“If they don’t have it, you don’t need it,” my grandpa remarked once as we parked in front of Bernie’s.
Inevitably, whenever my grandparents visited from California in June, he always needed supplies for that summer’s home improvement project. The historic hardware store always felt like home for grandpa (a carpenter by trade), having retired from San Bruno Lumber. About that time I remember hearing something about a recycling center in town though it never registered that the same family operated both enterprises.
Sitting in the office overlooking the store floor with Dennis Girard, he explained how Bernie’s present recycling is really just a continuation of his brother’s earlier efforts.
“My brother (Jack) started a recycling business in town years ago,” said Dennis, whose little red pickup stops regularly at the Keep Alliance Beautiful Recycling Center with a business and household assortment. “I guess we never really stopped.”
The former family venture operated out of their warehouse around the 1980s and early ‘90s period, Dennis related. The torch passed to the Hoxworth family’s sanitation business (who continued to accept aluminum cans until recent years), until it ceased to be feasible.
I have heard about recycling efforts from other area Keep America Beautiful affiliates’ staff, and, at times, a bit of the backstories. The local refuse collector in Chadron, for example, now picks up mainly corrugated cardboard, compared to a more comprehensive mix pre-pandemic. I have yet to seriously delve into the history of recycling in Dawes County (or other neighboring communities) though how the green movement gained/lost traction varies throughout Western Nebraska.
One chapter of a book on the subject would tell about the juncture when not everything was necessarily “just trash.” One day, Dennis said, “my brother wanted to recycle a load of garbage and over half was recyclable at the time. He put all the garbage back in a big bin. The City (of Alliance) picked it up and brought it back to us.” He also commented on how particular the business was – even more than three decades ago: Most people don’t take glass. Denver used to take it. If you had a semi load and a rock or a bit of porcelain in there they might not even pay you for the load, he explained. Then, as now, contamination from other materials was problematic. “Trying to educate the people is another story,” Dennis said.
Considering recycling in Alliance today, Dennis said, “(We are) lucky to have a recycling center in town.” He added, recycling is still important for “every reason – ecology, reusing waste, less in our dump . . .”
Bernie’s takes advantage of whatever KAB will accept. Recently, Spud, our hauler, has taken larger quantities of used paint to Clean Harbors in Kimball. The cans, paint and even the metal/plastic container holding them are shredded and incinerated all at once, the boss told us. Moving away from all but spray paint, Dennis said they have filled at least 2 ½ white containers of “really old stuff . . . and I think we have the big majority cleaned up.”
Two years ago, the venerable hardware store brought an impressive load of files to the center as the bookkeepers got ahold of and modernized the system. Now, Dennis reported, they generate a half a file box a month, if that. Well, the old cash register still stands watch by the card reader even though all the records became new paper somewhere.
To share your memories of recycling history from Alliance/Hemingford/Box Butte County or wherever you read this column, please email (keepalliancebeautiful@gmail.com), post on our Facebook page or send a letter, Attn: John Weare, to PO Box 324, Alliance, NE 69301.