In our previous post, we wrote a piece titled “Little-Known Facts About Painting And Coating”. We offered our readers some random factoids about high-quality paint, the history of painting, how much paint is sold and produced in this nation every year, and some more subtle, yet significant, differences between oil-based and latex-based paints. We had a fantastic time researching and highlighting a few things ourselves. Obviously, we are experienced in the ways of epoxy flooring in Northern Colorado and painting services in the same area. But there is a wide world of painting facts out there on which we have barely scratched the surface.
With that in mind, we are going to carry on with the same kind of post; call us paint nerds if you like, we just couldn’t get enough of these little-known facts. If you are in the same boat as us, we encourage you to read on! If however, you are more interested in one of our range of local painting and coating services like home painting, commercial painting, storage solutions, Super High Performance Polyaspartic, Epoxy Garage Floors, and even concrete staining on basements or garage floors, we think it’s alright if you skip out on this post in favor of finding the Northern Colorado coating and painting specialists you are looking for.
In Front Range communities like Berthoud, Denver, Broomfield, Fort Collins, Greeley, Loveland, Windsor, Longmont, Boulder, Thornton, Arvada, and others, people turn to Mile High Coatings for exceptional business property and home painting services. And before we get going on our promised topic today, we thought it would be fun to do a bit of a “mini-piece”, if you will, about one of the communities that call us the top residential and commercial painters. Of course, this isn’t a unanimous proclamation of our superiority here at Mile High Coatings; indeed, if every single person in Northern Colorado agreed that we were the only choice as commercial and home painters, there wouldn’t even be a need for a website or this post! That being said, we want to get the word out about how passionate we are about each Colorado community we serve.
Loveland, Colorado Painters
First up is Loveland, right next to our home-city of Fort Collins, CO. Loveland, such that it is, wasn’t always Loveland. The first settlers who came to what is now called Loveland named the area “Miraville”. Most notable of these settlers was Mariano Modena, an early trapper who decided to settle down in the area around 1858. Within the Big Thompson Valley, close to the Big Thompson River, what is now called Mariana Butte, and The Devil’s Backbone, the famous Fort Namaqua was built. This Fort served as a refuge for travelers on the Overland Stage Line, and eventually became the site for a federal post office. But by the time that Medina’s health had taken a turn for the worse in 1878, Fort Namaqua was already becoming a thing of the past. The city of Loveland would be founded some three years later.
Even still, some of you Lovelanders (or is it “Lovelandites”?) might find it fascinating to learn that the Medina family and their friends have a historical landmark as a cemetery which can still be found to this day. Although the location isn’t directly where Fort Namaqua would have been found, you can travel on Namaqua Road to First Street, just south of Highway 34, west of town. Just northwest of that intersection you can find the landmark with their graves. Interestingly enough, look to the west and you’ll see what is now called Mariana Butte, now home to hundreds of beautiful homes and a picturesque golf course which tangles itself through the winding Big Thompson River.
The Flour Mill
As Fort Namaqua faded into memory, St. Louis became a local buzzword. Andry Douty was the owner of a local flour mill, which had “St. Louis” printed all over merchandise and equipment as a marketing ploy of sorts. The mill’s success begat community success, and with that communal prospering came the opportunity for the pre-Loveland town (in 1868) to be considered for the county seat. As it turns out, Fort Collins, the military camp designated to protect the Overland Stage Line, was the victor in that particular running.
Barnes And Loveland
In 1873, David Barnes packed up and moved his family and life from Golden, Colorado (close to Denver) 50 miles or so north to the Fort Namaqua and St. Louis area. Barnes did so not on a whim, but on a tip from his good friend, William H. Loveland, the president of the Colorado Central Railroad. The tip was that there was a new railroad line set to be installed between Denver, Fort Collins, and, eventually, even Cheyenne, Wyoming. Barnes, for the short-term, became a wheat farmer, wisely selecting property where the surveyed land set to be a part of the railroad would be. Barnes donated a portion of his 80-acre farm so the railroad construction could go through. By 1878, everyone was moving from St. Louis to the railroad, around a mile west. Barnes, ever the altruist, helped sway the vote to incorporate, which took place in 1881, so that the town would officially be named “Loveland”, rather than “Barnesville”. We certainly prefer the former, some 100 odd years later.
Barnes was always highly regarded in the Loveland community. He was affectionately known as “Uncle Dave” until he passed away in 1886. If you are interested in viewing his home, to this day it still stands on Earnest Place.
Other 19th century highlights of Loveland include the founding of the Loveland Reporter-Herald (originally known as simply “The Reporter”), and the noteworthy fact that Loveland had grown from 250 residents in 1882 to the ample figure of 900 in 1885.
Perhaps in a future post, we will carve out the time to highlight 20th-century proceedings in our beautiful community known as Loveland. But for now, this brief history lesson will have to suffice.
Fun Facts About Paint And Painters!
The first thing we said we would do in this post, before we got slightly carried away talking about Loveland’s origin, was that we would be listing little-known facts about paint. And by golly, that is exactly what you are going to get, even if this post’s list might be a bit more truncated than what we had originally intended.
- Red is the very first color a baby will see. It’s true. Scientists speculate that the reason babies can see red in the first few weeks of being out in the world is due to the fact that the color red has the longest wavelength among colors that humans can see. Therefore, it’s the easiest to process.
- Looking to manage your anger, or maybe, someone else’s? Paint their room pink. While doing so might make a certain sliver of the population even more upset, if people can get past the color’s stereotypes, they might be able to enjoy a few of this pallet’s benefits. This color is said to help suppress anger and anxiety because of its intrinsically calming qualities. Remarkably, this is why mental health care clinics and even prisons paint their walls pink.
- In the past, perhaps around the time that Loveland was just a railroad line and a few hundred settlers, house painters were expected to grind down their own pigments with a pestle and mortar. Because that was an arduous process, typically only wealthy people could afford to have a colored home. Nowadays, whether you live in Loveland or not, you can call Mile High Coatings for affordable house painting services.
Loveland Painters
If you are looking for Loveland commercial and residential painting services, we believe that we represent a great choice because we do our best to blend quality with value. We offer our expertise and input as a complimentary service because we want our customers to be 100 percent satisfied by our commercial and residential painting services. If you are searching for Loveland paint contractors or exterior house painters, or perhaps even deck coating and basement flooring services, we’ve got you covered at Mile High Coatings. We are in the business of turning first-time customers into life-long clients. Through high-quality materials, affordable pricing, and friendly professionalism, we get the job done well. On every project, big or small we want to prove our worth to our customers. That’s what makes a good painting company great. Get your free estimate today!