op property.
Dale and I are thinking that the photos show the process of the beets being loaded from the piles onto wagons, and then onto the trestle where they are dumped into rail cars. Maybe it was unusual for the harvest to be so large that beets had to be piled on both sides of the road, and therefore photo-worthy? In one of the photos, you can read the sign that says, “The Great Western Sugar Company, Mead Beet Dump.”
Notice that these photos were taken before the church building was enlarged to its present size. The old steeple is still on the church.
Someone who knows cars would be able to help date these photos. The church was enlarged in about 1929, so the photos are earlier than that.
By the way, some of these photos may be duplicates but I scanned them all anyways, just to be safe. (Click on images to enlarge.)
