Alternative, Colorado: Where the People Think of Other Things to Do

My family and I recently moved to a smaller town here in Colorado. Alternative. It might sound like a strange name for a city, but it’s nice here. The cost of living is lower than where we were before in Fort Collins, and housing is more reasonable.

Before we moved, I did some research on the history of the city, just to find out a little more about it.

This fine city of 687, (a little more since my family of five moved here), was incorporated in 1968. Originally, they wanted to name it either Summitsville or Rocky Mountain Town. The mayor at the time, Ike Atckinson, was in charge of finding out which name the townspeople wanted the most. He asked around and they had a vote. Turned out it was a tie, so Ike went to his brother-in-law, Marvin, to break the tie. Now Marvin was not the shiniest apple in the barrel, and Ike knew this. He had assigned Marvin a city job to keep his wife, Becky, happy. He never really thought that he’d have to come to Marvin for anything, but he thought that this job would be simple. So, he went to Marvin and asked, “Which name do you like better?”

            “What are the choices again?” Marvin asked.

            Ike sighed and said, “Summitsville or the alternative.” He was just flustered enough that he could remember the other name.

            So Marvin announced that he had made a decision and went off to register that decision and incorporate the new city.

            Originally, then, the city was named, “The Alternative” and people just nodded and accepted it. Mayor Ike, however, thought it was a little cumbersome and got the people to agree to shorten it to just, “Alternative”. So it was then that Alternative, Colorado was born.

            Our family was the main attraction for the single day that it took us to unload the moving truck and get everything into the house. Most neighbors walked slowly by, giving weak waves or looking away and walking their small dogs quickly to their destinations.

Our new next-door neighbor, Martha, tried twice to bring us cookies. The first time, she had been watching out of her window and thought that we were done moving in when in reality, we had only stopped unloading to set-up a few things inside the house and grab some lunch. When we headed back out to the truck, we saw Martha with her cookie tray ambling up the toward our driveway, but with her eyes growing ever wider, she decided to make a u-turn and head back toward her house.

            Once she knew we were done and had closed the door to the truck, she came timidly back and knocked at our door. She introduced herself and cheerily peered around my daughter, who had answered the door, in an attempt to see where we were placing our furniture. We all decided to come to the door and expressed our appreciation for the cookies. Martha made sure to tell us that she had been baking all day and that when was certain that we would love them. They were oatmeal and raisin cookies and she put in extra raisins because they were so much better for people than chocolate chips, although she admitted that she occasionally snuck a few chocolate chips when she was feeling scandalous. She proceeded to tell us that she would come by tomorrow and let us know all about the town and who we should and should not know about. I had a feeling that we would find out about all of them, one way or another.

            Martha smiled and with one more peek around us, announced her departure, waved and waked back down the path toward her house, stopping once to wave and smile one last time.

            This would prove to be an interesting new adventure for us.

That’s the news from Alternative, Colorado for this week, a small town where people think of other things to do.