100 years ago: “Durango’s first newspaper editor dead: Mrs. Caroline Romney, pioneer newspaper publisher and editor, died Thursday at the home of her sister. Mrs. Romney came to Colorado in 1880 and started the first newspaper in Durango in 1881. Her office and printing press were housed in a tent pitched in the snow. Mrs. Romney founded The Record, a paper which later became The Herald.”

75 YEARS AGO: “Elk tracks up fresh cement job: Ouray street and water commissioner Gus Nickle says: ‘It’s all right for the elk to eat my turnips and sweet peas, browse on my imported tulips, and even tip over my garbage can, but when they come in on Main Street and track up a perfectly good cement patch in front of one of the most widely known and historic hotels in Colorado, that is carrying it too far.’”

50 YEARS AGO: “The annual ‘Coloride to Telluride’ will be held this weekend when fall colors are at their best in the high country. With only two restaurants open in town, the job of feeding the crowds will be assisted by the Band Mothers, whose home cooking pleased everyone last year.”

25 YEARS AGO: “In 1967, Dustin Hoffman’s character in “The Graduate” was told the wave of the future was plastics. In 1991, he might be told plastic recycling. Americans discard 2.5 million plastic bottles every hour. Few are recycled. But plastic bottles are now being reshaped into elegant pile carpet ... and just five recycled soft drink bottles make enough fiber-fill for a man’s ski jacket.”

Most items in this column are taken from The Durango Herald archives, Center of Southwest Studies and The Animas Museum. Their accuracy may not be verified.