My Telluride Quiz:

How Much do you REALLY know about Telluride?
OK, So you think you're from Telluride because you can answer a few questions about things that mostly happened recently? Now lets go back a few years!

Coonskin is named for what?
An animal skin, Duh!
A grove of aspen trees
A creek
A rock
An old timer's head wear
A ski run

In 1875 John Fallon made the first big mineral claim in
Tomboy Basin
Smuggler Basin
Bear Creek Canyon
Marshall Basin
Black Bear Basin
Cornet Creek

What famous outlaw robbed his first bank here?
Billy the Kid
Butch Cassidy
Wyatt Erp
Jesse James
Cole Younger
Annie Oakley

The Senate was:
A saloon
A movie house
A gentleman's club
A secret society
A mine
A ski run

The highest US Military Fort was called:
Ft. Tomboy
Ft. Imogene
Ft. Peabody
Ft. Cornet
Ft. Ballard
Ft. Wilson

Nichola Tesla and LL Nunn collaborated on what important invention?
The Tesla Coil
The alternating current generator
The mechanical ignition system
The radio
The wireless telegraph
Wireless energy transfer

What was Telluride called before 1887?
Imogene
Columbia
Marshall
Washington City
Lincoln City
Last Dollar

Telluride was the home to what high school athletics team, before the Miners?
The Bears
The Beavers
The Wildcats
The Cowboys
The Indians
The Wolverines

Telluride's Boy Scout Troop is:
Troop 469
Troop 500
Troop 200
Troop 600.
Troop 400
Troop 490

Complete this slogan: "Telluride: The Town without
a Toothache"
a Traffic Light"
a Traffic jam"
a Vice"
a Bellyache"
a Lift Line"

"Popcorn Alley" was
the concession stand at the movie theater
the concession stand for the hs athletics
the red light district
the Methodist Church's annual carnival fund raiser
the fire department's annual fund raiser
the Boy Scouts annual carnival fund raiser

Who delivered the famous "Cross of Gold" speech from the New Sheridan Hotel?
Theodore Roosevelt
William Jennings Bryan
Woodrow Wilson
William McKinley
Governor James Peabody
William Howard Taft

Who started his boxing career in Telluride?
Max Baer
Jack Dempsey
Joe Lewis
James Braddock
James Jeffries
Jack Johnson

What Native Americans frequented the valley before white settlers arrived?
Anasazi
Arapaho
Navajo
Ute
Kiowa
Sioux

The Underground was the name of:
A video arcade
A 1930s Speak Easy
A bar
A mine
A secret tunnel from the New Sheridan to a brothel across the alley
A moonshine still located in the Last Dollar Mine

The Galloping Goose was:
A saloon
A ski run
A mine
A creek
A trick at the Silverbelle
A train

Telluride was called:
"The City of Tarnished Doves"
"The City of Lights"
Both 2 and 4
"The City of Gold"
"To-Hell-U-Ride"
Both 1 and 5

The county museum is housed in the former:
Train Depot
Fire Department
Elks Lodge
Miner's Hospital
Last Dollar Brothel
Jail

The Silverbelle brothel finally shut its doors in:
1939
1949
1959
1969
1979
1989

The Idarado Mine closed in:
1899
1978
1956
1967
1973
1984

Baked in Telluride
is a locally grown plant of the canibus family
Dude! It's what we do in Telluride!
is the name of a local deli
-the old tin shack jail used to get so hot in the summer!
is the name of a brothel
is the name of an old opium den

The Cemetary is
called "Boot Hill"
located southeast of town
called "Lone Tree Cemetary"
called "Lone Pine Cemetary"
Has a mass grave for some avelanche victims
2, 3 and 5

The railroad was:
The Colorado Central
The Colorado Southern
The Silver San Juan
The Tomahawk & Western
The Durango Southern
The Rio Grande Southern

Lizardhead pass is named for what?
A railroad spur
a funny shaped tree
a grove of aspen
Lizard Head of British coastal geography
a really ugly old timer from the 1880s
a mountain peak

Sneffels is
a muppet character on the local public access TV
A Colorado 14er
the local name for a cold
A Jules Verne novel set in the San Juans
the name of a Belgian horses that used to pull a sleigh in town in the 70s
The Sheriff's bloodhound from the 1970s

Tin Village was the name of:
the smelter
the Idarado Mine company housing
the brothel district
a hardware store
the tin smith's shop
a roofer

Tomboy is the name of:
a bar
a valley
a mine
a brothel
2, 3 & 6
a ski run

The victorian building at the head of Bridal Veil Falls was:
a fancy hotel
a mining tycoon´s exclusive home
a boarding house
a brothel
Nichola Tesla's home
an electric power station

Movies were shown until about 1982 at:
the Nugget Theater
The Senate
The New Sheridan Opera House
the Last Dollar
the Silverbelle
Fly Me to the Moon

Ajax is:
a powdered soap brand
a bar
a street
a mountain peak
a ski run
a colourful local character

The Ophir Loop was:
a toll road
railroad grade
a trick at the Silverbelle
a brothel
the old timer's name for cocaine cut with gunpowder
a local freestyle skiing manuver

The first ski club
was the snow bunnies
was created in the 30s
was called the Ski-hi ski club
both 2 and 3
was Dallas
was the Powder Hounds

Which of these was NOT an original festival?
the Hang Gliding
the Jazz
the Chamber Music
the Film
the Bluegrass

Which of these have been found in the San Miguel River?
Cynide
Mercury
Gold
Lead
Trout
All of the above

The Telluride Ski Area officially opened
on December 22, 1972
on November 28, 1973
with five lifts and a base facility
with 6 lifts and the Coonskin base facility
both 1 and 3
none of the above

The Telluride Library has been in an old
Train Depot
Jail house
Brothel
Saloon
Library, Duh!
Bank


Stay tuned, I'll blog the answers soon! -On Telluride Time... ;-)

I Might be a Real Telluride Old Timer!

I've had a rather rootless existence my entire life. I could justifiably say I was born under a wandering star! I was born is a nondescript (unspecified) mid western town in which not a single trace of my existence yet remains. I confirmed this as I happened to be making a drive east a few years ago and on a whim decided to pass by the family farm. A building or 2 is left, but no the house or anything of importance. I doubt a single person remembers that I (we) ever lived there and there are probably only 2 to 4 other people alive that can tell you where that is.We lived in Vail Colorado after that. Similar story there too. We stayed about 4 years, but ultimately failed to set down roots there as well. There may be a few more people that remember us. I did manage to find some scraps of wood my brother and I nailed together 23 years before.We went to Kodiak Alaska after that. The shadow of that experience looms huge in my life though the amount of time spent there barely justifies a footnote. Possibly a huge reason the experience leaves such an impression on me and my brother is that Alaska by nature leaves an indelible mark on all of those who pass through her. Our experience there was also punctuated by the death of our father.

A brief note here about my family. I have felt for some time my father was simply a misplaced pirate. He was an almost perfect casting of Han Solo from Star Wars. I could say that he was the original Corsair in our family, except he was following a pattern established by his own father. My father was not beyond a serious breech of the law for financial gain, i.e: smuggling, though I believe he didn't consider himself a scoundrel. I thought he might have been the original black sheep of our family until I discovered that there exists the possibility his father was involved in smuggling Nazi gold to South America. I always knew my grandfather wasn't above bending ethics to suit his whims, but I was rather shocked to come across the possible nazi gold connection, -especially since I had always considered Opa an anti-nazi. I'm still not sure if he was a black sheep or a gray sheep. I'm reasonably assured my great grandfather had a less colourful existence as a tenured professor of mathematics at the U of Berlin, up through the early 30s.

After Alaska, we moved to Telluride, which probably left the largest indelible "postmark" of all, in my life. This was recently confirmed when I was challenged with one of those silly Facebook quizzes "Are You from Telluride?" At first I was completely intimidated by the quiz finding a lot of the questions seemingly in Greek. I responded illogically by creating my own quiz about Telluride feeling that this other's quiz was from an interloper. I hadn't really realized how "from" Telluride I am until I begin to consider that I am probably more "from" Telluride than anyplace else on earth. My construction of the quiz on Facebook was a real spin down memory lane. Strangely I probably have an advantage over many Telluriders; I was an assistant museum curator for more than 3 seasons. I'm not sure what that would amount to in university credit, but I imagine it would be roughly equivalent to all the required history courses at a state university, but all only on Telluride! I sort of amazed myself by outlining 35 part quiz in about 20 to 30 minutes with what I imagine are probably very challenging questions, after not having thought to awfully much on the subject in 25 years. Time will tell...

I still wasn't quite feeling amiable toward my unknown "interloper". Continuing to feel insecure about taking that person's quiz, I'm afraid I somewhat threw a gauntlet down; I derided the earlier quiz as targeted only to tenderfoots and my quiz being geared toward old timers! It would be interesting to see how my "opponent" does on my quiz. Thus feeling vindicated, I rose to the challenge of taking my opponents quiz. I got the highest placing, which makes me feel rather silly about my reservations in the first place. I did manage to ascertain for once and for all via both quizzes that I have roots permanently placed in Telluride.