July 29, 2021
$1.00
JEFFERSON COUNTY, COLORADO
A publication of
GoldenTranscript.net
VOLUME 155 | ISSUE 32
After 76 years, Meyer Hardware closing doors Store represents “longest hardware store legacy” in Colorado BY PAUL ALBANI-BURGIO PALBANIBURGIO@COLORADOCOMMUNITYMEDIA.COM
Steve Schaefer has never known a day without Meyer Hardware. His grandfather, Joe Meyer, purchased the store he would rename after himself in 1945, several years before Steve was even born. But Steve joined him there as soon as he could. “I started here when I was 10 years old,” Steve said. “After school, I’d walk across the creek and come over here and clean the bathrooms and mop the floor and put different things together like tricycles and wheelbarrows.” But now, after 56 years of working at the store, including 25 as its president after he took over for his own parents, Harold and Marilyn SEE MEYER, P6
Event has a new name and look but the focus on youth continues STAFF REPORT
discussed their plans for the area for the first time at a well-attended community meeting held at the current complex. During the meeting, Coors
Jeffco 4-H kids are busy preparing their cows, pigs and goats for Jeffco’s annual county fair. But when they get to the fairgrounds, they may no longer fully recognize the event they know and love. That’s because the county announced in 2019 that it was dissolving the annual fair and festival, which included food trucks, bands and rodeos and other festivities along with the kid’s 4-H shows and competitions that are the centerpiece of the fair. However, those shows and competitions, as well as the annual livestock auction and youth market, are now continuing on with a smaller new event called the Jeffco 4-H Junior Fair. Now, after a year in which the fair had to be scaled back even further because of COVID-19, Jeffco is set to get its first taste of this new version of the fair from July 31-Aug. 8. Jaren Tolman, a Jeffco 4-H leader whose kids will be competing in the fair, said that while the changes mean attendees will no longer be able to enjoy as activities as they have in the past, the actual 4-H activities will look much as the same as they have in previous years. The one major change? The fair
SEE COORSTEK, P11
SEE JUNIOR FAIR, P3
Steve Schaefer stands inside Meyer Hardware on July 22.
PHOTO BY PAUL ALBANI-BURGIO
Coorstek announces plans to reimagine complex with new HQ Area south of downtown to bring in more office and retail space BY PAUL ALBANI-BURGIO PALBANIBURGIO@COLORADOCOMMUNITYMEDIA.COM
For over 100 years, the Coorstek campus south of downtown Golden has been a hub of industrial innovation and production. But now, the company says it is
County fair competitions return with Jeffco 4-H Junior Fair
turning off the machines that have whirred at the complex for decades and moving its attention to a plan for the area’s future, which it says will involve moving the company’s headquarters to the site and building a mixed-use complex around it. “We want to bring our headquarters, which is now over in the Denver West office park, back to Golden,” said Coorstek CEO Michael Coors. “Back to our roots and back to our home.” On July 22, Coors and other Coorstek representatives publicly
INSIDE: VOICES: PAGE 12 | LIFE: PAGE 14 | CALENDAR: PAGE 17
STAYING IN THE KNOW During the meeting city staff said information and updates about the project will periodically be posted at guidinggolden.com.
GOOD TIMES ON THE GREEN Metro area mini golf offers variety and adventure P14