The writer Bob Oliver stopped in Monday on the heels of the Daily Freeman-Journal publishing his story about the volunteerism that crucially made a year of work on Webster City’s parks possible.

We got to talking, as you can imagine, and this question was raised: How do we tell people outside this place the extent of what Webster City has to offer?

Now, Bob and I can really get going on what it doesn’t offer: We both lived in Denver when it was developing into its present intensity. I know some of you might long for that level of activity, but get stuck on Colorado Boulevard just about any time of day and the glow dims. Denver, as beautiful as it is, was never designed to carry the load of cars it must daily carry now. So there’s that.

When I lived in Denver, I helped to start a small Lower Downtown newspaper, for which I regularly wrote. In those days, the desire to grow into what is now called LoDo was a future dream. How do we create population density? We need population density to attract a grocery store, a pharmacy, the other retail and services people see as a necessity to neighborhood living.

Well, I can tell you how that turned out. In 2019, I foolishly thought I could cut across LoDo to get to Federal Boulevard, on the night Garth Brooks was opening at the Pepsi Center, in a blinding thunderstorm.

Hahahahahahahahaha.

No.

All that previous stuff aside, I didn’t recognize the neighborhood. Let’s put it this way: They achieved population density.

So here are Bob and I, talking about what we don’t miss, when he mentions the guys who bus down from Minnesota in the spring to get a jump on the golf season at Briggs Woods. And he tells about the visiting couple who got “lost” on the bike trail coming out of Briggs Woods, absolutely delighted to be able to ride their e-bikes on that beautiful paved path. Were they lost? Yes. They were at Nokomis trying to get back to Briggs Woods, but they were happy — happy! — to be lost on such a peaceful ride.

When we think of Webster City, and Hamilton County, I can tell you that Bob Oliver and I filter what we have here through the lens of what we have had elsewhere. We have groceries that you can walk to, pharmacies that are friendly, restaurants and coffee shops that you can bike to, and parks and parks and — did I mention? — parks.

This is a boutique town, a town that isn’t a big box, but a town that has what you need to live in a refined space that is slower than, say, a LoDo in Denver, and certainly quieter. Yes, not everyone is looking for what we offer, but to lure those who do, I have this advice: Sell this town.

Jane Curtis is interim editor of the Daily Freeman-Journal.