DENVER — History has a way of rubbing off on us – especially if you go digging through the 9NEWS film archives for a peek into the past.
9NEWS reporter Noel Brennan started to wonder what he could find searching through the forgotten reels of 16MM film unseen for decades and buried under a layer of dust.
"That’s a lot of boxes," said Brennan. "Oh, these are so dusty. Holy cow!"
One of the coolest finds in the dusty tapes was a film reel dated July 21,1969, right after the lunar landing.
“And I’m really excited to see what’s on this,” said Brennan.
Searching for something old can certainly reveal something new. As he viewed the old films, Brennan began to wonder who one woman on the film was and what she's doing now.
“Who is this woman?” asked Brennan, as he watched the old film reel, he found a captivating moment – and it's not a man landing on the moon, but a young woman in the airport.
The young woman exits the jetway after getting off a plane at Denver's airport.
“Getting lots of hugs,” said Brennan. “There’s like a crowd of people waiting for her.”
But, who is she? This mystery woman.
Brennan turned to Twitter and began typing to solve this mystery of 9NEWS history.
The Twitterverse reported back to say she's Pam Greene at age 15 – the track star at Denver's Manual High School who was competing on the world stage.
At 18, Greene became the first Denver woman to ever make an Olympic team. She ran the 200 meters in the 1972 games in Munich.
After 53 years, since this day at Stapleton Airport, Brennan made a connection with a man named Denin Greene who was able to tell him everything he needed to know about Pam.
Brennan finally connected with Denin over a Zoom call. He has the archival footage cued up to where you can see Pam on screen.
“Alright, so I’m sharing my screen. Can you see an image?” asked Brennan.
“Yes, I do see an image,” replied Denin. Instantly, he's transported back in time. “Oh wow, what a great reception.”
“You’re always going to have history of who you were before, you know, years ago. Everybody does,” said Denin.
Brennan asked him what he was thinking about as he watched the woman arriving at the airport.
“Ah, how naïve, ha ha,” said Denin. He knows that 15-year-old on camera better than anyone. “Even then, at an early age, I knew that I was, you know, different from the perspective of my gender.”
Denin transitioned to a man about a decade ago. “It’s like more than you know turning the book to another chapter. It was more of like completely starting a new life again.”
Life for him back then was all track and field. "My outlet was running,” he said. "When I competed, I competed in the 100, the 200, the 400, relays.”
He set records at Manual and at Colorado State University, where he was inducted into the athletics hall of fame.
“In the ’72 Olympics, when I came back, they had dedicated a month to me as Pam Greene month, haha in Denver," he said. "So pretty, pretty fantastic, yeah.”
Fantastic indeed – and a bit overwhelming for a teenager. “It really was, but I enjoyed it because I was doing something that I loved.”
This moment at the airport marks the beginning of a career taking off.
“There’s my coach, Mr. Durst,” as Denin watched the film play. The athlete was returning home from race tracks in Europe.
“Oh, I’m surprised I’m still upright. It was such a long travel back to Denver from Europe,” said Denin as he reminisced. “That little 15-year-old at the airport, that was really kind of the beginning of like a springboard to become who I am.”
Years later, Denin wants to share who he is today.
“The book is called, ‘The Trans-being Experience,’” he said. “It’s an awakening of who you are authentically.”
Denin said he shared a lot of his personal experiences in the book that he said readers will find interesting.
He hopes others can learn from the history he lived.
“Amazing things can happen in your life. You just have to keep going through the ups and downs, get up when you stumble and just you know, keep your eye on that finish line,” shared Denin.
A lesson unraveled through life and on a reel of old 16MM film.
“We were digging for old stories and trying to revisit old stories, but we found a new one," said Brennan. "And I think that’s what the coolest thing about this is.”
Denin agreed, “Yeah, it’s just amazing. A blessing.”
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