2000-02-06 - 01:39:12

LEARNING DENVER DIRECTIONS

Boys as they grow soon orient themselves in many

ways, the ways growing more complex and detailed as

they mature. landmarks are visual clues. Down

the block past the yard with the always barking dog,

towards my cousins house, the streetcar tracks one

set going toward town - - the other set coming from

town directions soon learned which way is which.

Learning the way to the schoolhouse, where the

novelty - candy store is that has the neatest

assortment of penny candy any boy could desire.

As I attempted to construct the map of my world it

became obvious to me that I needed a bigger frame of

reference, so dad introduced me to the compass

which had the magic needle that always pointed

north. To me the easiest way was for me to face

where the mountains stood out, I had been told they

were to the west. Facing west putting the W on the

face of the compass toward the mountains, I saw that

north was to my right, south to my left. There

being only one more compass point to account for,

toward the flatlands at my back and having heard

nothing good about it managed to keep east at my

back for years !

This gave me something on which to build my mental

map. A way to understand what the grown folks were

talking about. Soon, I began to relate new points

to my mental map and comitted them to memory.

Cherry Creek came in from roughly the south east and

flowed into the platte river which flowed from south

to north through town. Another outstanding

landmark at that time was daniels and fisher tower

which could be seen from any small height in town.

East of the platte in the downtown area were

the railroad tracks and east of them was the Denver

Union Terminal (the depot) the tracks and the river

were more or less the dividing line between east and

west Denver. That made sense to me, but then I

heard the terms north Denver and south Denver and

it took me awhile to map it out in my mind,

northeast, southeast, northwest and southwest. As

i grew I learned who lived in each section of town.

The terms were often blurred but when connected to

what was being talked about the area under

discussion was located mentally.

Many other guide posts came along as i grew.

A task I set for myself was to memorize names of the

streets from broadway west to lakewood, and to the

east out into aurora. The avenues ran east-west,

the avenues were numbered in rising order from first

avenue going north and were named to the south. The

blocks were numbered in the hundreds going each

direction, for instance, broadway from first avenue

south was called south broadway. north from first

was either not so designated, broadway and other

streets were sometimes called called north broadway,

etc.

It became easier and easier to pinpoint where

something was by the hundred block and the name of

the street. Then dad gave me some carfare, and

would blindfold me and take me somewhere and drop me

off, as I would hear his car drive off the

blindfold would be discarded and it was east to go

to an intersection and read the street and avenue

signs and look at the addresses on the houses to

figure where I was. He always would drop me within

walking distance of a tramway line, and the routes

were something already accomplished in my

memorization process so it was a snap to catch a

streetcar and ride home. Dad had been a messenger

boy and was delighted to see me go through all the

mental mapping.

Downtown the streets were numbered and the

cross streets were named, starting from broadway

toward the platte river. It took some more memory

work and that was mastered also. When I started

work my mental map was of great value to me. There

were a few any-godlin, every which way areas in

town, one was bonnie brae with winding streets and

the other was near north high school that area was

weird also.

In later years, new developments proliferated

in town and the suburbs. the new style was curving

streets and cul-de-sacs in hopes of hindering

speeders and reckless drivers and it did help a

bit, also many of the developments had limited

access, only one way in and one out some of them

quite were large developments. All these things had

to be learned by the fire department, the police,

the various emergency ambulances and the postmen.

I am still able to find my way about town using the

grid system generally, but the suburbs have gone

beyond my memory as I have no use for that knowlege

- - - - I use paper maps for that.

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