Counting our Thanksgiving blessings usually is a litany of material things, as well as family and friends who enrich our lives. But this year I’m giving thanks for the people who have vision, commitment and practical know-how to make our communities the best possible places to live.
A sterling example is Ron Neely of Georgetown, who for 35 years has had one goal: to keep that splendid old Victorian mining town as a wonderful place to live and visit. He’s a historic preservationist, not just for saving beautiful old buildings, but for preserving and nurturing the unique man-built qualities that make his town one of the most attractive and healthy in the state.
I can think of no other individual who has made such an impact on the looks and spirit of his historic community. He is a visionary, hard-headed and practical, with financial savvy. All over Colorado, those with similar interests see Georgetown as the example of how to get it right, despite some really tough battles along the way.
Ron will be honored at a luncheon on Nov. 29 at the Oxford Hotel, where he will receive the Stephen H. Hart Award from the Colorado Historical Society, the Dana Crawford Award for Excellence from Colorado Preservation Inc. and the President’s Award from the National Trust for Historic Preservation.
That’s the Triple Crown of preservation; no one has ever received all three before – which just goes to show, once again, that even ski bums can turn out well.
That’s what Neely planned to be when he moved from Denver at the age of 28 in 1967 – ski a lot, work a little. Then he fell in love with Georgetown and its abundance of charming Victorian buildings, and realized how quickly they could disappear.
Georgetown and Silver Plume were named a National Historic Landmark District in 1966, among the first designated by Congress.
That federal attention encouraged a blossoming of local historic preservation groups. Ron founded and became executive director of Historic Georgetown Inc. in 1970, the same year Historic Denver and Historic Boulder began, with others following around the state.
The next year, HGI bought the 1867 Hamill House and made it into a grand museum, giving us a rare glimpse at how the wealthy lived a century and a half ago.
That was just the beginning. Under Ron’s leadership, through purchase and donation, the organization now owns the 1892 Bowman White House, the 1870 Johnson Cabin, the 1870-90 Tucker Rutherford Cottage and 1870 Kneisel House. It also helped protect and preserve the Alpine Hose Building, the Taos Square, Centennial Mill, and much more. HGI has sponsored the popular Christmas Market on early December weekends for three decades.
The group fought a 10-year battle with a developer who wanted to build ill-designed condominiums on Leavenworth Mountain above town.
When it was settled in 1982, HGI and the town partnered to buy the land and keep it as open space. The case garnered national attention, focusing on how much protection a town could give its historic properties.
Saxon Mountain, at the east approach of town, became a HGI property, and now has seven communication towers that are not visible from the town or highway, but are a valuable revenue source for the historic group.
The society has 2,000 acres of open space on the mountainsides around town – some with historical mining artifacts – and also cares for two town parks.
Ten years ago, Ron urged HGI and the town to buy an old filling station at the edge of town, and partnered with the Colorado Department of Transportation to craft the great Gateway Visitors Center which opened in 2003. The center has 300,000 visitors yearly.
A recently released study prepared for the Colorado Historical Foundation found that across the state, rehabilitation projects of old buildings have added $2 billion to our economy since 1981. Heritage tourism, with visits to historic and archaological sites, in 2003 generated $3.4 billion in direct and indirect expenditures, $300 million more than in 1999.
Neely left Historic Georgetown four years ago to become president of the new Georgetown Trust for Preservation and Conservation, a non-profit founded to free up HG for pure preservation efforts.
Ron suffers with Lou Gehrig’s disease and is increasingly frail, but his mind hasn’t slowed down, so he tries to work several hours daily, continuing to share his vision, knowledge and love of Georgetown.
HGI executive director Dana Abrahamson said Ron “looks way far into the future for this historic town, and people connect to what Georgetown strives to be. People appreciate what we have because of our history, and want to protect it rather than try to change it. Everywhere we go, Georgetown is known and recognized, because of Ron Neely.”
Neely is definitely one-of-a-kind; that Triple Crown will fit him well.
Joanne Ditmer’s column on environmental and urban issues for The Post began in 1962 and now appears once a month.
