“Big snows?” Jeanette Smith says when asked how she fared through the 53 inches of snow that hit Nederland recently. “It’s okay.” Jeanette laughs the question off, for she’s seen so much in her 87 years of life that the occasional occurrence of snow up to her shoulders is but a minor nuisance.

Jeanette has witnessed the ebbs and flows of Nederland’s growth, from the halcyon that was those peak years of the mining industry, to the town floundering from the loss of that industry before the ski area in Eldora was created. She remembers the Jamboree, Old Timers’ and Miners’ Days, and Frozen Dead Guy Days; she remembers the miners, the artists, and the hippies.

Framed in her hallway in her home in Nederland is a large photograph of the town from 1914. She points to the Antlers Hotel where she attended camp every summer, and explained where St. Rita’s Catholic Church would eventually be built, as well as where Highway 119 would go, explaining that the land was purchased for $400.

But apart from witnessing the changes the town has gone through, she’s experienced peaks and valleys in her own life as well. Tremendous loss and everlasting love, and many generations of family growing and thriving like the stretching roots of a great Colorado blue spruce.

A spruce tree would connect Jeanette to the mountains before she would ever venture into them herself, since a giant spruce grew in the back yard of her childhood home in Denver. When she was but a toddler her brother relocated the sapling from the mountains to their back yard as part of a Boy Scout project. Jeanette has pictures of her and her family, generation after generation, standing in front of that same tree, from sapling to stories high.

The walls of Jeanette’s current home in Nederland are picture collages of more than a hundred years of history, from her grandparents who emigrated from County Mayo in Ireland, to her parents, aunts and uncles, to her own six children, six grandchildren, and five great-grandchildren. As she goes by each photograph she instantly can recall the date the photo was taken, and where it was taken. Often there’s a story or a memory attached, which she is pleased to tell.

She gathers more photo albums to share and spreads the memories across her dining room table, which is proudly adorned with St. Patrick’s Day decorations. She finds photos of her father from his time serving in France during World War I at the age of 18; he lived to be 87 despite having been exposed to chemical gas during the war.

“My uncle became an artist and worked for Walt Disney to make “Snow White and the Seven Dwarves,” she shared after finding a portrait her uncle made of her father. She became excited when comparing a photograph of her father at the age of 24 to a picture of her grandson at 24, as the two of them looked remarkably alike.

Jeanette looks carefully at a class photo from her time at St. Vincent de Paul Elementary School and tries to locate herself….she was standing in the middle of the middle row. When asked if she liked school, Smith chuckled and noted that when she was a child she had always just gone with the flow of life. School wasn’t something she hated or loved – it just was.

But at the age of 9 she experienced something much more impactful, and that was coming to Nederland to attend Camp Montrita, a camp for Catholic girls run by the Junior Catholic Daughters of the America that was held within the historic Antlers Hotel. Smith shared her memories of the games and activities she and other girls from Denver, Kansas, and Nebraska would enjoy, from horseback riding to the shores of Barker Dam, to talent shows and hikes, and even a snipe hunt through the old cemetery, before being scared off by boys pretending to be ghosts.

“We loved to hike to Mud Lake and spend the day,” Jeanette wrote in a piece written in 2008. “Some sunbathed, others hiked round the lake, and some caught tiny frogs, crayfish, and the special salamanders that lived there. The director did not appreciate these creatures in the bathtub.”

Her essay details walks into downtown Nederland shops for “candy, pop, and ice cream,” hay rides, cowboy cookouts by the campfire, and nights of square dancing. The memories forged over those summers definitely left a lasting impression, as fresh in her mind as if they had happened yesterday. To this day, Jeanette still writes of her experiences and of the things she’s learned along the way. Writing and cataloging photos helps her always to remain connected to those memories, as well as to her family and loved ones.

Among the mass of photos on her walls are also frames dedicated to single memories – from family gatherings, like Easter at her mother’s house in Denver, to weddings and wedding anniversaries. Jeanette has at least one photo from every decade celebrating her marriage to Michael B. Smith, from 1954 to his passing in 2021.

Mike was born June 27, 1935 in Boulder, and moved to Nederland when he was 11 years old. He contracted polio in 1949 and survived, regaining his ability to walk. He met Jeanette when he was 14, having ridden his bike up to the camp one summer, most likely out of curiosity. He would marry her in September of 1954, after having dated her for a year.

Mike worked in many mines throughout his career, including Cold Springs, Conger, Cross, Eureka, and Tungsten Mill; and worked in construction and carpentry right up until retiring in 2000. He’s remembered, not just for his work in mining, but also as a leader in the community who served on many boards and assisted in many long-lasting projects. Jeanette remembers clearly the impact the loss of the mining industry had on Mike and on Nederland.

“The mining fell apart in ’58 or ’59. The ski area hadn’t been built yet or anything, and a lot of people just packed up and moved to another mining town, and that was devastating to someone who the only thing they’ve done is mining,” Jeanette recalled. She described how Mike had to work several jobs, including trucking – which he did not enjoy – and construction.

“By the 60s Boulder was starting to really move; Martin Acres was being built and all that stuff, so he was hired on as a laborer and then he studied and became a journeyman carpenter, and then he got bored with that and decided to do some mining again,” she laughed, then named some of the projects he worked on, including building homes in the then-new Big Springs subdivision and constructing the roads in Sunnyside.

The Town of Nederland also went through some difficult changes after losing the mining industry the first time. Jeanette remembers that just as the town was going through one of its worst transitions, without industry and before tourism, that was right when the hippies began to show up.

“Our hippie era was just hellacious,” Jeanette recalls. “One summer there was at least 300 to 400 people living out at Gold Lake in tents and lean-tos!” She remembered local hunters getting upset at the influx of people camping in the wilderness, as it chased the deer and elk away.

From 1955 to 1962, Jeanette gave birth to six children: Joe, Mark, Jim, Diane, Pete, and Sheila. In addition to being a full-time mother, Jeanette also worked as a teacher’s aide for 29 years, teaching Nederland Elementary School kids how to read.

Over the decades she has organized and managed town events like Old Timers’ and Miners’ Days, took part in the Red Hat Society, formed a bible school with collaboration from Nederland’s churches, wrote and edited the joint church newsletter, taught religious education after Sunday Mass at St. Rita’s (where she also played the pipe organ), and volunteered at the Nederland Mining Museum.

In addition to having experienced some of Nederland’s “rough” weather, including a snowstorm with four-foot-high snow drifts that occurred when she was pregnant with her son Pete, nothing quite compared to having survived a natural gas explosion.

“Explosion and fire destroy Smith home” the headline reads in the February 20, 1981, edition of The Mountain-Ear.

“The explosion occurred at 8:50 a.m. in the garage where Michael Smith had been working. Within 10 minutes the remainder of the house was engulfed in flames. The explosion was heard for as far as five miles away,” the report reads.

“At that time there was no snow on the ground; it was dry and the atmosphere was really heavy,” Jeanette recalls.

Welding equipment in the garage created a spark that ignited the natural gas leak. Nederland was full of workmen off for President’s Day, many of whom quickly ran to the Smiths’ aid; emergency services were already on their way by the time Jeanette had gotten around to calling for them.

“A friend out in Rollinsville said she heard it,” Jeanette mused. “I have a friend who was down at Whistler’s Cafe at a window facing west and they saw it, and it was just like in the cartoons – it went ‘Ka-Boom.’ With the ‘Ka’ she saw the roof go off of the house, and then the ‘Boom’ when the roof came back down, and all the glass in the windows got blown out.”

A state patrolman was the first to respond to the incident and arrived just in time for Mike to emerge from the rubble of the garage that had exploded around him. Mike had lifted the roof joists off of himself, and stood covered in white dust. The patrolman remarked that it looked like Jesus of Nazareth rising from the dead.

The Smiths’ son Mark ran into the flaming house and began collecting childhood photos and family memorabilia and passing them out the windows. The piano was also saved, as were many of Jeanette’s songbooks, though they survived slightly smoky and singed. Jeanette runs her fingers along a deep scratch in the dining room table that sits in her current home, and notes that Mark had helped to save that table as well, though it suffered minor damage.

She survived the explosion with minimal injury. However, Mike had severe burns on his hand and face and had to be taken to the hospital. Luckily, Mike had a signed paycheck in his wallet, and his wallet had been rescued from the fire; Jeanette used the funds to purchase new clothes for him for whenever he would be released.

“But what was really sad that day was his dad went down to Boulder for lung cancer surgery. He had smoked since he was 14 and was a miner, and he died on the operating table that same day,” Jeanette said. “And so the minister at the Presbyterian church drove me to the community hospital to tell Mike, and that was a very hard thing to do. Mike lost his house and his dad the same day…so we’ve been through a lot together.”

In late July, 2014, Jeanette, Mike, their six children and their families were selected to be the Grand Marshal Family in the Old Timers’ Parade. It was the first time in 10 years that the whole family was together in Nederland.

Five years later Mark Smith passed away from cancer at the age of 63. Mark worked for many years as a road supervisor for Boulder County, and was also the owner of his own business, Antique Excavation Company.

Mark, much like his parents, had volunteered his services and expertise to the Nederland community on numerous occasions. He selflessly dug defensive lines with his D-7 dozer to protect homes in the Sugarloaf neighborhood from the Black Tiger fire, and was among those who excavated and carved out access roads in Jamestown and Lyons that had been buried in debris from the 2013 flood.

Then, in September, 2021, Jeanette lost her husband of 67 years to Parkinson’s and Post Polio Syndrome.

As Mike was in the Life Care Center in Longmont she would arrange to bring friends and family with her to visit him. She, of course, has pictures of her visits with him, of them together and of Mike with his loved ones.

And though it was obvious from that array of pictures that spanned decades that Mike had lost a significant amount of weight, it was also clear from the smile on his face that he was still bright with life.

“I made these so Mike would have something on the wall in his room,” Jeanette said as she pointed to several scrapbooks and picture frames that she put together specifically for her visits to her husband.

“When you have somebody who is in a nursing home you got to bring something to make them feel like they’re not isolated.”

An article highlighting Jeanette and Mike Smith’s beautiful marriage was printed in the Valentine’s Day issue of The Mountain-Ear published on February 11, 2021. It included these excerpts from a letter Jeanette wrote, titled “My Valentine” about that fateful summer day Mike rode up to the camp.

“I watched Mike ride his bike near Camp Montrita one summer. The next summer, he had the courage to ask me to go on a bike ride with him. We went from Camp Montrita to the Eldora turnoff. We each had the old-fashioned wide tire, one-speed bikes. At that time, there was a trail through the woods back toward the now YMCA camp off the West Magnolia Road.

“We rode our bikes to a little pond that Brownlee Guyer called the Tennessee Pond for the nearby Tennessee Mountain. I tried to find the pond the next summer, but because Colorado was at the beginning of a drought in the early 1950s, I could not find it. It had turned into a big grassy place. Every time the Seniors Snow Show passes the pond it brings back fond memories of the first time Mike and I visited the pond so many years ago.”

Jeanette, sitting at the scarred dining room table, doesn’t linger long in lamenting, but instead focuses on those picture-perfect moments: playing the piano and singing with the camp girls on rainy days… going on a bike ride with the one you don’t yet know is going to be the love of your life… posing with your own children in front of the great spruce tree that you yourself posed in front of as a child. Jeanette, her house awash in pictures in glass frames, is the keeper of all those memories, and with them the keeper of priceless history.

She still presides as the ambassador to Nederland’s history, ensuring that it isn’t forgotten. Jeanette runs the tours at the Gillaspie House Museum whenever she can, and remains active in several groups, including her writing group, the Nederland Area Seniors, Nederland Area Historical Society (NAHS), and her church – though she notes that she doesn’t play the organ during Sunday Mass anymore, but now she gets to play piano at home just for herself.

“When COVID hit I thought maybe I’ll stay home and relax, but now I’m getting involved again, ahhh!” She feigns a scream, as if things are too overwhelming. But she admits that she loves staying active as well as staying involved.

In addition to keeping informed and having an opinion about many of modern-day Nederland’s “big” issues, from the proposed Chipeta Park Pump Track, to the TEENS, Inc. childcare center, and the town’s new logo, she’s also been lending her expertise and sharing her treasure trove of history with the NAHS as they prepare to celebrate Nederland’s 150th Anniversary.

“I’ve got the invitation hanging up by the telephone, and I’ve already mailed some,” Jeanette said excitedly, explaining how she’s been reaching out to Nederland’s “old timers,” to all those with deep-rooted history in the Town who are now living all across the country, and inviting them to the sesquicentennial festivities scheduled for this August.

During a recent meeting with Nederland Town staff, NAHS, the Peak to Peak Chamber of Commerce, and other organizations regarding planning the 150th Anniversary events, Jeanette was nominated to be Grand Marshal of the parade. That nomination was unanimously and enthusiastically accepted.