The Gilpin County Historical Society is pleased to announce its Spring Fest on April 23 from 10 a.m. until 4 p.m. This event will be held at our tour office located at 117 Eureka Street in Central City across from the Teller House

First, we want to show our appreciation for our volunteers with a pizza party from 12 p.m. until 2 p.m. Pizza and drinks will be provided for our volunteers. In addition, our volunteers will get a free tour of the Weekly Register Call Print Shop where we are having our grand opening today. So, if you are one of our volunteers, please come join us.

Second, we are having a membership drive today. Please consider coming out to support us financially. We are very dependent on contributions from our community to support the works of the society. Without your support, we would not be able to preserve our county’s rich history. We have several levels of membership that offer some benefits.

Third, we are having a job fair. We need docents to conduct our tours. This is a part time job and the hours are 10 a.m. until 4 p.m. Some positions are yearround and some are from Memorial Day until the beginning of October.

Fourth, we are having a volunteer recruitment drive. Outside our executive director and the docents, we are a volunteer organization. We are very dependent on community support to meet our goals. Much of our volunteer work is event oriented. We have the Cemetery Crawl in August along with the Creepy Crawl in October. We need both storytellers and guides for these events. We also need volunteers for other events that we might hold along with representing the Historical Society at places like the County Fair. We also need help with marketing, administrative functions, and maintaining our museums.

Fifth, and most important for this event, is our grand opening of our new exhibit. We have partnered with the Central City Masonic Lodge to preserve the historical Weekly Register Call Newspaper Print Shop as a museum. The Weekly Register Call moved into this building about two years after the paper was founded in 1862. The paper is the second oldest paper in the state and the oldest continuously published paper in the state. The shop features a Chicago Taylor Cylinder press that is from the late 1860s and was used until around 1980 to print the paper. It is reported to be the only model of that press in existence. There are two other job presses in the shop of which one dates back to the late 1870s. We are very proud to be able to preserve that shop and to make tours available. On April 23, we are offering a $2 discount off our regular admission price of $7 for the tour for adults. Children 12 and under are free for all our tours.

The Gilpin County Historical Society offers tours of our Thomas house, which is set in the late 1800s, the Central City Opera building, the Teller House and Saint James Church. Tours of the museum are available by appointment in the off season and tours of the Coeur d’Alene Mine are available in the summer on the weekends.

We hope you will come out and join us on April 23 from 10 a.m. until 4 p.m. We will be at our tour office located at 117 Eureka Street in Central City across from the Teller House. Parking is available on the street along with the Teller House parking lot located across from the County Courthouse on Eureka Street. Tours of the print shop originate from the tour office and are located only a block away.

You can contact us at gilpinhistory@live.com or at 303-582-5283. We hope to see you there.