Events
Programs and Events
Did you miss any of our live programs?
Some recordings are available to the general public at no cost, while some are only available to members. Now is a great time to join, as we’re constantly releasing new and exclusive material. Call 303-278-3557 if you have any questions or if you want to join by phone. You can also reach us electronically.
Homestead for the Holidays 2022
Homestead for the Holidays lets you experience the winter season just like the pioneers did. This family-friendly event will have you strolling through the Golden History Park, taking in the colorful decorations, making a craft that you get to take home, and basking in the season. It’s time to go homestead for the holidays!
Our valued volunteers make this event possible and will serve as interpreters within the historic structures to answer questions and guide your experience.
Advance registration via eventbrite is required.
Event highlights
- woodstove cooking and authentic blacksmithing
- hands-on crafting (including a tin ornament you’ll take home)
- learning fun historic dances
- winter survival demos with Aaron “Hutch” Hutchings
- holiday songs performed by Rex Rideout, Time Travel Music
- and more!
Details and pricing
Member adult: $5
Member child aged 5-17: FREE
Non-member adult: $10
Non-member child aged 5-17: $5
Children aged 4 and younger: FREE
We appreciate your support!
2021 Homestead for the Holidays photos by Povy Kendal Atchison
Membership
Membership pays for itself with just a few programs for your family. Join us.
Golden History Park
Golden History Park (formerly Clear Creek History Park) is home to many of the original buildings from the Pearce Ranch in Golden Gate Canyon. Thomas and Henrietta Pearce raised eight children on their ranch. It was one of the largest in the area by 1912.
Stroll around and imagine yourself growing potatoes or raising chickens as part of a homesteading family. Peek through the windows of real 1800s cabins and see other buildings from the ranch like the barn, chicken coop and two-seat outhouse.
You’ll also see the 1876 Guy Hill schoolhouse at the park. It was moved to Golden in 1976.
More Golden history
Check out the Golden History Museum & Park blog for the latest behind the scenes videos and stories, personal memoirs, and history tidbits about Golden.
Ranching Women of Colorado
In-person event. Register on eventbrite.
The 19th century west opened opportunities for women, including entering the male-dominated ranching industry. Join author Linda Womack as she tells the stories of women ranchers in Colorado. These women not only survived, but thrived, in a role outside the conventional norm.
About Linda Wommack
A Colorado native, Linda Wommack is a Colorado historian and historical consultant. An award-winning writer, she has written eighteen books on Colorado history, including Murder in the Mile High City, Colorado’s Landmark Hotels, From the Grave: A Roadside Guide to Colorado’s Pioneer Cemeteries, Our Ladies of the Tenderloin: Colorado’s Legends in Lace, Colorado History for Kids; Colorado’s Historic Mansions and Castles, Colorado’s Historic Schools, Ann Bassett; Colorado’s Cattle Queen, Haunted History of Cripple Creek and Teller County, Growing Up with the Wild Bunch, Ranching Women of Colorado, Cripple Creek, Bob Womack and the Greatest Gold Camp on Earth, and From Sand Creek to Summit Springs; Colorado’s Indian Wars. She has also contributed to two anthologies concerning Western Americana. Linda feeds her passion for history with activities in many local, state, and national preservation projects, participating in historical venues and speaking engagements, hosting tours, and is involved in historical tours across the state.
Pricing
Free for museum members, $10 non-members
Membership
Membership pays for itself with just a few programs for your family. Join us.
More Golden history
Check out the Golden History Museum & Park blog for the latest behind the scenes videos and stories, personal memoirs, and history tidbits about Golden.
Brands in Colorado
In-person event. Register on eventbrite.
The Old West is right beneath the surface of today’s ranching and rodeo culture. Come join us for an evening of brands, the larceny of livestock (aka rustling), shady characters, range and stock detectives and a host of other typically western notions.
The Old West still lives on today in Colorado, proving the more things change, the more they stay the same.
About Randi Samuelson-Brown
Randi Samuelson-Brown is originally from Golden, Colorado, but now lives in Denver. A passion for Colorado history was instilled by her father from early on, and she certainly latched on to the more notorious aspects of live in Colorado and the West. She was a finalist in the 2021 Colorado Book Awards for the Bad Old Days of Colorado.
Her newest book is Brand Chaser – Book #1 of the Dark Range Series.
When not writing in her free time, Randi is often riding horses and traveling around Colorado and the West, finding inspiration from people, places, and open spaces. She loves speaking at museums and organizations, and especially loves to meet readers.
Books: Brand Chaser, The Bad Old Days of Colorado: Untold Stories of the Wild West, Market Street Madam and The Beaten Territory.
Pricing
Free for museum members, $10 non-members
Membership
Membership pays for itself with just a few programs for your family. Join us.
More Golden history
Check out the Golden History Museum & Park blog for the latest behind the scenes videos and stories, personal memoirs, and history tidbits about Golden.
Join the Friends of the Museum for free coffee, tea, and refreshments.
Friends of Golden History Museum is a support and advocacy board for Golden History Museum & Park. They help GHM&P reach their education mission, financial sustainability goals, and preservation and capital needs.
The Friends help plan and carry out programs like the Black and White Night Fundraiser. They give financial support to educational initiatives such as field trips, Hands-on History camp scholarships, and in-classroom outreach.
They also provide support for preservation and capital projects like digitization of GHM’s historic photography collection, construction of a new buck rail fence at Golden History Park, and underwriting for Golden History Museum exhibits. If you are interested in more information on the Friends or becoming a member, please contact us.
The Friends is supported in part by your donations to Community First Foundation. Thank you.
Political Cartoons, Masculinity, and Women’s Activism in Colorado, 1900-1925
In-person event on Wednesday, March 29. Register on eventbrite.
Join Metro State University professor Todd Laugen as he discusses broader trends in reform and women’s activism in Colorado, using political cartoons which drew scathing critiques of political corruption and manipulation in the early 20th century.
Pricing
Free for museum members, $10 non-members
Membership
Membership pays for itself with just a few programs for your family. Join us.
More Golden history
Check out the Golden History Museum & Park blog for the latest behind the scenes videos and stories, personal memoirs, and history tidbits about Golden.
Homesteading the West – The Tale of Lavinia Morgan Anderson
In-person event. Register on eventbrite.
Lavinia Morgan Anderson is a composite character of a pioneer woman living on a ranch in Colorado in the late 1880s as she remembers how she emigrated west in a covered wagon in the 1860s as a child and grew up in Kansas before settling in Colorado with her husband after staking a claim under the Homestead Act. While Lavinia did not actually exist, her life did exist as well as that of thousands of other women who made similar journeys. This story is drawn from snippets of many diaries the women kept telling of their challenges, privations, fears and triumphs. They record the woman’s side of pioneer life. Come and learn about these adventures and more through this thrilling living history program.
About Linda Batlin
Linda Batlin is a storyteller and author from Boulder, Colorado, where she has lived for over half of her life. She enjoys sharing her love of the mountains and of Colorado with audiences. She tells stories filled with wisdom and mirth for all ages in schools, libraries, festivals, museums, senior centers, campfires and other events. Her entertaining and educational living history presentations of important women characters from Colorado history such as Isabella Bird bring them to life and are often requested. Her repertoire is also filled with multicultural folktales from around the world such as nature stories, Asian stories, animal stories, ghost stories, Jewish folktales, puppets, etc. She is a member of the National Storytelling Network.
Batlin’s recent performance of Isabella Bird’s 1873 travels is available for viewing on the Members Only portion of the website.
Pricing
$5 for museum members, $10 non-members
Membership
Membership pays for itself with just a few programs for your family. Join us.
More Golden history
Check out the Golden History Museum & Park blog for the latest behind the scenes videos and stories, personal memoirs, and history tidbits about Golden.
Borderlands Curanderos
In-person event. Register on eventbrite.
Join Metro State University professor Jennifer Koshatka Seman, author of Borderlands Curanderos: The Worlds of Santa Teresa Urrea and Don Pedrito Jaramillo, as she discusses U.S.-Mexico Borderlands during the turn of the twentieth century.
Pricing
Free for museum members, $10 non-members
Membership
Membership pays for itself with just a few programs for your family. Join us.
More Golden history
Check out the Golden History Museum & Park blog for the latest behind the scenes videos and stories, personal memoirs, and history tidbits about Golden.
Autumn Fest 2023
Autumn Fest is a free celebration of Golden featuring hands-on activities for the whole family, including crafts, big trucks, and even farm animals. Join us to welcome the fall season at Golden History Museum (923 10th St.), proudly sponsored by:
O’Sullivan Personal Injury Law Firm
Golden Downtown Development Authority
Free and Low-Cost Family Activities
- make-your-own thaumatrope station and lawn games (hoop toss, ladder ball, and cornhole)
- 4-H petting zoo
- craft stations
- BIG TRUCKS (Streets, Fire, and Police Departments)
- costumed Civil War interpretation
- karate demonstration
- hands-on paper-making station
2023 Partners
- Colorado Volunteer Infantry Group
- 4-H
- Boulder Apple Tree Project
- Mines Museum of Earth Science
- Golden Library
- Foothills Art Center
- Golden Street, Police, and Fire Departments
- Golden Public Art Commission
- Lane Academy of Martial Arts
2022 Sponsors
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Autumn Fest Gallery
Location and Pricing
Golden History Museum and Golden History Park
Free
Registration
Unlike most GHM&P programs, there is no registration for Autumn Fest.
Membership
Membership pays for itself with just a few programs for your family. Join us.
More Golden history
Check out the Golden History Museum & Park blog for the latest behind the scenes videos and stories, personal memoirs, and history tidbits about Golden.
How to register
Click the green ticket button in the upper left of each event to buy tickets online. 
Click “read more” in the lower right of each event for details. 
Event and Program Ticketing Policies at Golden History Museum & Park
(updated 11-20-18).
Please note: Tickets will only be available at the door if the program reaches its preregistration minimum.
Weather: All events are rain or shine. Tickets will not be refunded for any inclement weather including but not limited to snow, wind, rain or extreme temperatures.
Cancellation: GHM&P reserves the right to cancel a program for any reason. A full refund will occur automatically and notification sent if GHM&P cancels a program for any reason.
Refunds: Participants will not receive a refund except in the event that GHM&P cancels the program.
Facilities: Restrooms are not available on-site at the Golden History Park or Golden Cemetery. If at the Golden History Park, participants may use public restrooms located on 12th Street. Please call ahead to ask about accessibility concerns and mobility recommendations.
Additional details: Please note the minimum age requirements of some of our programs. Excessive disruptive behavior and any safety risks may result in a participant being asked to leave a program at the instructor’s discretion. Pets are not permitted at programs; service animals are permitted.
To purchase tickets, cancel your registration, or learn more about our events and ticketing policy, please call the Golden History Museum front desk during business hours at 303-278-3557.