Template:Wp-Greeley, Colorado-History

the text in this section is copied from an article in Wikipedia

Union Colony

Greeley began as the Union Colony of Colorado, which was founded in 1869 by Nathan C. Meeker, a agricultural reporter for the New York Tribune as an experimental utopian farming community "based on temperance, religion, agriculture, education and family values," with the backing of the Tribunes editor Horace Greeley, who popularized the phrase "Go West, young man". A committee which included Meeker and former Civil War general Robert Alexander Cameron traveled to Colorado to find a suitable site, and purchased 12,000 acres at the confluence of the Cache la Poudre and South Platte Rivers. The site, formerly known as the "Island Grove Ranch", included the area of Latham, an Overland Trail station, and was halfway between Cheyenne, Wyoming and Denver, Colorado along the tracks of the Denver Pacific Railroad.^[1]

By May, 500 people had arrived to take up residence in the new colony. The name Union Colony was later changed to Greeley in honor of Horace Greeley, who had come to Colorado in the 1859 Pike's Peak Gold Rush.

Latham

Greeley is located just west of the area previously occupied by the Overland Trail station of Latham, originally called the Cherokee City Station. The Latham station, which was also known as Fort Latham, was built in 1862 and named in honor of Milton S. Latham, one of California's early senators. The stagecoach station was at the confluence of the South Platte River and the Cache la Poudre River. It is believed that the birth of the first white child born in Colorado, a girl, occurred there. Fort Latham was the headquarters of the government troops during the Indian conflicts of 1860–1864 and the county seat; the post office was called Latham.

Early history

Greeley was incorporated as a city on April 6, 1886.

Greeley was built on farming and agriculture, but kept up with most modern technologies as they grew. Telephones were in town by 1883 with electric lights downtown by 1886.^[2] Automobiles were on the roads alongside horse drawn buggies by 1910.^[2] A Women's Citizens League was established there to support female suffrage.

In 1922 KFKA became one of the first radio stations to broadcast in the US^[2] and the Greeley Municipal Airport was built in 1928.^[2]

Greeley housed two POW camps in 1943,^[2] during World War II. One was for German POWs and the other was for Italian POWs. A vote to allow the sale of alcohol passed by a mere 477 votes in 1969,^[2] thus ending temperance in the city.

The Greeley Philharmonic Orchestra was started in 1911.^[2] In 1958, Greeley became the first city to have a Department of Culture.^[2]