TELLURIDE, Aug. 2, 5:00 p.m. - Although 93-year-old Dock Pulliam claims not to be a social person – “Indians are not social people,” she once said – she spends the better part of her week managing the Montrose County Senior Center in Nucla, talking with the thirty to fifty people who come in for lunch three days a week. Alternating in demeanor between grandmotherly caregiver and drill sergeant, Pulliam ensures her staff of two prepares balanced meals, her volunteers deliver them to homebound seniors, and that the seniors that do come into the center to eat have a good time. And if seniors can’t make it to the center on their own, Pulliam sends out the West End Senior Transportation van to pick them up, sometimes at the wheel herself.

The Senior Center is Pulliam’s passion, and the transportation service is invaluable to those who rely on it not only to get to the senior lunch during the week, but also to get to periodical medical appointments in Montrose and Grand Junction. Many seniors in the Nucla area have lived there for decades, and aren’t looking to move anytime soon. The senior transportation service allows them to remain in their home community but still get to where they need to go.

With the mission of providing a better standard of living to area seniors by keeping them in their homes and out of care facilities as long as possible, the Montrose County Senior Citizens Transportation Program provides about 400 client trips monthly, reaching almost 16,000 clients annually. With the absence of public transportation in the rural West End, many seniors who rely on the transportation service would be stuck without it, unable to go shopping in Montrose or join their friends at the Senior Center for lunch.

On a recent Wednesday morning, Pulliam was at the Senior Center at 9:30 a.m., talking with the two women who were preparing that day’s meal. They would be offering tacos and chicken fingers that day, but the meals needed to be finished by 10:30 a.m. so a volunteer could begin delivering a handful of meals to area homebound seniors. Pulliam sat at a table talking to a visitor while her staff and volunteer put meals together in the kitchen.

“I just try to keep the peace,” Pulliam said. “I don’t like confusion.”

Pulliam claims to have a mind like an elephant, which rings true when she recounts the history of her arrival in Nucla and subsequent involvement with the Senior Center. Originally from Missouri and of Cherokee lineage, Pulliam relocated to Nucla when her husband began working in the uranium mines in 1955. She finished raising her younger daughters here and had her hand in raising other community children when she taught at the elementary school and operated a daycare center.

After her husband died in the mid-70s and her children moved away, Pulliam started working with the Senior Center in 1977. Back then they were serving meals out of the VFW, and rounding up seniors from as far away as Redvale and Paradox to come eat in Nucla.

“We used to bring in two big vanloads of people,” Pulliam said, “but everyone in Paradox has died, and all but one of the folks in Redvale has died.”

Over time, with local government and grant support, the Senior Center grew to its new location on Main Street north of the high school, complete with modern industrial kitchen equipment. Some of that growth was also made possible by Pulliam; in addition to the 2,000-plus hours she works at the Senior Center, Pulliam has also donated well over $50,000 of her own money in support of the services provided there. And she is happy to do all of it.

“Do what you want to do,” Pulliam says.  “This is what I want to do. I enjoy the people, enjoy helping them.”

Nucla resident Mary Jo is one local senior who takes full advantage of the transportation services offered. She lives in a trailer about a 5-minute drive from the Senior Center.

“I don’t drive unless I absolutely have to,” she said, getting into a car to be taken to the Senior Center for lunch. Five minutes later, she had arrived at the Senior Center and took her place at a table, ready to dig into her plate of tacos.

The Montrose County Senior Citizens Transportation Program is one of over 80 area programs funded by the Telluride Foundation. This article is the tenth in a series of stories about regional non-profit organizations, and is sponsored by the Telluride Foundation.