Estes Park and the Talented Tenth

Larimer County mugshot of Griff Evans after winging James Nugent

10% of Estes Park's inhabitants in the 1910 census had more than an eighth grade education.  Because Estes Park has aged and accepted so many immigrants from states with diploma mills in the 110 years since then, the 2020 census will likely include 10% full-time residents with graduate-level degrees, mostly in soft science fields like epidemiology and massage therapy.

Has Estes Park become any smarter in 110 years?  It seems unlikely.  Has is become any more diverse?  Well, it was homogeneous to begin with, so even one African American or one Jewish individual not immediately shown the door is going to make it slightly less homogeneous, so I guess it depends on if the census taker arrives to a household before the posse comitatus does.

Should Estes Park continue ignoring 90% of its residents to provide advantages and positions of power to what it deems its top 10%?  Clearly, Estes Park is made up of two groups:  insiders and those not welcome in the treehouse.  Ken Zornes' wife now sits on 10 different boards, and she arrived here a little over ten months ago.  Is it the fact that she is so capable, that others are so unwilling, or that we have 90 boards too many in town?  Why would the hospital form a "rumour board" to quash rumours when they could have just fired one doctor (Jerzy Kozinsky) last April to keep four more qualified doctors from leaving or retiring or entering a different profession because Larry caused them so much despair?  It seems like a waste of everyone's time, placing wallpaper over a leaky faucet when a plumber could fix the problem.  And by plumber I mean a man who has sex with multiple women.

Here is E.P. Du Hickey again:  "In any discussion concerning the wisdom of a community of 6500 people like Estes Park being run entirely by nine people (CDIV, Jimmy P, Johnny C, Greg "The Great Pretender" Rosebug, Maybilly RFD, Bill Van Horn, Jerry Miller from beyond the grave, Ken Zornes' wife, F.O. Stanley) we should not forget the talented tenth man.  An ordinary Rotary Club meeting may answer for the nine men of mediocrity, but if this is all we offer the talented tenth man, we make a prodigious mistake.  Why?  Because the tenth man, with superior natural endowments (wowsa), symmetrically trained and highly developed, may become a mightier influence of stormwater drainage, a greater inspiration to others for redundant broadband, than all the other nine, or nine times nine like them.  To not make proper provision for the higher education of the talented tenth man who could form yet another non-profit in town is to dwarf the tree that has in it the potency of a grand oak, or at least a pretty significant erection given high-dose Cialis and two well-placed Popsicle sticks."