Oral History Interview
with
George V. Fagan
Interview by
Judy Finley
13 April 2005
CSHP 0002
Part 2
Colorado Springs History Project
CSHP
Pikes Peak Library District, Special Collections
Copyright 2015
Colorado Springs History Project
The Colorado Springs History Project was conducted between the years 2005-2010 in a joint effort to document and update the history of Colorado Springs from mid-20th century to 2010. This volunteer team included members from the region’s major academic libraries and faculties, as well as the Pikes Peak Library District and the Pioneers Museum. Administered and supervised by the Colorado Springs History Project Committee, the project interviewers consisted of a number of local volunteers.
The oral history portion of The Colorado Springs History Project identified and interviewed individuals who had helped to shape the city of Colorado Springs in various and diverse ways. Subjects were also sought as representative of inhabitants of the Pikes Peak region and those who could provide insight into the city’s story in the second half of the twentieth century. Interviews reflect the rapid growth of Colorado Springs from the post-World War II era to the early part of the twenty first century. Interviews touch on business and government relations, religious organizations, various non-profits, the Air Force Academy, Colorado College, key local businesses, and the growth of many important charitable services within the community. Several interviews touch on education in Colorado Springs, highlighting both secondary and post-secondary educational institutions.
The collection is comprised of 50 tapes, 19 CDs, and 2 DVDs with 32 individual interviews. These interviews are housed in the archives of Pikes Peak Library District’s Special Collections. A complete listing of the interviews is available at the Special Collections reference desk. Transcripts for many of the interviews are available for use.
Digitization
Audio from the Colorado Springs History Project was digitized between 2009 - 2011 and is available for study and use in the Special Collections department.
The Colorado Springs Oral History Project
George V. Fagan
Oral History Interview
CSHP 0002
Judy Finley
13 April 2005
Colorado Springs, Colorado
[tape 1, side 2]
Finley This is side two of my interview with George Fagan on April 13, 2005. We were talking about the effort to tear down the old county court house and the efforts of Earl Bryson and others to save that building which ultimately became the new home of the Pioneer museum. Was this under the auspices of SpABA, the Springs Area Beautiful Association?
Fagan It was a separate, it’s a separate organization. It was Earl Bryson that started SpABA and I don’t think that continues. It was a -- we were all in that too, but anyhow but after he was able to save the court house, Earl Bryson entered to try to save the Chief Theatre which was the Burns, the Burns Theatre, which was a very fine theatre seating 2,500 people. Excellent acoustics and so forth. And when they turned it into a movie house in the 1920’s, they blocked off the galleries and they were all blocked off, for people to use this. Well anyhow, we, Earl Bryson… I don’t know if from another organization or not but anyhow, they hired an architect to say how much it would take to renovate it and open it again as a theatre. It wasn’t very much, it was probably something like under $50,000 to do that. So he tried to campaign to save it. The theatre, the building, the building was owned by Mrs. Will Nicholson. Her husband Will Nicholson was the mayor of Denver at one time and she was the daughter of Jimmy Burns.
Finley She was?
Fagan She was the daughter of Jimmy Burns. And the Burns house of course, is here on Wood Avenue and she owned that.
Finley Well she must have inherited what was the Burns Theatre then, somehow the ownership of it, directly from the Burns Family.
Fagan Yeah, they kept the ownership of the theatre even though they turned it into a movie theatre. She still controlled it and of course the Exchange National Bank which is on that corner administered her estate. She was still living but administered her properties and Earl Bryson and I went to talk with the, president of the Exchange Bank and the bank officials and they said, “Yes”, they were going to try to preserve the bank, preserve the theatre but eventually that wasn’t so… we never did talk to Mrs. Nicholson. Maybe if we’d gone to Denver and talked to her maybe we could’ve persuaded her but anyhow, the bank kept promising they want to keep it and the next thing we knew and here is the wrecking ball, wrecking it, tearing it down so that was a lost cause.
Finley A lost cause.
Fagan Lost cause.
Finley Can you describe a little bit about Earl Bryson’s other activities? Do you remember him well?
Fagan Well he was involved in SpABA of course which is Colorado Springs Beautiful [Springs Area Beautiful Association] and they encourage gardens and this was…well, it was I was still at the Academy because my wife’s garden at the Academy won the SpABA prize so that had to be 1970’s -- 1965 -- 66, in there. In 1968 we moved downtown and bought this house and she won a SpABA award for her garden here. So SpABA continued quite awhile. And I’d like to mention two other things or about. These projects, one, another project I was involved in the mid 70’s, I guess early 80’s was the Colorado Springs Senior Center. The senior center on Hancock Street had been a shopping center and it had a Safeway store and in fact, when we first came down to the Academy site in 1958, there was no shopping, no grocery store, nothing. So my wife used to come to that Safeway.
Finley The Golf Acres.
Fagan The Golf Acres, yeah but then it started dying on the vine, that whole thing. So it was a woman and I can’t think of her last name and I’ll have to think of it. Anyhow, she started another organization called Senior Citizens Incorporated and I got involved in that as a vice president for her and one of their projects was trying to establish a senior center. Well, they floundered around for months because they didn’t have any money and then suddenly, Mayor Isaac, Dave Isaac, yeah I mean…
Finley Bob.
Fagan Bob. Bob Isaac. Bob Isaac came and talked to her and told her that he came home from some kind of a meeting in Baltimore. And in Baltimore, they had turned an old shopping center into a senior center. So Bob says… said to her, “Why can’t we turn Golf Acres into a senior center if you’ll sort of hancho the thing. Melinda, Melinda I can’t think of her -- I have to think of her name. Melinda was her name; first name. Anyhow, so that’s what they did and they start planning for that and one of the problems was at that time, is that Bob Isaac said, the city couldn’t take the shopping center away from the owner directly, it needed an intermediate. So the senior center soon became that intermediate, they took over the shopping center.
Finley Now, how did they pay for it?
Fagan The man who owned it gave it for tax benefits so he transferred it to a…the seniors, Senior Citizens Incorporated. He was able to get his tax benefits and we in turn were able to donate it to the city so that’s the way that started.
And in turn, we need a big fund drive. It would take a million dollars or more to convert it. How are we going to raise that money? Well just again by coincidence, a man named Jackson, I can’t think of his first name, a man named Jackson was a vice president of the Equitable Insurance Company and the Equitable building, you know it was down at Cascade and Colorado Avenue where the utilities is today. But Jackson, Mr. Jackson, full of energy and knew all kinds of people so he became the head of the finance committee and he tackled. He said, “let’s take the… get the plans for the museum, for the senior center.” And he marked off each of the activities and put a dollar price on and he went out to various companies and organizations in Colorado Springs and sold them on -- furnishing the money for the ballroom, furnishing the money for this, furnishing the money for that and within a couple of months, he had all the money for the senior center so that’s the way that started.
Finley That’s wonderful. And then of course, the city became involved certainly with the programming and funding for that.
Fagan Oh yeah, yeah.
Finley Right.
Fagan Yeah, but that Mr. Jackson was the guy who really made the difference.
There’s one more project I’d like to talk about and that is what today is called the villa, the Villas at Southgate which originally were the Villas of San Jose.
Finley On South Corona Street, right?
Fagan On South Corona Street.
Finley Yes.
Fagan Again, this property was owned by St. Joseph’s Church, St. Joseph Catholic Church.
Finley And that was the Catholic Church down there in that neighborhood.
Fagan That’s the church there.
Finley Yeah.
Fagan Saint Joseph’s. And they were willing to give up part of their land to build an apartment building for senior citizens. Well, this of course involved money, involved a huge loan, involved sponsorship. So again, Sister Dolores was involved in that, and we persuaded Richard Hanifen… Richard Hanifen to get involved in that. We used to hold meetings down at Saint Joseph’s Church, they had a classroom building there and we got other people involved.
One key guy was John Armstrong, John Armstrong Jr. And John Armstrong was at that time was the vice president of the Colorado Springs National Bank which is family owned and his father was the president. Now, that John again was not a Catholic but John was willing to work on that committee. We had a number of people I can’t think of them all. One was John Sabo, John Sabo the lawyer S-A-B-O and John decided he would become a member of that and would do all the legal, all the legal part… free. So Bishop Hanifen met with us. Bishop Hanifen agreed that he as the Bishop from Colorado Springs would sponsor the building. It required a federal loan on the -- I can’t think of the -- housing act of the section eight of the housing act and it required a sponsor and he decided he would do that. So he informed the [YEN]? an organization, and this time it was called the Catholic Housing Authority, the Catholic Housing Authority incorporated and we hired (and she was a nun then) Claudia Deats.
Finley How do you spell her last name?
Fagan D-E-A-T-S and Claudia Deats sort of became the honcho of the project. [inaudible] paperwork.
Finley And what was your role in that project?
Fagan Well I was the vice president of this…
Finley Association.
Fagan Corporation.
Finley Corporation, yeah. [Laughter]
Fagan So many Corporations, I can’t remember them all. Anyhow, he applied for a loan to build a housing project with 100 units -- no no, sorry, with 50, 50 units, 50 units. And it was for senior citizens, low income senior citizens and it was to be -- for independent living. Well the outcome of it all is that -- the loan was over four million dollars and we built as a result, the first unit which was what they call Villa San Jose and we operated that for a couple of years and they decided to build a second unit and this second unit was called Villa San Maria and this project went on for years.
John Armstrong remains as the chairman. I for some time, part of the time, I was this… I was the treasurer. Other part of the time, I was the vice president but I was involved with that program for I would say 16 years. And John Armstrong was involved with it for that time. And there are two projects that are beneficial to Colorado Springs and to that area. Now, that area wasn’t a very good area. And partly as a result of the activities of the Villas at San Jose, they were able to get money and then people interested in reviving that whole area. They built, we built project and it now is a big rebuilding program in that area so it’s interesting to see how they mushroom -- things mushroom from time to time.
Finley Well it’s very interesting to see how much private citizens can influence community action through the years and you certainly have given a good outline of programs relating specifically to the seniors and also to this Marian House Soup Kitchen for down and out people. Is there anything else before we move on that you would like to describe in terms of your specific volunteer activities in the community or is that or I shall move on now?
Fagan I can’t, you know when I retired from the Air Force and went to Colorado College, everybody seemed to be after me to work and for some reason I just was unable to say no so I was involved with the Fine Arts Center. I was on the board, board of trustees in the Fine Arts Center and of course I was involved with these other projects.
Finley What do you remember about the Fine Arts Center at that time when you were on the board?
Fagan Well, on the … the director, the early director was with … had been Fred Bartlett and I -- one of the members of the board, an ex-officio member is the chairman or the superintendent of the academy and I was the superintendent’s representative for three or four superintendents. General Warren and General Morgan and others so I was familiar with that board, I just happened as a representative of the superintendent but this time I was… in 1971 or 2, I became an elected member of it and at that time, Nave, I can’t…
Finley Michael Nave. I think his name was Michael.
Fagan I can’t think of his first name but Nave was the super -- was the director and he’d come from Williamsburg, from the museum in Williamsburg and what his idea was to turn the Fine Arts Center into another Williamsburg. So we were very opposed, very opposed to that.
Finley What did he mean by that?
Fagan Well he was going to turn it into a museum like Williamsburg with colonial paintings and stuff like that. Forget about the western world. Well Nave didn’t last too long and then he was replaced by Paul, Paul somebody, I can’t think of his name. Harold.
Finley It doesn’t come to me either.
Fagan He was the director for a little while. He was there during their 50th anniversary of the art and fine arts museum. I’ll have to look up his name. Anyhow he was a good director but he overspent his budget. He went wild and spent, overspent the budget by about $100,000 or more dollars. So they fired him. [Laughter]
I don’t know somehow, right I don’t know and what they call the advisory board, the Fine Arts Center advisory board and the advisory board job was the… trying to hire the new sec… the new director. The names are escaping me. The fellow -- the interview among people and while you write can you check that, I think his name was Wagner. He did a good job. He sort of brought back the emphasis on the Taylor collection and the local collections and rather than travelling , and they had a lot of travelling shows. So he said, emphasize local people. And David, David Wagner, I think his name …and he was here quite a few years. Now they have a new one, I can’t… I have nothing to do with it but I know they have a new one. So the Fine Arts Center, they’ve had their ins and outs too.
Finley Yes, well.
Fagan And it was at this time while I was on the board of directors that the Numismatic Society agreed to come to Colorado Springs and the Fine Arts Center ceded some of their land to build the Numismatic Center.
Finley That was Fine Arts Center land?
Fagan The Fine Arts Center land.
Finley Ha, I wasn’t…
Fagan The Fine Arts Center land came out onto Cascade Avenue and the way they built that, they built that Numismatic Center, a part of it was land that belonged to the Fine Arts Center. I’d have to go look at it again to see exactly where it was but that was part of it.
Finley Well, of all your community activities, George and your professional activities too, let me ask you what accomplishments are you proudest of in your lifetime?
Fagan Well, that’s hard.
Finley It’s hard to say but what gave you the most satisfaction really?
Fagan Well, it was building the Academy Library I think was the best thing. The other big thing I think I was Colorado College. By being able to build the addition to Colorado College Library and to build the special collections at Colorado College, plus the Colorado College group I think they were good projects. That never would’ve been realized unless the time was right to do those and that money was available and once the WES, Women’s Education Society, put up money for all those projects and so I worked closely with them on that. And my other famous project which I’m sorry Colorado College let lapse was the Friends of the Library of Colorado College which was very, very successful and we -- you know all this well as I do. I can’t think of the…
Finley People involved in with the Friends of the Library?
Fagan Yeah. She was the president.
Finley Harriet Brooks? No.
Fagan Yeah, before Harriet Brooks. Zoe..Z..
Finley Yeah
Fagan I could picture her. She later was in the real estate.
Finley Zane Bowers. Zane.
Fagan Zane, that’s it.
Finley Zane Bowers.
Fagan Zane Bowers, yeah. She did a great job in coordinating all that and we ran the book sale. Book sales you know would bring in, you know $25,000 for two days and we decided if we can do it in two days and why not do it in one day. We brought in $25,000 for one day in the same way. So that was a successful enterprise for that.
Finley Yes. And you described all that very well in the other oral history interview that I conducted with you related to Colorado College. You also…didn’t you get involved with the Friends of the Air Force Academy Library after you had retired or during the time…
Fagan I started that afterward.
Finley After you retired?
Fagan A fellow was [inaudible] a fellow named Schaefer, Smith Schaefer asked me to help them to start a Friends of the Library. So we did and General Clark and the professor of history, General … geez, I can’t think of the name but anyhow, we incorporated, Friends of the Library.
Finley And this was after you retired from the Colorado College Library?
Fagan Well yeah, this is…
Finley Was it in the ‘90’s or…
Fagan ‘80’s.
Finley In the ‘80’s.
Fagan ’84.
Finley ’84. Right after you retired from CC, okay.
Fagan ’84.
Finley I’m going to turn this over.
Fagan It’s after I retired from Colorado College. I retired ’83 from Colorado.
Finley Right.
[AUDIO ENDS]
