Long before crowds gathered at the Buffalo Rose for live music, dinner, and dancing, they came through the same doors for an entirely different reason: to swim.
On February 27, 1927, the Golden Plunge opened in downtown Golden in the building that now houses the Buffalo Rose event venue. Nearly a century later, newly discovered photographs from the Rocky Mountain News offer a remarkable glimpse inside the Plunge on its opening day.
Submitted photo
The photographs show a packed indoor pool, with spectators lining the deck and champion swimmers performing exhibitions for the crowd. One image, taken from the northwest looking southeast toward the deep end, reveals the recognizable structure of the building that still stands today. Contemporary accounts suggest more than 4,000 people attended the opening celebration.
The Golden Plunge quickly became more than a neighborhood swimming pool. Visitors traveled from Denver to experience the impressive indoor facility, which featured a pool approximately 100 feet long and 30 feet wide, reaching nine feet at its deepest point. The Colorado School of Mines swimming team also practiced and competed there.
Among those connected to the Plunge was Nils Christiansen, a Colorado School of Mines student and Olympic swimmer who competed at the 1936 Berlin Games. Christiansen later worked as a swimming instructor at the Golden Plunge.
The pool’s story was relatively short-lived. The Great Depression made operating such a large facility difficult, and by the early 1940s its days as a swimming destination had ended. The building went on to serve Golden in many forms, including as a union hall, roller-skating and dance venue, and Eakers Department Store before eventually becoming part of the Buffalo Rose.
But one particularly fascinating piece of the Golden Plunge never disappeared.
Rather than demolishing or filling the pool, a floor was constructed directly over it. The original Golden Plunge remains beneath the Buffalo Rose event venue today, its sloping concrete floor and drains still visible below the room where concerts, weddings, and community gatherings now take place.
On February 27, 2027, the Golden Plunge will celebrate its 100th anniversary. A century after people traveled to downtown Golden to gather inside this remarkable building, the crowds are still coming—only now, they’re gathering on the dance floor directly above the pool where it all began.
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