Information Still Being Sought in Cheyenne Arson

Information is still being sought regarding a September 2021 arson in Cheyenne that damaged a military surplus store.

Firefighters from Laramie County Fire Districts #1 and #2 were dispatched to The Supply Sergeant at 3415 Ridge Road at 5:06 a.m. on Sept. 7.

Upon arrival, they saw smoke and flames coming from the front of the store. Crews were able to get the blaze under control within minutes and limit the amount of damage to the building.

Laramie County Fire District #2 via Facebook

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The sheriff's office was called to investigate, and on Sept. 13 released security camera footage from inside the store showing what appeared to be someone breaking the front window with a rock, tossing a jug of flammable liquid inside, and then igniting it.

The agency also released a still picture of the suspected arsonist taken from an area security camera in hopes that someone might recognize them.

Laramie County Sheriff's Office via Facebook

But deputies still haven't been able to crack the case, and are once again asking for the public's help.

Anyone with information is asked to call Crime Stoppers Silent Witness at (307) 638-TIPS. Callers will remain anonymous and may be eligible for a cash reward of up to $1,000.

For more information about this case, check out our earlier posts:

FLASHBACK: Remember These Long Gone Frontier Mall Stores?

CLASSIC CHEYENNE: The Cole Shopping Center

In December of 2020, Blue Federal Credit Union completed its new headquarters at the corner of Converse and Pershing in Cheyenne. Well, it’s not so much a ‘corner’ as it is the smooth edge of a roundabout, but anyway. Before Blue FCU built its new campus, the site was at one time a premier shopping destination for Cheyenne. From the 1950s through 2016 it was Cheyenne's Cole Shopping Center.

Local businessman Frank Cole bought the land that would become a Cheyenne gathering place in the 1950s when the corner of Converse and Pershing was the edge of town. Starting in 1952, three different Safeway grocery stores called the Cole home over its half-century of existence. A plethora of other stores served the neighborhood too. From the movie theater to Blockbuster; there was the Cole Department Store, the fabric store, the East Branch of the Carnegie Library, and so much more.

As Cheyenne grew and changed, the Shopping Center fell into decline. Stores closed and new ones didn't take their places. The anchor of the area, Safeway, closed for good in 2016 with much of the rest following. In 2018 the buildings were demolished and the new construction began.

The Cole was so integral to the neighborhood that when we asked on social media for folks’ memories we were flooded with hundreds of responses.

Check out many of those memories below, along with several pictures of the Cole Shopping Center, mostly from near the end in the twenty-teens.

LOOK: Things from the year you were born that don't exist anymore

The iconic (and at times silly) toys, technologies, and electronics have been usurped since their grand entrance, either by advances in technology or breakthroughs in common sense. See how many things on this list trigger childhood memories—and which ones were here and gone so fast you missed them entirely.