North Poudre Irrigation Company Oral History Collection

Collection

Identifier: WNPI

Staff Only

Scope and Contents

The North Poudre Irrigation Company Oral History Collection consists of eleven interviews with former company presidents and officials from 1992 to 1994. They reflect subjects' backgrounds, their involvement with the company, and general recollections about irrigation, farming, and water management in northern Colorado. The interviews, conducted by CSU graduate students and faculty, are copies of material recorded for a contracted project to manage the current and historic records of the NPIC. The location of the original tapes is not known. The collection also includes a general chronology and narrative of the company's history and a listing of prominent company officials and board members.

Dates

Creation: 1992-1994

Creator

North Poudre Irrigation Company (Organization)

Restrictions on Access

There are no access restrictions on this collection.

Restrictions on Use

Not all of the material in the collection is in the public domain. Researchers are responsible for addressing copyright issues.

History

The North Poudre Irrigation Company helped the development of agriculture in northern Colorado by supplying water to farmers. Incorporated in 1901, the company was a conglomerate of several earlier irrigation enterprises, including the North Fork Irrigation Canal Company (1878), the North Poudre, Box Elder, and Lone Tree Canal Company (1879), and the North Poudre Land, Canal and Reservoir Company (1880). The company founded the sugar-beet farming community of Wellington in 1903 and convinced the Colorado and Southern Railway Company to build a line to the settlement. As the company expanded, it tapped water from a variety of sources, including the Colorado-Big Thompson Project. Today the company owns more than 22 storage reservoirs and approximately 200 miles of ditches as it continues to provide water for northern Colorado's farms and cities. Its history reflects the evolution of agricultural and municipal water use in the region.

Extent

0.75 linear feet (2 document boxes)

Language of Materials

English

Additional Description

Abstract

The North Poudre Irrigation Company has supplied water in northern Colorado for over one hundred years. Incorporated in 1901, the company founded the sugar-beet farming community of Wellington in 1903 and currently manages more than 22 storage reservoirs and approximately 200 miles of ditches. This collection primarily consists of eleven oral histories with company officials. It reflects the history of this local irrigation enterprise and the evolution of agricultural and municipal water use in northern Colorado. A portion of the collection is digitized and online.

Arrangement

The collection consists of oral history interviews arranged alphabetically (audiotapes in Box 1, transcripts in Box 2) along with two folders of historical information.

Acquisition

The North Poudre Irrigation Company Oral History Collection was transferred from the Colorado Agricultural Archive to the Water Resources Archive in February 2004. In 2014, the company donated interview transcripts.

Online Materials

Documents in this collection have been digitized and are available through the Colorado State University Libraries website. In the electronic version of this document, direct links appear in context.

Processing

Processing was completed in July 2006. Materials were reboxed and refoldered using acid-free supplies. Metal fasteners were removed and replaced with plastic clips. Papers concerning technical details of the broader records management project were discarded, as were floppy disks containing project index files. In September 2008, the paper by Ann Hilfinger was printed from a CD of files and added. The CD, containing draft transcripts and other administrative files, is in the collection file. Transcripts donated in 2014 were processed in June 2014. At the same time, records management and oral history project files from Jim Hansen were organized on the Library's digital archive server.