City of Greeley history

In the early 1900's, German-Russians came to start a new life in the USA. Many of them went on to own their own sugar beet farms.

The first sugar beet factory was built in 1902 to process the beets into sugar.

Founders O.T. and Minerva Jackson established the town in 1910 as a place where Black people “should be given an opportunity to achieve a degree of independence through agriculture which they could not experience as long as they continued to sell their services to others for a daily wage.”

The Greeley Philharmonic Orchestra was started in 1912.

Suffragist Carrie Chapman Catt created the League of Women Voters on February 14, 1920- just a few months after the ratification of the 19th Amendment.

The first Spud Rodeo was held in 1922 in honor of the potato crop.

The Greeley Municipal Airport was built in 1928.

The building that houses the Greeley History Museum was originally built in 1929 for the Greeley Tribune.

The Greeley chapter began in 1931, but it was called the Women Citizens League.

By 1933, erosion was visible and billowing clouds of airborne topsoil became part of the “Dust Bowl” that stretched from the Dakotas to Texas.

It wasn’t until 1937 when the Colorado-Big Thompson Project gained approval.

The Mexican Farm Labor Program, widely called the “Bracero Program”, began in 1942 and became the largest guest worker program in US history.

In 1945, Greeley finished construction of Milton Seaman Reservoir on the north fork of the Poudre River upstream from the Bellvue Treatment Plant.

In 1958, Greeley became the first city to have a Department of Culture.

The company that would later become Monfort then ConAgra then Swift and now JBS was started in 1960.

In 1980, HP bought the land to build a computer manufacturing plant.

The huge output from the plant brought Greeley the applelation "Steak House of Colorado." With the arrival of the Hewlett-Packard Company in 1982, Greeley acquired a high-tech dimension.

1995 The Greeley Water and Sewer Board adopted a water conservation implementation plan in order to address Greeley ' s growing water needs as the population exceeded 60,000.

The transmission pipeline project that began in 2003 is closer to completion.

The sugar beet factory was torn down in November 2008 so that a new cheese factory could be built.

Construction is planned to begin in 2020.

On March 2, 2021, the Greeley City Council unanimously approved an ordinance that made it possible for the city to purchase 1.2 million acre-feet of groundwater called Terry Ranch, an underground, non-tributary aquifer.