Standing precariously balanced on a stepladder, Betty Fox leans over to pull out one of the heavy, leather-bound volumes from the bookcase that lines the wall of the vault in the La Plata County Courthouse. Many of the volumes – dating as far back as 1876 – were once a bright cherry red, but over the course of time have faded to a drab maroon. There is a lot of history in this room. As Fox carefully flips through the brittle pages that are dog-eared and yellowed with age, images come to life of a time that is gone but not forgotten. For the past 122 years, the events of La Plata County – some significant – are chronicled in these annals.

Hundreds of pages document payments made to area residents who trapped and scalped coyotes for a small bounty from the county. A $25 application and receipt for a dance hall permit is still fastened together with a rusty pin that looks as if it hasn’t been removed since it was first placed there in 1930. Records of births, deaths, marriages, and real estate transactions can also be found hidden somewhere between the covers of these thick volumes. Inadvertently, Fox even found a piece of her own history. While casually flipping through the death records one day, she happened across a mention of her great-grandfather who was run over by a timber truck in the early 1900s. Fox who grew-up in Fort Collins and lived in the Denver most of her adult life, hadn’t realized that anyone in her family had ever been to Durango.

Many people come to Fox, clerk to the county board of commissioners, when researching resolutions passed by commissioners 50 years ago or when trying to establish whether a road falls under the jurisdiction of the county. But delving into the past can often be a difficult task because although clerks began using typewriters in the 1920s, any information prior to that was handwritten and often illegible. “Horrifying” is how Fox describes the hours she would spend searching dozens of volumes for a single entry, often times trying to decipher 100-year-old spidery handwriting. “It’s really so flowery that it’s hard to read. It was scary coming in here because you didn’t know exactly where something is… I’d just tear up and head for the vault,” she said.

But as of last week, those days are gone. It’s been a gradual process, but La Plata County is heading into the 21st century. From now on, documents that had been added to the antiquated volumes will be scanned onto a CD-ROM by MID, Microfilm & Imaging of Durango, Inc., a local company. “We were fortunate here in Durango we can do that and didn’t have to buy the equipment. It’s been a real savings for us,” said County Clerk Linda Daley. The county will recoup all the money it spends to have information scanned to CDs when it sells documents to title companies which keep tabs on property ownership and oil and gas leases.

Fox made her final handwritten entry Jan. 9 before closing the books for good. It was, she said, a bittersweet moment that symbolized the end of an era. “These volumes are unique and specially bound and so it was a strange moment for me,” she said. “The new system is clearly better but there's a certain charm to these books that I will miss.”

The new, completely automated system provides easy access to documents with the touch of a button. All anyone has to do when seeking information is key in a search word press “enter” and hit “print”. Like Fox, Daley can’t deny feeling somewhat sentimental when it comes to the past. There is a sense of romanticism that comes from reading faded handwritten entries of yellowed pages that tell grand stories of men who died from gunshot wounds and "strong drink” or those who were brought before county commissioners to explain their reasons for failing to vote. Nevertheless, Daley is looking forward to having access to a more practical system that will save space, money – the specially ordered books cost $600 each – and time. “I think it’s great. It gives easier access to the public and of course our primary problem has been storage space and you can store things in a computer cheaper than you can build a new building,'’ she said.

The county first began storing information on microfilm in the late 1960s, Daley said. Although those who are not computer literate may have a hard time adjusting to the new system, Daley said, it shouldn't take long to bring everyone up to speed. In the meantime, the 527 cherished leather-bound volumes will continue to be safely stored in the fireproof vault at the county courthouse, available to anyone looking to take a journey into the past.

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