Whisper of the Past: Things Lost

Steven Wade Veatch

On a lazy late fall Sunday in 1991, I walked down to Cripple Creek’s business district with my wife Shelly, my friend Mitch, and his wife Jane. Colorado’s legislature had recently legalized gambling in this historic gold mining town. Several entrepreneurs were converting some of the old brick buildings in the historic downtown into casinos. The excitement of the prospect of limited-stakes gambling was spreading along the Front Range of Colorado. It was thought that people from Colorado Springs, Pueblo, and Denver would be crowding gaming houses when they opened, so investors bought up historic buildings and began the process of modernizing them.

The only sounds that Sunday morning were a few cars going down Bennett Avenue. The lingering scent of the chilled mountain air invigorated us, reminding us of the majestic beauty that surrounded us. 

As we were walking along, we noticed several buildings on the corner of Bennett Avenue and Second Street were being torn down for a new casino to be built there. This was once the site of the town’s old movie theater. The Star Theater showed “moving pictures” as early as 1915. We walked down there for a better look. 

Figure 1. The Star Theater at 218 East Bennett Avenue, Cripple Creek.
The sign by the entrance declares this theater part of the Sullivan and Considine
Circuit that provided Vaudeville entertainment. Photo courtesy of the
Cripple Creek District Museum. CCDM 2001 156.

The owners had started to demolish the old historic building. “Let’s go down in there and look around,” I said to Mitch. Shelly and Jane were reluctant to go, but they followed us down to the site’s ground floor.

We knelt in the dirt, looked through the rubble, and found lots of old broken peanut shells dropped by theatergoers 70 years earlier. The shells had fallen through the cracks in the theater’s floor. We found more. Lots of them. Then Jane found clippings of motion picture films, probably created from splicing or repairing the films when they were being shown in the gold camp theater. 

As the sunlight broke through the clouds, Jane caught sight of a shining object in the debris. I carefully pulled it from the dark earth with my fingers. It was an Indian head nickel, money from the gold rush days. Next, Mitch yelled that he had found a dime, one with the head of the Roman God Mercury on it. This coin was minted in 1918. Shelly found a Standing Liberty quarter—the denominations kept going up. 

Figure 2. The obverse of the Standing Liberty quarter dollar.
A number of these quarters were found at the old Star Theater. Photo is public domain.

The process of finding these numismatic artifacts was slow. I turned to Mitch and said, “This process is taking forever; but we need to go through the entire site here. We’re about to hit a jackpot.”

“I have an idea,” Mitch said. He stood up, climbed out of the spot we were working on, and walked up to his house a few blocks away. He returned carrying four green, plastic strawberry baskets, one for each of us. We used the baskets to sift the dirt and could go through a lot of material with them. We found lots of silver coins. The more we looked, the more we found.

Jane yelled out, “OH MY GOD! Look what I found!” She held up a woman’s ring. It was solid gold with one small, simple ruby, something a miner’s wife would own and wear. We looked at her discovery with awe and wondered how someone could have lost it, and how sad the owner must have been after losing it a lifetime ago in the Star Theater. 

Figure 3.  The author’s recollection of the ring found in the ground-floor sediments of the old Star Theater. AI generated image.

We had dirt and dust all over us from digging, turning our clothes and faces completely black. While working through the dirt, we couldn’t help but notice the curious gazes from passersby. Soon a small group of tourists gathered around the site to watch us. By then we had recovered 29 silver coins and a gold ring, all artifacts lost to time, but now found. We decided it was time to quit.

We hauled away our discoveries in the strawberry baskets and went back to Mitch’s house. All of us tidied up and then sat around Mitch’s kitchen table and looked at the coins and gold ring we found. With a tremor in his voice, Mitch leaned in closer as he embarked on a deep conversation about the weight of loss and the desperate search for a glimmer of hope on the uncertain road that stretched before us. We wondered what precious pieces of ourselves would slip through our fingers as we embarked on this uncertain journey. 

Independence: A Troubled Town in the Cripple Creek Mining District, Colorado

By Steven Wade Veatch

    A troubled man, with a festering and poisoned mind, emerged from the shadows on a Saturday night, just five days before Thanksgiving, 1903. He went down the shaft of the Vindicator mine, a substantial gold producer in the town of Independence, one of more than a dozen camps in the Cripple Creek mining district of Colorado. While down in the mine, this man planted a device that would later explode, killing two men. He had hoped to kill more. This was not the last act of violence committed by the fanatic bomber known as Harry Orchard. He later planned another attack, one that would be more destructive and more lethal for the town of Independence. And there would be other incidents of mayhem: saloon fights, gunfights, railroad accidents, and injuries from mining. Independence was anything but a quiet town.

    First known as Hull’s Camp, the town was renamed by promoters after the storied Independence mine, which is 2.5 miles south of the townsite. According to The Morning Journal, Mr. W. S. Montgomery, one owner of the Hull City mine, said, “Yes, there will be a town at Hull’s camp and it will be known as Independence. The site of the new town is an admirable one, with plenty of water and well sheltered by the surrounding hills. It is the center of the most productive section of camp. The streets are now being laid off and already several large business firms have signified their intention of locating in the new town” (The Morning Journal, Oct 28, 1894). A group of town organizers formally platted Independence on November 11, 1894 (MacKell, 2016). 

Figure 1. Map of the Cripple Creek mining district. A red arrow points to the town of Independence. The Vindicator mine is almost due south of the town of Independence. The Independence mine is northeast of Victor. Modified from Jameson, 1998.

    Independence was a place where miners and their families lived, and by 1896, the population reached 500 (MacKell, 2016). An active business district along Montgomery Avenue included of an assayer, jeweler, photographer, and one doctor (MacKell, 2003). There was a drugstore, grocery, meat market, bakery, barber shop, two saloons, and a lumber mill. According to the newspaper, Mrs. Marshall “set a good table” at her restaurant (The Morning Journal, February 27, 1895). Willard F. French ran an active assay office in town. Independence also had a boardinghouse and two hotels (MacKell, 2016). Mrs. Mamie Crook’s Hotel Montgomery offered a “Nice home for miners, good board and clean rooms at reasonable rates” (MacKell 2016). The Independence Retort published a weekly newspaper. 

    The Midland Terminal Railway stopped at the modest depot on First and Montgomery to handle freight and passenger traffic (MacKell, 2003). While the railroad built the depot, the station agent lived in a nearby box car (The Morning Journal, December 13, 1894). While laying tracks toward the depot, the railroad made a cut in the ground on the property of the Longfellow mine number 2 and exposed a gold vein. The cut was near where the depot was to be built. Owners of the claim picked up some pieces of rock from the vein and threw them into the firebox of a nearby locomotive. The rock came out of the fire blistered with gold. Within five days, miners had dug a carload of ore (The Morning Journal, December 19, 1894). Station agent Jackson of the Midland Terminal depot at Independence later became a joint owner of the lease on the Longfellow number 2. Newspapers later reported of several gold strikes there. The Florence and Cripple Creek Railroad also had a depot in Independence (figure 7).

    Accidents and injuries were not uncommon at the railroad depots in Independence. In one example, a moving train struck a Mr. Adams near the main Independence depot about 6:30 pm on Tuesday, June 20, 1899. Adams was from Pueblo and was on an excursion to the mining district. He was taken to the Sisters’ Hospital in Cripple Creek and died that evening (The Morning Journal, June 20, 1899).

    Saloons did a brisk business in Independence. The Morning Journal reported this unusual story: “John Lamb of Independence, commenced a suit in district court to recover money lost by him in an Independence gambling hall. The defendants in the case are Charles Zeigler and Charles Cunningham. Lamb alleges in this complaint that while on his way home from work he dropped into the gambling hall and saloon of the defendants and after being given a drink or two by them his brain was so stupefied by the drink and drugs that he did not know what he was doing. He alleges that the defendants then induced him to play a game of chance, and he lost $117 . Scott Ashton, of Victor, is the plaintiff’s attorney” (The Morning Journal, August 15, 1899).

    Independence was likewise the location of a large ore loading rail yard. Locomotives made it a noisy place, with their pistons chuffing, whistles blasting, and brakes screeching. Switch engines and crews traveled around to the various mines and mills and switched ore cars out—pulling the loaded ore cars away and replacing them with empty cars. The switch crew would then assemble loaded ore cars into a train that hauled the ore to a mill for treatment. People in town surely would have noticed the heavy rumbling of a train as it rolled by, pulling loaded ore cars. They watched locomotives that ran through the area, belching plumes of heavy black smoke, soot, and cinders. The air smelled of coal and hot valve oil, and the wooden railroad ties reeked of creosote. 

Figure 2 shows the Midland Terminal Railway engine number seven, with its switch crew taking a break at the town of Independence in 1904. The photograph also reveals the dual gauge track and extra link-and-pin coupler socket on the engine, allowing it to handle either standard or narrow-gauge equipment. The coupler—for narrow gauge cars—was offset, while the standard gauge coupler was centered (the coupler can be clearly seen above the “cowcatcher” in figure 2). Both the Midland Terminal and the Colorado Midland were standard gauge, but other railroads in the district were narrow gauge. 

Figure 2. Switch engine and its crew in Independence, Colorado. Hull City mine in the background. Photo date 1904 by an unknown photographer. From the Joata (Osborn) Bottcher collection. Courtesy of the Cripple Creek District Museum, CCDM A8524.

    Independence continued to grow, and by 1899, 1,500 people called it home (Sprague, 1953). The town crowded around two important mines, the Vindicator and the Hull City mine. 

Figure 3. The town of Independence, Colorado, looking northwest. Photo date 1897. Webster and Yelton photographers. Courtesy of the Cripple Creek District Museum. CCDMA82. 329A.

    The Vindicator mine was in the Montgomery gulch section of this small gold-rush town. It was a steady producer, and by 1907, The Mining Investor reported the mine had almost 25 miles of underground workings and had distributed, in total, over $1.7 million  in dividends to stockholders (The Mining Investor, March 2, 1908). By 1910, the Vindicator was the fourth largest producer in the district, employing 350 miners who worked there.

    The rich Hull City mine, which covered an area of 39 acres, was within the town limits (Lindgren and Ransome, 1906). According to Lindgren and Ransome (1906) the “Hull City had a complex vein system where calaverite, the main ore mineral, coated narrow seams in these veins. Quartz and fluorite coated small vug holes.” By the end of 1899, the mine had produced $900,193  in gold, and during the next three years (January 1, 1901 to January 1, 1904) generated gold worth $999,174  (Lindgren and Ransome, 1906). 

Figure 4. The town of Independence with the Hull City mine (foreground) and the Vindicator mine. Library, The State Historical Society of Colorado. CCDM A82-132.

By 1906, the Hull City’s main shaft reached a depth of 1,265 feet, with 11 levels; a second shaft, the King shaft (sometimes called the Vaughn or Glorietta shaft) was 860 feet deep, with 12 levels. This King shaft was in operation near the southern boundary of the mine (Lindgren and Ransome, 1906). 

The record of accidents and deaths miners suffered at the Hull City mine is incomplete. The Aspen Weekly Times reported that an explosion killed James Drury in the lower stopes of the mine on June 4, 1901. According to the reporter, “He was warned before going into one of the stopes that one of the shots had failed to explode but went on and drilled into the blast. The entire side of this head was blown away” (The Aspen Weekly Times, 1901). Another mine accident killed A. M. Mellon on the morning of April 5, 1902, as he rode in a cage in the Hull City shaft. When he carelessly stuck his head out from the cage, a passing timber crushed his skull and snapped his neck. He had no relatives (The Telluride Journal, 1902). Records show that rocks from a bucket dropped on John Williams, killing him (Sherard, 2006). The nearby Vindicator injured and claimed the lives of an unknown number of miners. The true extent of these grim statistics for the Vindicator and the Hull City mines will remain largely unknown.

Figure 5. Early photo of Independence. Mining operations dot the landscape. Photographer and date unknown. Courtesy of the Cripple Creek District Museum. CCV93GKCCM WA.

    Cripple Creek was a Western Federation of Miners union stronghold, and a crisis arose on August 8, 1903, when Cripple Creek union miners walked out in support of the striking smelter workers in Colorado City, Colorado (Taylor, 2003). The issue was over hours worked each day and pay. By August 11, at least 3,500 men had quit work in 50 of the district’s mines (Jameson, 1998)..The district soon became a battlefield, with confrontations between labor, employers, and the state of Colorado. About that same time, the district’s labor wars spilled over into the town of Independence. The disputes resulted in injuries and loss of life. Harry Orchard, who resided in Independence, became embroiled in the district’s labor strife, and committed several acts of violence. On November 21, 1903, a bomb set by Orchard exploded on the sixth level of the Vindicator mine, killing superintendent Charles H. McCormick and shift boss Melvin H. Beck, who were inspecting the mine (Orchard, 1907; Annual Report for the Vindicator, 1903).

Figure 6. Harry Orchard, whose real name was Albert Edward Horsley, lived in Independence and left behind a bloody trail in the Cripple Creek Mining District. Photo courtesy of the Cripple Creek District Museum.

    About six months later, Orchard, with the help of Steve Adams, placed between 150 and 200 pounds of dynamite under a loading platform at the Florence and Cripple Creek Railroad depot in Independence (Jameson, 1998; Sprague, 1953). On June 6, 1904, at 2:15 am, while a crew from the Findley mine waited for a train, the bomb exploded. The blast blew one miner 150 feet away from the depot, killed 13 miners, and injured another 20. Orchard and Adams covered the soles of their shoes with kerosene, so the sheriff’s bloodhounds could not track them, and disappeared into the darkness. Colorado’s lieutenant governor declared the county in a state of insurrection and mobilized the National Guard (Jameson, 1989).

    The strike lasted for fifteen months before finally coming to an end. Thirty-three people were killed, but organized labor lost out as a result of determined opposition by mine owners and the state of Colorado. With no further union representation in the district, miners worked under the tight control of mine owners (Taylor, 2003).

    Harry Orchard was later convicted of blowing up the former governor of Idaho, Frank Steunenberg, in 1905. Facing the death penalty, Orchard confessed to the murder of the former governor and 16 other people. Orchard died in the Idaho state penitentiary April 13, 1954, at the age of 88.

Figure 7. The Florence and Cripple Creek depot in Independence after Harry Orchard blew it up on June 6, 1904. Courtesy of the Cripple Creek District Museum. CCDM 82 420.

More commotion would come to Independence on February 11, 1906, when two masked gunmen robbed the Silver Bell Saloon. A gun battle broke out that killed one robber, while the other outlaw fled packing $1,800 in cash (MacKell, 2016). 

After the district’s labor wars ended, Independence’s population shrank. Records reveal that, in 1919, 500 people remained in town. The town’s population continued to dwindle as gold mining declined. Its post office closed in 1954, and the Hull City mine ended operations in 1958. A handful of people remained for a few years after that, but then the town nearly disappeared—melting into thin air. Today, only a few ramshackle historic structures survive.

Acknowledgments 

    I thank Ben Elick for modifying the map used in this paper. I thank the Colorado Springs Oyster Club and Dr. Bob Carnein for their critical reviews. 

References and further reading

Annual Report for the Vindicator Consolidated Gold Mining Company, 1903.

Jameson, E., 1998, All That Glitters: Class, Conflict, and Community in Cripple Creek: Chicago. University of Illinois Press.

Lindgren, W., and F. L. Ransome, 1906, Geology and Gold Deposits of the Cripple Creek District, Colorado: Washington, Department of the Interior, U.S. Geological Survey Professional Paper No. 54.

MacKell, J., 2003, Cripple Creek District: Last of Colorado’s Gold Booms: Charleston, Arcadia.

MacKell, J., 2016, Lost Ghost Towns of Teller County: Charleston, History Press.

Orchard, H, 1907, The Confessions and Autobiography of Harry Orchard: New York, The McClure Company.

Sherard, G. 2006, Colorado Mine Accident Index: Fatal and Non-Fatal, Retrieved from https://history.denverlibrary.org/sites/history/files/ColoradoMiningAccidents.pdf, on January 21, 2022.

Sprague, M., 1953, Money Mountain: The Story of Cripple Creek Gold: Lincoln, University of Nebraska Press.

Taylor, R.G., 2003, Cripple Creek Mining District: Palmer Lake, CO, Filter Press. 

Aspen Weekly Times, June 8, 1901, p. 3.

The Morning Journal, Oct 28, 1894, p. 1.

The Morning Journal, December 13, 1894, p. 8.

The Morning Journal December 19, 1894, p. 3.

The Morning Journal, February 27, 1895, p. 1.

The Morning Journal, June 20, 1899, p 4.

The Morning Journal, August 15, 1899, p. 4.

The Morning Journal, December 26, 1899, p. 94.

The Mining Investor, March 2, 1908, p. 70.

The Telluride Journal, April 10, 1902, p. 6. 

Cripple Creek High Grader has Change of Heart

 By Steven Wade Veatch

Cripple Creek is Colorado’s most famous and storied gold camp. High-grading, or the theft of gold ore by miners who worked in Cripple Creek’s gold mines, was rampant. These miners were called “high-graders,” and they sneaked out small pieces of rich ore in their hair, secret pockets in their clothes, boots, toolboxes, lunch pails, and anywhere else they could (Veatch, et al. 2017). Many people were involved in high grading—from those who stole the ore to those who bought it—assayers, bank tellers, and merchants (Sprague, 1979). It was a dilemma that mine owners had to deal with constantly. 

A letter, written by a high grader, was recently found in the Union Gold Mining Company’s collection of correspondence at the Western Museum of Mining and Industry in Colorado Springs. The letter was addressed to the company treasurer. In the letter, the writer, George Dandignac, confessed that he took some ore from the Porcupine mine during the month of June 1895. Dandignac wrote that a year later he found God, and that he is compelled to return it “as an atonement for the crime.” The high grade was returned with the letter. Dandignac also confessed to stealing a specimen of quartz the size of a walnut but could not return it as it was “back east.”

A letter (dated July 25, 1896) to Mr. Morse, treasurer of the Union Gold Mining Company, from George Dandignac, a Cripple Creek miner. His letter was about gold ore stolen from the Porcupine mine. Source: Dandignac, 1896.

This crumbling letter, more than 12 decades old, attests to how Dandignac’s newly found faith produced such an amendment of his life that he could not keep his ill-gotten gold.

References and further reading:

Dandignac, G. T., Letter to Mr. Morse. 25 July 1896. Union Gold Mining Papers, Western Museum of Mining and Industry, Colorado Springs. Manuscript.

Sprague, M., 1979, Money Mountain: Lincoln, University of Nebraska Press, p. 205.

Veatch, S.W., B. Elick, and J. Salvat, 2017, Cripple Creek High Grading: The Untold Stories. 38th Annual New Mexico Mineral Symposium, Socorro, NM, November 11-12, 2017, Program with Abstracts. New Mexico Bureau of Geology and Mineral Resources. pp. 26-28.