Co-operative companies were formed to benefit the members of the settlement. A co-op store was organized April 24, 1882, with Platte D. Lyman, president; Jens Nielson, vice president; C.E. Walton, Sr., Kumen Jones, and Benjamin Perkins, directors; L.H. Redd, secretary; and Hyrum Perkins, treasurer. On Saturday, June 10, 1882, the store opened with J.A. (Jody) Lyman as clerk. On March 7, 1883, the store declared a dividend.
The San Juan County records show that the San Juan Co-operative Company was incorporated December 18, 1886. It was organized for a term of twenty years. The object of this "association is to engage in the business of dealing in general merchandise, and to commence the manufacture of leather and lumber, and engage in other business of home manufacture and understand pursuits including farming, dairying, and stock raising, Bluff being the principal place of business." Capital stock was $100,000 (Taken directly from Saga of San Juan 77).
Above the store was a dance hall and a big recreation room with a stage. You went up the steps from the outside into this hall and we used to have dances and things up there. It was being used more or less for recreation hall when we first moved to Bluff (Taken directly from Perkins Oral interview).
In later years the Co-op store caught fire and burned down.
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San Juan High School