Don's College and Jobs

DON DENNIS AND ANN (MILLER) DENNIS FAMILY WEBSITE

1. HOME (The early years)	2. Pueblo, Gr Junction	3. Fairbanks 1				4. Fairbanks 2
5. Arizona	Dupree Ranch	Denver		Ann's Pottery/Art		Articles 1 2 3 4
Calendars 56-61	La Veta, CO	Stories		50's Song Hits		Lefse		Sports
click for: Sturgis (100 + pages of Sturgis material)		click for: Fowler (100 + pages of Fowler material)
Pueblo Junior College	Don's College and Jobs	Ancestors		"It All Began"		"....And an Electric Chair"
Army & Yearbooks	USS Dennis	USS Fogg	James Turner		USS St. Lo	Delbert Miller	POW WWII
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Bottom of page: Newspaper Career

Pueblo Junior College

Back, Left: Jack Milam, Waymond Dean, Bob Warlick, Sam Smith, Tony Hegler, Julie Yearling
Front, Left: Ron DeLeon, Norm Colglazer, Harry Simmons Coach, Len Roybal, Greg Smith
Coach Harry Simmons and the 1960-61 NJCAA National Champs

Tim Simmons, Left, Speaking at the ceremony naming the CSU-Pueblo basketball arena floor "Harry H. Simmons Court" in December 2008. Five members of Simmons' 1961 National Junior College Championship Team were on hand for the ceremonies. From Left, Jack Milam, Len Roybal, Julie Yearling, Norm Colglazer and Tony Hegler.
Photographs courtesy of CSU-Pueblo Athletic Department, with written permission.

Pueblo Junior College was a 2-year College. After getting out of the active Army in December 1957, Don enrolled for the January 1958 quarter. He attended Pueblo College from January 1958 until December 1959, completing his courses in 5 quarters and graduating. He immediately went to work for the Pueblo Chieftain newspaper.

1959/1960 Tsanti Yearbook picture

In 1963 Pueblo College became a 4-year college, Southern Colorado State College. Married and working in Grand Junction, Don decided to move the family back to Pueblo and complete his 4-year degree. He attended college this time year-round from September 1964 until December 1967 (while working at the Pueblo Chieftain) and was one course short of graduation when the Fairbanks opportunity arose. He completed this final course at the University of Alaska in Fairbanks.

1964/1965 Tsanti Yearbook Picture

He finished with a Major in Business Administration and Minors in Journalism and Economics.

Over the years Don did graduate work at Columbia University in New York and obtained additional units from LaVerne College and Santa Clara University.


College Book costs in 1958	Tuition at Pueblo Junior College was $20 a quarter, plus a $7.00 activity ticket charge.

Rent during college was $15.00 monthly for a room
in Jack and Hazel Eaton's home, 516 Gaylord, Pueblo, CO.
Don lived there during his second year of college and until married.

First Don, in Jan - March of 1958, lived at 606 Abriendo, with the Virgil Bugg Family.
Rent was $18 a week, for room and board.
His roommate was Lawrence Baseggio from Atwood, CO (Sterling, CO).
Then both moved from this boarding house to the home below.

Michigan Ave home of Mrs. Flood, where Don, Jerry Hummitzsch,
Lawrence Baseggio and 5 other young men
lived during the spring of 1958.

Lawrence Baseggio, 1958

Jerry Hummitzsch, PJC photo, 1958
(see bottom of page)

516 Gaylord, Pueblo, CO, home of Jack and Hazel Eaton.
Don lived there from fall of 1958-January 1961
Vern Warren roomed there first and got Don a room in Sept 1958.

Vernon Warren
Vern Warren from La Veta, CO
PJC Photo, 1958

click to see: Uptown Theater; Ianne's Pizza and the HiFi Club;
LaTronica's; Patti's; Gus's Place; and the
Original Pass Key Restaurant, all college favorites!

PUEBLO JUNIOR COLLEGE STUDENT HANDBOOK
click to enlarge

1959

Pueblo Junior College enrolled 1,100 students in the fall of 1958, 58-59 school year.

JOBS DURING COLLEGE

Don arrived in Pueblo to start College in January 1958.   He was a full time student and didn't work other than to help out occasionally at the Uptown Theater in the Mesa Junction section of Pueblo, sometimes traveling with Mitch Kelloff to the San Luis Valley to pick up and drop off films from other theaters he owned. The Uptown Theater was owned by Mitchell and Ann Kelloff for whom he had worked as projectionist at the Valley Theater in Fowler during high school.

During the summer of 1958 Don managed the Spur Theater in La Veta, CO, for the Kelloffs and went to summer Army camp and postal school in Indianapolis; Ft. Benjamin Harrison.

Courtesy LaVeta Historic Preservation Committee and Kathy Kiernen Martin
(Click to enlarge)

In September 1958 he moved back for college in Pueblo, where there was a record snowfall in early September, breaking off tree limbs and causing damage. Don and friends borrowed a big truck and made enough money hauling trees away etc, that he didn't have to work for awhile as he started college.

During the holidays, Nov and Dec of 1958, he took a job as mail carrier on Pueblo's East Side.

In April and May of 1959 he worked at Colorado Fuel and Iron, the Pueblo steel mill.

That summer, 1959, he moved back to La Veta, CO and worked at Charlie's, the Masinton's store, after summer Army camp at Ft. Carson, CO.

Yearly he attended a weekly meeting, spent a weekend a month and a two week summer camp with Uncle Sam, fulfilling his 8 year army commitment.

In September 1959 he went back to Pueblo to complete college and on November 3, 1959 was hired by the Pueblo Chieftain newspaper starting work three weeks later.

Charlie's Cash and Carry, La Veta, CO
Charlie Masinton's Grocery Store.

2007 Masinton Park

1956-1957_
Tsanti Yrbk

1958-1959 Yearbook

1959-1960 Yearbook

1964 1965
Tsanti Yrbk

Uptown Theater, Pueblo

Buying supplies before
moving to La Veta to run the
Spur Theater.

Don worked in the original newspaper office of the Pueblo Chieftain when he first went to work for the Chieftain in November of 1959.    The offices for 24 years had been in a downtown old stone office building, 211 W. 5th St, with the newsroom on the second floor and the business offices on the fourth floor.   The last of the old-style newsmen worked there.    One reporter had never ridden in a car and if you saw him walking and offered him a ride, he would turn you down.   Another wore a straw hat with "PRESS" written on a card, standing in his hat band.   They spanned 50 years of newspaper reporting, having worked with Damon Runyon and various other old famous characters.   Everyone beat their Underwood typewriters to death pouring out reams of copy.

The Chieftain broke ground in February 1960 and eventually moved to their new building within about a year of Don working there.   They upgraded to electric typewriters but the "old timers" kept the Underwoods humming.    The old characters slowly dropped out and retired in the next few years.   It was "too different". They taught Don so much about reporting.   He has always considered those first 2-3 years the pinnacle of his newspaper days. He was also a stringer for the AP and UPI, earning $10-20 per story they used.

In Fairbanks with the News Miner, the newspaper upgraded to computers in the 1970's. Don kept his old Underwood, and when it no longer would work with the system he reluctantly retired it, brought it home and it kept a place of honor for years.   He doesn't like computers, although he understands them pretty well and does email when he has to.... he prefers to use a typewriter.
He worked for newspapers from December 1959 until November 1979, and still writes sports copy for different publications and the Goldpanner website, www.goldpanners.com .

Pueblo Chieftain, Grand Junction Daily Sentinel, Jessen's Daily,
Fairbanks News Miner, Associated Press, United Press International,
Alaska Journal of Commerce.

AP and UPI wire machines bringing the story
of President Kennedy's assassination into
the newspaper, at the Daily Sentinel
in Grand Junction.

Bill McClatchey was Sports Editor both times Don worked
as sports writer for the Pueblo Chieftain. This article
is from 1973, after Don had moved to Fairbanks.

The new Pueblo Chieftain/Star Journal building.

June 1963

1961 PJC Indians- click to see background people

Back to Page 1

Marvin Knutson, President of Pueblo College 1945-1964,
died from a stroke at Peoria, AZ on August 1, 2009.

PUEBLO COLLEGE

1956-1957_Tsanti

Don's College and Jobs

1968 Alumni,Nov_Dec

1968 Alumni, Jan-Feb

1958-1959 Pueblo College Arrow Newspapers

1969 Alumni Bulletin

Newsletter 1960

some enlarge with a click

Dave Socier	"Slim" William Adams	Conrad Gulliford	Dave Jackson	LeRoy Novak
Jerry Hummitzsch	Marlow Sloan	Lawrence Baseggio	Monte Denbo	Mike Romero
Lytle Cowell	Jack Klein	Ron DeLeon	Joe Dionisio	Frank Romero
Bob Sansone	Ed Carpenter	Les Pollock	Tony Hegler

Guy Kennedy
Tony Marich

Pueblo Community College (PCC) is a two-year institution of higher learning located in Pueblo, Colorado. PCC traces its history to the founding of Southern Colorado Junior College (SCJC) in 1933.
In 1937 SCJC became part of the Pueblo County Junior College District, and was renamed Pueblo Junior College.
In 1961 the college district was dissolved by the General Assembly and the Junior College became the four-year Southern Colorado State College (SCSC).
In the 1970s, SCSC opened a branch institution, the College for Community Services and Career Education, that in 1978 was re-organized by the General Assembly into a separate entity and renamed in 1979 to Pueblo Vocational Community College under the Colorado Community College System. In 1982 it was renamed to Pueblo Community College.

click to enlarge and read.
1941 PJC Civilian Pilot Training Classes

DON DENNIS AND ANN (MILLER) DENNIS FAMILY WEBSITE

NEW on the site

1. HOME (The early years)	2. Pueblo, Gr Junction	3. Fairbanks 1				4. Fairbanks 2
5. Arizona	Dupree Ranch	Denver		Ann's Pottery/Art		Articles 1 2 3 4
Calendars 56-61	La Veta, CO	Stories		50's Song Hits		Lefse		Sports
click for: Sturgis (100 + pages of Sturgis material)		click for: Fowler (100 + pages of Fowler material)
Pueblo Junior College	Don's College and Jobs	Ancestors		"It All Began"		"....And an Electric Chair"
Army & Yearbooks	USS Dennis	USS Fogg	James Turner		USS St. Lo	Delbert Miller	POW WWII
Copyright law precludes use of others work without explicit permission. Web pages, by law, are protected as soon as created. www.dondennisfamily.com reserves the right to pursue unauthorized users of any image, clip or text from this website. If you violate our intellectual property you may be liable to pay compensation, and where appropriate, the costs of collection and/or statutory damages. Material is watermarked with transparent overlay or marked, and our presentation of this material is copyrighted. No part of this website or the related files may be reproduced or transmitted in any form, by any means (electronic, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without prior written permission. (THIS MEANS: DON'T EVEN THINK ABOUT USING ANY OF OUR SCANS!)