MORRISON — Tiny Town, the roadside attraction near U.S. 285 south of Indian Hills, celebrates a big milestone in 2015 — its 100th year.

In 1915, Denver moving company owner George Turner began building the miniature buildings for his young daughter. The town that developed was opened to the public in 1920 and has been a delight for kids and families ever since.

“It’s a happy and magical place,” said Elvira Nedoma, who now manages Tiny Town and Railroad. She recently completed a book about Tiny Town’s history, “If These Tracks Could Talk: The First 100 Years of Tiny Town,” that will be available in the park’s gift shop in the coming months.

That history is segmented by various ownerships, floods, fires and consequential starts and stops. But more than its own history, Tiny Town is an homage to the history of Denver and the surrounding community.

Among the buildings in Tiny Town — seen from footpaths or the popular train pulled by miniature, historic replica engines — are reproductions of the Arvada Mill, the Meyer Ranch House in Conifer and the Coney Island hot dog-shaped roadside hot dog stand that opened in Denver, was moved to Aspen Park/Conifer and is now in Bailey.

Many of those replicas are there on behalf of the original business owners. When Turner opened Tiny Town, his business-owning friends paid a small fee to have their storefronts represented.

That model has carried throughout various generations of Tiny Town, most heartily by the Northern Colorado Chapter of the Institute of Real Estate Management, a property management trade group that revived the park in 1988, giving it the life it has today.

“Their members adopted each building,” said Jodi Holstein, the executive director of the institute. “On the weekend, the people who had adopted the buildings rebuilt the buildings and had a contest to see whose was the best. They had a lot of fun doing it.”

The institute established the Tiny Town Foundation, the nonprofit that operates it today.

The town continues to grow, most recently with the addition of the Molly Brown House and the Maxwell House (a replica of a Georgetown Victorian home) and the Indian Hills bar and restaurant, Sit N Bull, which moved in on May 23.

“I’ve known about Tiny Town for 40 or 50 years,” said Sit N Bull owner Paul George. He said his bar fits in with the other historic buildings in Tiny Town. “I thought it was a good idea. Sit N Bull has been there for eight years, but the building has been been a restaurant for 60-ish years.”

It will be George’s responsibility to maintain his replica, as is the requirement for anyone else who wants to build in Tiny Town.

Parts of Tiny Town show signs of wear, from visitors (“the kids touch everything,” Nedoma said), the weather and the fact that many of the more than 150 buildings’ original owners are not around anymore to maintain them.

Therefore, much of the maintenance of Tiny Town is in the hands of Nedona herself and a dedicated team of volunteers who do everything from operate the trains to bring fresh coats of paint to the buildings.

“Volunteers are the lifeblood of Tiny Town,” Nedoma said. “We would not be open without them.”

But Nedona points out another vital factor keeping Tiny Town afloat, evident in Tim and Sandy Green, who brought their 3-year-old grandson, Finnigan, to Tiny Town from Denver on May 28.

Their story is typical of many of the families there: Tim visited when he was young, and they bring all their grandchildren to share it. As for Finnigan, Sandy said, “He couldn’t stop talking about it the whole way up from Denver.”

Josie Klemaier: 303-954-2465, jklemaier@denverpost.com



Tiny town

Where: 6249 S. Turkey Creek Road, unincorporated Jefferson County

When: 10 a.m.-5 p.m. every day through Labor Day.

Admission: $5 for adults, $3 for kids 2-12 and free for kids 2 and younger. $2 per person for the train.

More information: tinytown railroad.com