Ranchers have gone the way of the dinosaur in the Brush Creek Valley, but memories remain. During a recent reunion to Aspen/Snowmass, surviving members of the Anderson family visited their old childhood home that is now at the physical core of Anderson Ranch Arts Center.

After lunch at the café, Ed and Bert Anderson, the two surviving offspring of Bill and Hildur Anderson, along with nine other close relatives made the rounds of the campus led by Paul Collins, the current Program Director of Painting, who will assume the title of Interim President of the center when Hunter O'Hanian leaves next month.

With keen eyes, the brothers inspected the remnants of the old ranch buildings that have been incorporated into the state-of-the-arts studios.

“I don't recognize very much of the out buildings, except for the corners of the old barns,” said Ed Anderson.

The main ranch house, where they grew up, seemed familiar and unfamiliar at the same time. The top floor contained the bedrooms of the four Anderson children, Ed, Bert, Jim and Margie. Now that floor contains an apartment for visiting artists and faculty.

“My bedroom was on the south side of the house. My window was one of the few that opened. I used to climb out on the portico and sit and watch the chipmunks,” remembered Ed.

The lower floor that once housed the woodburning stove in the kitchen is now a library of art books. On the walls though are photographs of their parents. One in particular brought back a lot of memories. It features Bill on the fiddle and Hildur playing the accordion.

Happy memories (SUBHEAD)

Ranching life was hard for the whole family, but Bert and Ed remember it with fondness.

Their roots come from Swedish immigrants. Their grandfather Charles and his brothers Anton and John Hoaglund were working on a freighter that stopped in New York City. They jumped ship and headed out West.

Their grandmother, Mary Beck, had come with her brother Henry from Sweden when she was 16 years old. He was a liquor dealer, who traveled a lot and later owned a liquor store in Aspen. At first, Mary lived in Leadville in a boarding house and then traveled to Aspen over Independence Pass with her brother. Charles and Mary met at a Swedish dance and were married a month later.

One of the family stories that Ed and Bert remember about their grandmother Mary had to do with her false teeth. While living in Leadville, Mary was told that all Americans had false teeth and she was talked into having all hers pulled to install this status symbol of her new homeland.

Charles Hoaglund worked in the Smuggler Mine all his life, while Mary worked at Tourtelette Park (high up on Ajax), feeding the miners in a cafe. Their daughter Hildur was born in Aspen near Herron Park on June 21, 1907. She had five siblings.

When Hildur was three years old, the family bought a ranch from one of Charles' brothers in the Brush Creek Valley.

“At first the family lived in a small cabin with a dirt floor with no electricity or running water, while they built the ranch house. They skidded all the logs from the hills using a sleigh drawn by a horse. At first they raised cattle and pigs,” said Bert Anderson.

When they later drilled a well for water in order to “go modern,” it turned out that they had also drilled into a natural gas supply. “You could light the fumes out of the faucet,” said Bert.

Hildur inherited the ranch from her parents and married Bill Anderson from Rifle, who came from Norwegian stock.

After graduating from school, Hildur became a teacher at the Little Red School House and also taught in Woody Creek and Rifle. When she married, though, she had to give it up because married women were not allowed to teach. After raising her family, she got a teaching degree at Western State College in Gunnison and taught mathematics in the Aspen School District for many years.

Ed and Bert remember the years growing up on the ranch and how they often put their parents in a panic.

Ed remembers a return trip from the Aspen hospital where his brother Jim had just been born. His father Bill was driving back with the two boys when he had a flat tire near what is now Owl Creek and Highline Roads and realized that he didn't have a jack to replace it. Since Ed and Bert, aged two and three, were asleep in the back seat, he left them in the car to go to a neighbor's for a jack.

Before he got back, the boys awoke, and thinking that they'd been abandoned, they took off for Woody Creek. When Bill returned all hell broke lose as he scoured the valley for his sons.

Getting lost seemed a common occurrence. Once, when Hildur was out collecting eggs, the boys woke up and found her missing. They were in the process of dressing baby Jim to head off to their uncle Johnny Hoagland's ranch nearby, but their mother returned before the trek began.

Another time, Hildur found the boys' shoes by the irrigation ditch which was quite large and thought they had drowned. Giving their parents a fright seemed to be part of the fun of growing up on the ranch.

As the boys grew up, the family began to raise sheep, which they took to Rifle for the winter, where they rented a place to stay. Because of this, the boys started school in Rifle and this continued for three or four years. With a flock of 200 to 300 sheep, it was quite a trek to bring them back up the Roaring Fork Valley for their summer pastures on Smuggler Mountain and the kids and several dogs would help with the trip.

“When we lived in Brush Creek, we did everything on the ranch. What I hated the most was driving the stacking horses when we were stacking hay. They could get really contrary,” said Ed.

When Ed and Bert were in the 5th and 6th grades, their father Bill changed from sheep to horses and the Anderson children went to school in Aspen.

“The ranch was all open space with a large meadow where we would play with the horses and played ‘work-up' baseball,” said Ed.

“I loved the ranch. I loved looking up at Belt Mountain (Mt. Daly),” said Bert.

Following in his grandparents' footsteps, Bert met his wife Judy in Aspen and married a month-and-a-half later. He became an engineer and they live in McAlester, Okla.

Ed met his future wife Anne at the hospital where Hildur was recuperating after having been kicked by a horse.

“We met at his mother's bedside. It's the only reputable place to meet a man,” she said.

Ed Anderson joined the Navy for eight years and then became teacher. Now retired, he and Anne live in Rangley.

Brother Jim was also an engineer. He and sister Margie are both deceased.

When the brothers were teens, the family sold the homestead to the Meltons for $25,000 and moved to the east end of Aspen. The family sold the 1.5 acre-property at the end of Cooper Street 10 years ago and it is now a city park. The family met there for a picnic during their reunion.

In 1966, the old homestead of the Anderson family was transformed into an artists' community under the lead of ceramist Paul Soldner. Later, the land's owners, Jim Chaffin and Jim Light donated the property and Anderson Ranch Arts Center was born.

Just as the early residents of Anderson Ranch have so many wonderful memories of their time there, the Art Center now provides art students, faculty, staff and visiting arts with a memorable experience of living and working in the Brush Creek Valley.

Ann Larson's e-mail address is alarsonco@earthlink.net.