After more than nine months of trying, the State of Colorado has succeeded in collecting close to $1,500 in delinquent taxes from state representative Glenda Swanson Lyle. Lyle, a Democrat from north Denver who was recently elected House minority whip, sent the state a cashier’s check covering most of the…
At 26, Sarah Steinberg has the dogged persistence of a door-to-door salesman twice her age. In the face of a changing music industry, how else could the young deli worker/songwriter carry on? “I want to make it in the pop line,” she explains, “but pop is not what it was…
part 1 of 2 In 1977, when the inactive Glory Hole mine near Central City was being promoted as a tourist attraction, a visitor seated himself near the rim of the mine’s chasm and began eating a picnic lunch of fried chicken. The 900-foot-long gorge blasted down through 300 feet…
part 2 of 2 Caldwell, who even friends say sometimes has his own way with the truth, swears he met William Muchow in the White House during the Kennedy administration. A land developer, Caldwell claims he was there at Kennedy’s request coordinating a program aimed at improving relations between the…
cartoon…
Haji S. Adnan appeared to symbolize everything that was right about the city of Denver’s controversial minority contracting program. Adnan, who died of lung cancer this summer at the age of 67, had come to the United States from Indonesia in the 1950s, educated himself at the Colorado School of…
Hit parade: Even before Horace Mann vice principal (for now, at least) Ruben Perez gave the Denver Public Schools a thwack with the golden ruler, Denver was taking plenty of hits in the national press. The Wall Street Journal took a swing at a familiar punching bag with its November…
If, in the past two weeks or so, you’ve been watching the jock-sniffer segments on the TV news or plowing through the daily sports sections, you know now what deep thinkers like Copernicus and Bill McCartney and O.J. Simpson have known for ages: The earth revolves around the Heisman Trophy…
Looking back on her standoff with a military helicopter on the plains of eastern El Paso County this fall, Mary Blake wishes she’d had more firepower. “If I’d had a big gun,” says the 49-year-old Blake, “I would have shot the devils, but I didn’t have a big enough one.”…
Coach Potatoes Having read the McCartney article by Teri Thompson (“McCartney’s Greatest Hits,” November 30), it still amazes me as to the amount of fear that she and her ilk are under. One has to wonder whether the half-truths espoused by her will be taken as gospel, or whether the…
In September the reopening of the Oriental Theatre, at 4335 West 44th Avenue, was being touted as a harbinger of good things for northwest Denver–an indication that art, culture and enterprise might soon attract more people to this vibrant but often neglected section of the metro area. But just two…
If Denver International Airport were up and running, Mayor Wellington Webb wouldn’t have to be. After all, the Denver mayoral election isn’t until next May. But Webb, prepping for a second major contest, won’t be sprinting on the sleek new tarmac of DIA. This will be an extremely muddy track…
The pale blond teenager listened intently to the younger but more experienced girl. They stood together on a downtown Denver street watching people file by, looking for the proper one. “Don’t ask older people, because they’ll stop and give you a lecture,” eighteen-year-old Skyler was told. “Don’t ask the high-powered…
part 1 of 2 “I have received your letter and one from your unfortunate boy. I am very sorry for you.” Over the past 120 years the paper has yellowed with age and the ink has faded to a light brown that is barely legible. The author, Miss L.M. Swenson…
part 2 of 2 By 1988 the situation at Mitchell had worsened. Dropout rates had continued to climb, as had drug use and gang activities–much of which Delia blamed on the nearby apartment complexes. Kids told her they were actually afraid to come to school. She asked superintendent Ken Burnley,…
Mark our words: When the city announced last week that warnings from a New York bond-rating firm had forced it to back away from $30 million in publicly financed loan guarantees for fiscally shaky MarkAir, one question was left unanswered: Why did it take so long for the city’s beautiful…
In the years that we’ve known and loved Bill McCartney, one absolute has been clearly established: Nothing the man does should come as a surprise. Yet when McCartney announced his resignation following the Buffs’ regular-season-ending victory over Iowa State, it was as if Newt Gingrich had thrown his support behind…
Bursting Her Babble Regarding Patricia Calhoun’s “The Power of Babble,” in the November 23 issue: Methinks the lady doth protest too much. It is she who babbles. What would Calhoun have us do–give a medal to the pot-smoking lawbreaker? With people like this advising Clinton, it’s a wonder that any…
You would think that developer and financier Larry Mizel would have bigger battles to fight. Mizel, who has an estimated worth of more than $100 million, is chairman of M.D.C. Holdings, Inc., the largest real estate developer in the Denver area. Three months ago he sold his interest in Omnibancorp…
The tiny Denver Rock Island Railroad doesn’t have a cowcatcher on its lone diesel locomotive, but it may need one soon. The obscure, thirteen-mile-long railroad is engaged in a ripsnorting feud with the National Western Stock Show, which the Rock Island’s operator accuses of trying to put him out of…
Colorado Attorney General Gale Norton won attention and re-election this fall with the help of slick TV ads touting her crime-fighting skills. One such commercial, implying that Norton keeps our streets safe by personally contesting felons’ appeals, featured mug shots of some of the state’s most heinous criminals. As the…
When Denver attorney Jeff North sued Baker & Hostetler earlier this year, the prestigious downtown law firm tried in vain to keep from airing its dirty laundry in public. The firm, which had lured North away from the upper echelons of the federal Resolution Trust Corporation and then kicked him…
