Local residents and visitors are invited to discover the history of western Colorado’s sugar beet farming in a special, never-before-seen screening of the new Rocky Mountain PBS documentary Colorado Experience: White Gold on Tuesday, February 6. The documentary film event will be hosted at Museum of the West, 248 S. 4th St., Grand Junction, in the Whitman Educational Center, with a 6:00 p.m. reception and 6:30 p.m. screening, followed immediately by a Q&A session with the film’s producers and the people who appear in the film. All activities are offered at no cost. “This film highlights the sugar beet industry’s importance to Colorado in the 20th century, and how it impacted our community in western Colorado,” says Producer Dan Garrison. “After discovering sugar beets on a trip to Europe, Colorado businessman Charles Boettcher filled a suitcase with seeds and found Colorado’s plains were the perfect environment for sugar beets. This new crop would prove to be one of the most important in Colorado’s agricultural history. Additionally, sugar beets attracted a diverse array of workers – fields were soon filled with everyone from Mexican settlers and refugees, to European immigrants and children, and WWII German Prisoners of War,” says Garrison. The February 6 event’s panel discussion will feature Garrison, along with historian Jonathan Carr, and beet farmers Jim Bernal and Angel Colunga. This premiere screening is brought to viewers by Colorado Mesa University, Rocky Mountain PBS, Museums of Western Colorado, and Grand Valley Power. For additional information, visit museumofwesternco.com or call Museums of Western Colorado Executive Director Peter Booth, 970-242-0971 x2204, or RMPBS Producer Dan Garrison, 970-248-1073 or DanGarrison@rmpbs.org
