My North Denver
By Dixie Darr
When I first moved back to North Denver in 1978, friends refused to visit me after dark because they were afraid to park on the street. “Do you feel safe there?” they’d ask, voices dripping with skepticism. Things change. Now those same people say, “Gee, I wish I could afford a house in that neighborhood.”
Mostly, though, perceptions of the neighborhood have changed more than the neighborhood itself. Even those of us who live here have different experiences of the area. Because I spent my childhood here, My North Denver includes phantom places that now exist only in the memories of longtime residents--places like the old Penney’s store in the Chaffee Park shopping center at 48th and Pecos (now a bingo parlor). When you gave the clerk your money, she put it in a pneumatic tube and sent it to the lone cashier, who sat in a windowed cage above the main entrance to the store.
I still see the old North Denver Bank at 38th Avenue and Julian, where my mother worked as a teller in the drive up window. We would pick Mom up after work and go up the street to Carl’s for dinner. Luckily, some places have remained relatively unchanged, bridging the gap between the past and the present. For my money, Carl’s still makes the best pizza in town. My dad prefers the Italian sausage sandwiches. Pagliacci’s and Patsy’s are still around, too. Carbone’s is now Lechuga’s, but otherwise hasn’t changed much.
Woodbury Library is an integral part of My North Denver, then and now. It was the first, and for many years the only, library I knew and it remains my icon library. It defines the word for me. These days I go there two or three times a week, usually to pick up books I’ve ordered from the Denver Public Library website. It’s always crowded with people of all ages.
For the past five years, I’ve enjoyed the drive along 46th Avenue, from Federal to Sheridan, every Monday, Wednesday and Friday while on my way to lift weights at the Scheitler Recreation Center at Berkeley Park. It boasts the best fall colors in North Denver. I missed it this year because I switched my workout to Rude Recreation Center. South of Colfax and, therefore, not technically in North Denver, Rude underwent a major expansion earlier this year and now has the best, biggest and brightest weight room in the city.
Now I’m going to say something that will shock you. I have never had a cup of coffee in my life. So I don’t frequent any of the popular coffee houses in the neighborhood. They are not a part of My North Denver. Frankly, the whole coffee culture annoys me. I’d rather have a cantaloupe liquado in one of the handmade pine booths at Taqueria Patzcuaro at 32nd and Bryant. Everything on the menu is good. Even my persnickety brother and sister-in-law like it.
The final stop on my personal tour is Highlands United Methodist Church at 32nd and Osceola. Except for weddings and funerals, I hadn’t been to church for forty years. A few years ago I realized that my best friends were a born-again Baptist, a lay minister with the African Methodist Episcopal church and a Catholic nun. One of them asked me if I thought maybe that was a message for me. The next day, I started looking for a church to attend and found HUMC. With deep roots in the neighborhood, a small, friendly congregation and an open philosophy, the church has become an important part of My North Denver and is a place where I always feel safe.
Maybe someday you’ll show me around your town. Until then, welcome to my neighborhood.
12:04:32 PM 
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