People

: John Witt Collier; He was born in Dukedom, Tennessee. His application for social security benefits gives his parents at James H. Collier and Fountain Ella Hughes. According to his obituary in the Daily Sentinel, which also confirms the location of his birth, he was born on March 17, 1873. He came to Grand Junction, Colorado in 1899 and began working as a fireman for the Denver and Rio Grande Railroad. He married Margaret Almeria “Maggie” Howell in Grand Junction in 1902. They lived with their family on a farm across from the first Grand Junction High School at 9th Street and Chipeta Avenue. There, they raised horses and grew hay. In 1907, Collier quit the railroad and moved with his family to the Redlands, just across from Orchard Mesa and near the Black Bridge. There they farmed and ranched. According to Oral History interviewee and son John Jay Collier, his father found land in Pinon Mesa that no one had claimed and homesteaded there in 1915 or 1917. He sold his property in Grand Junction, Colorado, and “proved up” by spending at least three months on the land for seven years. He sold horses and lumber for corrals, farmed, and raised sheep and cattle. They summered their cattle on the mesa and wintering them in the Redlands. John Witt also acted as the supplier to ranches on Pinon Mesa and Glade Park, gathering supplies in Grand Junction and delivering them.

: Johnna Bernholtz; Contributor to "2020: The Hammer and The Dance: A Gunnison Valley Journal," (source:2020: The Hammer and The Dance : A Gunnison Valley Journal).

: Johnnette Phillips; Johnnette Anderson Phillips was born to John and May Anderson on May 18, 1935 in Shreveport, LA. She graduated from Byrd High School in Shreveport in 1953. She met her future husband, Jack Phillips, in Louisiana while he was stationed there during his USAF service. Jack was a "Yankee" who grew up in Eagle County, CO. Johnnette Anderson and Jack Phillips married in 1955. They moved to Eagle County after he finished his tour of duty. Initially, they lived at the Phillips family sawmill operation on Muddy Creek off Colorado Highway 131 near Piney Mountain. The family sawmill supplied lumber to the Gilman Mine. Later, the Phillips family lived in the town of Eagle. Johnnette Phillips worked in various positions within Eagle County government before she started her political career. She was elected to the position of Eagle County Clerk and Recorder in 1978 and served in this capacity for fourteen years. In 1992, Phillips was elected to the position of Eagle County Commissioner. She served in this capacity for eight years. Johnnette Phillips was the first woman in Eagle County elected to both those positions. Johnnette and Jack Phillips were married fifty-four years at the time of Jack's passing in 2010. They were blessed with four children: Jill, Jan, Jackie and Jeff.

: Johnnie Stevens; Johnnie Stevens was head of ski patrol at the Telluride Ski Area in the 1970s. A Telluride native and lifelong skier, Stevens grew up in Pandora, where his dad was the mill superintendent at the old Gray Mill. Ultimately, he became COO of the ski company and was inducted into the Colorado Ski Hall of Fame. Born in Montrose, Stevens moved from Ouray and came to Telluride, at age 6, when his father became Idarado’s mill superintendent. Stevens left Telluride for a few years in the late 1960s, serving his Vietnam War draft at the Pentagon and attending graduate school in Gunnison. When Stevens returned to Telluride, in the 1970's, the ski area was getting started and Bill Mahoney asked Stevens to work for the ski area. That is when Johnnie became the head of the ski patrol and the assistant mountain manager. Biography taken from:https://www.telluridenews.com/image_9c21bc2c-911a-11e8-b53c-bb70c2f94615.html Accessed 1/30/20 And taken from:https://www.telluridenews.com/news/article_212ae5e2-be80-5952-904b-1c67f09f5784.html Accessed 1/30/20

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