Secrets in the Shadows: A Mystery at Black Mountain, Colorado

1894 found Spencer Penrose and his partner Charles Tutt immersed in the Cripple Creek gold rush. They worked tirelessly to extract gold from their COD (Cash on Delivery) mine and broker real estate deals in the gold camp. Spencer’s brother, Professor Richard Penrose, a renowned expert in geology and mining, would occasionally visit the two partners in Cripple Creek, offering them valuable advice on the operation of their gold mine.  

Sometime in 1894, after a few too many drinks at Johnny Nolan’s saloon, the three men decided to escape from the town’s hustle and bustle and embark on a prospecting trip to the scenic Black Mountain area in Park County.  Leaving from Cripple Creek with minimal equipment, the trio planned to stay for a week. 

After riding about two days and covering 40 miles, they entered a canyon with blood-stained walls—scarred with the remnants of a gun battle, a chilling reminder of the bloodshed that occurred there years ago. The sounds of the wind whistling through the canyon seemed to echo the cries of the fallen warriors.  The canyon opened into the Black Mountain area, and seeing nothing there to warrant any prospecting, the three men rode on to look for a favorable spot for camping before nightfall claimed them. 

Stopping, around 5 p.m., they stood before a strikingly large and impressive house. It was a surprise for all of them. Its construction implied wealth and success. They stopped at the property’s entrance, where a broken gate and damaged fence hinted at neglect. As the three men looked around, they found the house’s front door and several windows open, with no signs of life. The sight of scattered debris and broken glass hinted at the possibility of a sinister event. The sound of the wind whispered through the towering pines, creating a haunting symphony that pierced the silence. The soft scent of damp earth and decaying aspen leaves mingled with what they saw and enveloped them in an atmosphere of mystery and intrigue. 

Image of what the abandoned house in the Black Mountain area of Colorado may have looked like when the Penrose brothers and Charles Tutt came upon it in 1894. Art by the author using AI.

The three men entered the house. One room opened to the right, its door slightly ajar, revealing a glimpse of what was inside. Another room opened to the left. A hall staircase separated the two rooms. Someone had evidently used the room to the right as a library or den. The silent rows of dusty bookshelves, holding a dozen forgotten books, looked like a tomb of lost stories. A mineral cabinet, holding some specimens, was built into the wall; someone had thrown other glittering mineral specimens onto the floor. A well-used riding crop, the leather polished smooth, hung beside a pair of elegant fencing foils and masks. This dusty room held the faint scent of leather and metal and echoed with the absence of laughter and life; only the rug on the floor hinted at past warmth. Then came a cold and unsettling surprise.

A chill snaked down their spines as they saw a woman’s long brown hair spread across the floor, its presence heavy with unspoken dread. Someone had squeezed the hair, hacking the ends off with a dull knife—the cuts jagged and rough—and then violently threw it. “Well, we had come there for mineral, not murder,” said Richard Penrose.  The entire scene was dreadful. 

As twilight descended, casting long shadows, the Penrose brothers and Tutt walked outside and saw kitchen utensils scattered across the ground. Peering into a barn they saw, that like the house, it was deserted. As it was getting late in the day, the trio decided not to investigate further, but rode on beyond this abandoned property into the open country a few miles away in order to select a spot to camp before night settled in.

At nine o’clock a loud snap of a twig sounded over the comforting crackle of the campfire, making everyone jump up from their blankets, where they’d been enjoying the fire’s warmth after their supper. A weathered prospector, his face tanned and lined, walked into the camp with a Winchester rifle slung across his shoulder. A burro, laden with supplies, followed close behind. “Hello partners; what luck?,” said the prospector. The conversation soon turned to the abandoned house. ‘Well boys, said the visitor, “I saw it go up. And the owner was always around. He was one of them English dude arrangements, wore an overgrown cap and yellow boots—kind of a sport. Never took no notice of nobody. Had one of them God Almighty airs with him.”   As recounted by the prospector, the Englishman spent money on the house and furnished it with items he hauled in from Balfour and Alma. The prospector claimed the English “dude” left for three months and then came back with a woman. “I’ve seen them many a time riding together, and damn me, I never saw such hair as that gal had. It was just about two years ago this spring, they both skipped God knows where. Some say they didn’t skip.”  According to the prospector’s account, another Englishman, an older man, showed up at the house. “That was the last of the young fellow and the girl with the fine locks.”  The prospector said that rumors suggested the old man was her husband, and she had run away with the younger Englishman. The old man—her husband—had followed and caught up with them at the Black Mountain property, after which the house was abandoned. 

The Penrose brothers and Tutt were lost in thought after the old prospector’s chilling tale. A hush fell over them as they listened to the whispers of the wind in the trees. The crackling fire cast an orange glow on the faces of the group as they sat around the campfire, pondering the old man’s tale. What happened to the woman? Why was her hair cut off? These questions lingered in their minds: why had the owners left the house and its sprawling grounds behind? The unanswered questions hung heavily in the chilly night air. The old prospector spent the night with the three men, saying he would not stay overnight at the Englishman’s house “for all the gold in Colorado; for the damn place is haunted.”

As dawn broke, the old prospector, armed with his Winchester, disappeared into the shadowy hills of the Black Mountain district with both his burro and his tales. The three men from Cripple Creek eagerly mounted their horses and left. The horses’ hooves resonated in the air, stirring up a cloud of golden dust that danced in the sunlight as they rode back to the gold-crazed Cripple Creek mining district, where ambition and the promise of riches fueled the energy of the town. 

In the years that followed, the Penrose brothers and Charles Tutt forged a path of tremendous success through minerals—copper and gold—and found their way into the history of the West and the American imagination. No one heard or wrote anything more about the mysterious woman and her lustrous locks. The old prospector slipped into oblivion.

Acknowledgments: I thank Bob Carnein for his insightful comments and help improving this manuscript.

References and Further Reading:

“Mystery of Colorado.” The Denver Press, September 7, 1894. p.6.

Veatch, S. W., 2017, The World’s Greatest Gold Camp: A Concise History of the Cripple Creek Mining District, in L.C. Kleinhans, et al., eds., Gold and Silver Deposits in Colorado Symposium: Golden, Colorado, Colorado School of Mines and others, p. 78-83.

A Cripple Creek Profile: Frank Finegan and His Requa Savage Mine

 By Steven W. Veatch

Francis “Frank” Finegan (1835-1914) was an adventurer who fought in the Civil War. And he was among the first group to arrive at the goldfields of the Cripple Creek mining district, where he located and patented several mines. Stockholders elected him president, treasurer, and general manager of the Requa Savage when he incorporated the mine on April 26, 1894 (Colorado State Mining Directory, 1898). 

Figure 1. The Requa Savage mine. A miner, named “Big Swede," stands by an ore cart under the headframe of the mine. Photographer and date unknown. Courtesy of the Cripple Creek District Museum. CCDM A 8315.

Finegan left enough of a record to trace his interesting journeys and see the stormy corners of his life. He was born in 1835 in Loughrea, County Galway, Ireland. In 1854, he sailed out of Liverpool to New York City (Portrait and Biographical Record of the State of Colorado, 1899). He then left New York City and lived for a time in Hartford, Connecticut, where he worked as a stonecutter and mason. He moved to California in 1857 and mined on the American River, the site of the original 1848 gold discovery in California. One year later, he sailed to Australia and farmed near Ballarat. With three partners, he located a gold mine near there. The partners worked it until 1859, when they sold their interests, each pocketing $35,000—a whopping $1,091,375 in 2020 dollars (Portrait and Biographical Record of the State of Colorado, 1899). 

Finegan left Australia and returned to California for a few months in 1860. He then moved to New York City. On April 12, 1861, at 4:30 am, while Finegan was fast asleep, Confederate General Beauregard ordered his gunners to open fire on Fort Sumter, South Carolina. Cannons roared like a crack of thunder. Explosions lit up the darkness and smoke settled over the fort. Thirty-four hours later, the besieged Union garrison raised a white flag and surrendered. The Confederates committed an act of war that forced President Abraham Lincoln to act. Two days later, Lincoln called for volunteers to fight in a war to preserve the Union. 

Finegan answered Lincoln’s call. He joined the 69th New York Regiment that month and was mustered into service for three months. The 69th Regiment was part of the Irish Brigade, which at the beginning included the 63rd, 69th, and the 88th New York Regiments and the 28th Massachusetts Regiment. The 116th Pennsylvania Regiment, made up of Irishmen from Philadelphia, was added during the fall of 1862 (R. Sauers, personal communication). The Irish Brigade quickly built a reputation for fierce fighting on the battlefield, and Finegan found a passage into hell when he fought in many of its engagements.

The 69th New York Regiment fought in the First Battle of Bull Run under the command of General William T. Sherman. During that battle, Confederate forces took Finegan prisoner. The Confederates released him on parole (Both sides had no means to take care of prisoners; Grant later stopped the practice of releasing prisoners). Once released, Finegan reenlisted for three years and returned to the battlefield. 

Finegan saw combat at the Battle of Fair Oaks (Henrico County, Virginia) on May 31 and June 1, 1862. It was there that he saw the use of Union balloons, some reaching altitudes of over 1,000 feet, to report enemy positions and direct artillery fire. 

Later, at the Cornfield Battle of Antietam (September 17, 1862), Finegan went down hard with a savage head wound while carrying the flag (Portrait and Biographical Record of the State of Colorado, 1899). Almost 8,000 Union and Confederate soldiers were killed or wounded in the Cornfield Battle. 

Finegan fought in the Battle of Gettysburg (July 1 - 3, 1863), where he witnessed horrific sights. He surely would have heard flags flap in the wind and bullets whizz by. The air was heavy with the scent of blood. There were fields of slaughtered and decaying bodies everywhere. While marching down a road jammed with troops and shining bayonets, he doubtless heard the cries of the wounded and the amputees, and then noticed a heap of amputated legs, feet, arms, and hands under a tree. During the Civil War, doctors performed a lot of amputations to prevent wounds from becoming infected. Antibiotics used to kill germs had not been invented yet. Gettysburg was the bloodiest clash of the Civil War and came with a high casualty list for both sides: 7,058 died; 33,264 wounded, and 10,790 went missing (LeBoutillier, 2017). As the war continued to intrude into his life, Finegan was becoming a hardened fighter who learned his skill on the battlefield.

Finegan, who was likely detached from the 69th Regiment, took part in the siege of Vicksburg (May 18 – July 4, 1863) as Grant directed artillery fire at the city. The air burst into flames as the shelling continued, and then Grant’s army relentlessly attacked the city for over 40 days. Eventually, the food and supplies ran out, forcing the soldiers and citizens of Vicksburg to eat mules and rats (Stanchak, 2011). The Confederate forces at Vicksburg surrendered on July 4, 1863. Amid the broken bricks and fires, a few homebound citizens must have watched through shattered windows as the Union forces marched by.

Finally, Finegan survived two later battles: the Battle of the Wilderness (May 5 - 7, 1864), in Spotsylvania County, Virginia, and the Spotsylvania Court House Battle (May 8 - 21, 1864). 

Finnegan was among many who witnessed the great suffering, horror, madness, and destruction of the Civil War that resulted in a horrific cost of life in the nation’s bloodiest war—at least 750,000 soldiers died, hundreds of thousands of others were wounded in battle, and an unknown number of civilians perished (McPherson, 2015). An estimated two percent of the population was killed (Ward, 1990). The Civil War set four million slaves free, brought the downfall of the Southern planter aristocracy, and preserved the Union as one nation, indivisible. 

Figure 2. Battle of Gettysburg. Painting by Thure de Thulstrup. Original scan: Library of Congress. Public Domain.

Having miraculously survived these bloodbaths, Finegan returned to New York City, where he mustered out in June, 1865. After he left the Army, Finegan returned to Australia once again. He settled in Victoria, where he worked in contracting and building. Then, in 1874, he moved to San Francisco where he worked as a stonecutter and mason. In 1880, he moved once again, this time to Colorado Springs, Colorado. He started a building business and lived at 225 S. Cascade. In 1881, he was elected alderman and served six years on the city council of Colorado Springs (Portrait and Biographical Record of the State of Colorado, 1899). 

In the shadow of Pikes Peak, peripatetic Finegan was becoming restless; excitement was absent in his life. This was about to change in 1891, when gold fever from the Cripple Creek mining district infected Finegan. The only cure for him was to come to the district and step into mining. About the time Finegan arrived in the district, a prospector, with the swing of his pick, revealed a streak of bright gold ore at a spot on the side of Beacon Hill. This discovery set in motion the establishment of the Requa Savage mine, in which Finegan was the driving force. Finegan incorporated the Requa Savage so optimists could invest in the mine. Now there were funds to hire engineers and miners and to buy machinery to develop it. 

Some maintain that Finegan named the mine after “Uncle” Benjamin Requa, an early settler, or for the nearby Requa Gulch. The gold mine was near Arequa, one of the oldest towns in the district. By 1896, the town of Arequa, named after Ben Requa, included the “A” as the first letter of its name, as seen in the map in figure 3 (Mackell-Collins, 2014). The Requa Savage was on the north side of the Gold Dollar mine (see map figure 3).

Figure 3. Map of the Cripple Creek Mining District, 1896. A red arrow points out the Gold Dollar mine. The Requa Savage mine is just north of the Gold Dollar. The town of Arequa is underlined in red. Map source: Hoyer-Millar (1896).

Figure 4. View of Beacon Hill. A red arrow shows the location of Arequa. Photographer unknown, date mid-1890s. From the Olla Burris collection, Cripple Creek District Museum. 

As time passed, the Requa Savage became known as a modest producer. According to the Mining and Engineering Journal (1910), the Requa Savage mine, in 1910, shipped two carloads of ore assaying at one ounce per ton. Other carloads yielded less gold, but the mine produced $100,000 that same year. 

The passage of time would not be kind to Frank Finegan. He fought cancer but lost that battle and died on October 22, 1914, in Colorado Springs, at 79. His family buried him in the Evergreen Cemetery. 

Figure 5. View of the Requa Savage mine. Ten miners pose in front of the mine. Photographer and date unknown. Courtesy of the Cripple Creek District Museum. 

History records that, over time, Finegan was one of several prominent men associated with the Requa Savage mine. Records show that by 1912, the One Hundred and One Mining Company owned the mine (Mining Science, 1912). In 1913 The Mining Investor reported that Democratic Colorado State Senator Louis A. Van Tilborg (1870-1937) worked the Requa Savage mine for a short time. Van Tilborg, a druggist and an assayer, was the mayor of Cripple Creek from 1907 until 1911. He served in the Colorado legislature from 1911 to 1914. The presence of gas forced Van Tilborg to suspend work at the mine. Once the mine resolved the gas issues, production resumed under the lease of Kermit MacDermid, of the C.K. and N. Mining Company (The Mining Investor, 1913). By this time, the Requa Savage’s surface plant included a shaft house equipped with a steam hoist and electric compressor. 

Although the Requa savage mine claimed a small area of land, it boasted five shafts. By 1914, the main shaft reached 700 feet deep (Consolidated Extension Mines Company, 1914). A crew of miners disappeared down the main shaft at the start of each shift and then drilled, blasted, and mucked in the shadows of the mine as they followed the occasional blossom of gold ore in barren rock. By 1914, the Requa Savage was owned by Rainbow Gold Mines Company. Rainbow Gold then leased it to another operator who, based on reports of good gold ore, planned to expand the development of the mine (Consolidated Extension Mines Company, 1914). 

A new group of investors reincorporated the Requa Savage Gold Mining Company in November, 1915, as the Requa-Savage Mines Company with offices at 112 N. Tejon Street in Colorado Springs (Weed, 1918). A report showed the mine was producing ore in 1929 (Kiessling, 1929).

According to The Mining Journal (1935), Commonwealth Gold leased the Requa Savage mine. Mr. Wellington Symes, who was the president and general manager of the property, subleased it to a group in Denver; and Andy Vidgen, the mine superintendent, purchased new machinery to increase ore production (The Mining Journal, 1935). 

As the years passed by, the ore decreased until the mine became unprofitable. The owners then closed the mine. Today, as you drive on Highway 67 between Cripple Creek and Victor, you will pass where the town of Arequa and the Requa Savage mine were once located. Both places now exist only in the pages of history. And we are reminded of Frank Finegan and how he emerged from obscurity and left his mark on time through his Civil War exploits and his ownership of a Cripple Creek mine. 

Acknowledgments

I thank the Colorado Springs Oyster Club critique group for reviewing the manuscript, and Dr. Bob Carnein for his valuable comments and help in improving this paper. 

References and further reading:

Colorado State Mining Directory, 1898: Denver, Western Mining Directory Company.

Consolidated Extension Mines Company, 1914, Referring to the Requa Savage mine on Beacon Hill in the Cripple Creek District, owned outright by Rainbow Gold Mines Company. United States Bureau of Mines: Colorado School of Mines Library Digital Collections, retrieved from https://mountainscholar.org/handle/11124/171813 on June 5, 2021. 

Hoyer-Millar, C. C., 1896, The Cripple Creek Gold-Fields, Colorado, U.S.A: London, Eden Fisher & Co. 

Kiessling, O.W., 1929, Mineral Resources of the US 1929: Washington DC, Dept of Commerce.

LeBoutillier, L., 2017, Secrets of the U.S. Civil War: North Mankato, MN, Capstone Press.

MacKell-Collins, J, 2014, Arequa Gulch: A Long Gone Town in Colorado, retrieved from https://janmackellcollins.wordpress.com/2014/03/20/arequa-gulch-a-long-gone-town-in-colorado/ on January 10, 2021.

McPherson, J., 2015, The War that Forged a Nation: Why the Civil War Still Matters: New York, Oxford University Press. 

Mining Science, 1912, Denver, vol 65, no 1,682, April 18, 1912.

Portrait and Biographical Record of the State of Colorado, Part 2, 1899: Chicago, Chapman Publishing Company.

Stanchack, J., 2011, Eyewitness: Civil War: New York, DK Publishing.

The Mining Investor, 1913: Denver: The Mining Investor Publishing Co, no 1, vol 71, May 19, 1913.

The Mining Engineering Journal, 1910, New York, Hill Publishing Company, vol 89, Jan-June 1910.

The Mining Journal, 1935, February 28, 1935, pg. 18, retrieved from https://vredenburgh.org/mining_history/pdf/AMJ-1935.pdf on February 15, 2021. 

Ward, G.C., 1990, The Civil War: An Illustrated History: New York, Alfred A. Knopf.

Weed, W. H., 1918, The Mines Handbook: New York, W. H. Weed Publishing.

The Lennox House: A Mansion Built from Cripple Creek Gold

 By Steven Wade Veatch

William Lennox (1850-1936), after prospecting in the mountains near Fairplay, Colorado, headed down to Colorado Springs, a new town at the foot of Pikes Peak. He established himself as a businessperson and later invested in Cripple Creek mines. These mining investments made him a millionaire almost overnight. 

The now wealthy Lennox built a new home, one that would show his position in Colorado Springs’ society. He hired the well-known Denver architect Frederick J. Sterner to design his two-and-a-half story mansion across from Colorado College—at the northeast corner of North Nevada Avenue and Yampa Street. Lennox started his home building project in 1900 (at a cost of $50,000) and moved into his stylish home in May 1901 (Lennox, 1901). Lennox hired James H. Barry as the general contractor for the construction of his home (National Register of Historic Places, 1999).

Photo of the Lennox House, 1001 N. Nevada Avenue, Colorado Springs, Colorado. This cyanotype  was taken around 1901 (courtesy of the Cripple Creek District Museum). This was written in pencil on the back of the cyanotype: "Lennox's new house NE corner Yampa and Nevada.” 

Repeat photo of the Lennox House taken February 2021 by S. W. Veatch. 

The Lennox house was one of Sterner's first commissions in Colorado Springs, and soon his architectural designs were in high demand among the city's leading citizens. Sterner’s local projects included General William Jackson Palmer's (the founder of Colorado Springs) second Antlers Hotel and the renovation of Palmer’s residence, Glen Eyrie, both in 1901 (Lennox Walking Tour). 

The Lennox house featured elements of the Mission Revival style in an interesting display of large curvilinear parapets, smooth stucco walls, quatrefoil windows (an ornamental design of four lobes resembling a flower), arched windows, and porches with arcades. A stunning red tile roof topped the structure (Central Downtown Historic Walking Tour). 

Lennox finished the interior of the home with hardwood, an open design, lots of windows, and large doorways. Several large eye-catching fireplaces heated the home.

Perhaps on a warm summer afternoon, after years of visible success, Lennox walked down a path, fringed with blue flowers, to a bench between two cottonwood trees and sat down. A songbird chirped on a fence post. As calm as a stone in a pool of deep water, he looked at Pikes Peak and thought about his life, how it began, and how it had changed. 

Lennox, the child of Scottish immigrants, was born on Christmas Day in 1850 in Iowa. Looking back on his life in 1901, Lennox wrote, “I was brought up on my parent's farm and used to hard work . . . I attended the Iowa State University at Iowa City. I could not spare time from farm work to graduate but acquired sufficient learning to teach a country school” (Lennox,  1901).

With his parents and siblings, Lennox made the journey from Iowa to Denver on the Kansas Pacific Railroad, and from there they traveled by stage on a rutted, dusty dirt road to Colorado Springs. They arrived in April 1872. According to Lennox, his parents “bought and moved to a ranch at Edgerton, on the west side of Monument Creek, about ten miles north of Colorado Springs” (Lennox, 1901). Just nine months earlier, on July 31, 1871, General William Jackson Palmer, a Civil War veteran and railroad tycoon, had established Colorado Springs. Promoters called it the Fountain Colony, and Colorado was still a territory. 

The same month they arrived in town, Lennox and his brother helped plant the first cottonwood trees General Palmer brought in to shade the wide streets of the business center of the city (Lennox, 1901). The trees gave the city a burst of green when it had been a treeless prairie.

The 22-year-old Lennox pondered infinite possibilities. He had both the appetite to succeed and the will to make it happen. He was a westward-looking man, and Fairplay was not too distant for hope. Lennox left Colorado Springs for a few months to prospect and mine near Fairplay. He then returned to Colorado Springs in 1873 and started a feed and livery business at the age of 23 (Lennox, 1901). The following year he added the handling of coal as the agent for the Denver & Rio Grande Railroad, and later a freight-transfer business entered his orbit of business enterprises (Lennox, 1901).

In 1876, Lennox married Belle Cowgill. He went to Iowa for the ceremony and returned to Colorado Springs with his bride. They had six children; two died in childhood. 

Lennox emerged as the largest coal dealer in the Pikes Peak region. He continued in the coal and transfer business until April 1901 (Lennox, 1901). 

While operating his coal yard, Lennox invested in mining operations in Gunnison, Summit, and Teller counties (National Historic Register of Historic Places, 1999). In 1891, Lennox bought Robert Womack’s El Paso lode (Portrait and Biographical Record, 1899). Womack was the first to find gold at Cripple Creek, in 1890, and his El Paso strike started a gold rush to the area. Lennox next organized the Gold King Mining Company, which included the El Paso lode. Lennox invested in other Cripple Creek mines. Along with Ed Giddings, who owned a department store in Colorado Springs, and Judge Colburn, Lennox leased the Strong mine in Victor (Sprague, 1953). One report states that the Strong lease brought $20,000,000 to the Lennox group (Newton, 1928). Lennox also became a major shareholder and officer of the Ajax mine, also in Victor (Wilkins, 1983).

The Gold King mine. Womack's claim came under the ownership of the Gold King Mining Company. Undated photo by A. J. Harlan. Courtesy of the Cripple Creek District Museum. CCDM A84-30.

Lennox became a millionaire as the Cripple Creek mining district became the foremost producer of gold in the nation (National Register of Historic Places, 1999). Luck had been Lennox’s constant companion.

While banking his Cripple Creek fortune, Lennox served as president of the Exchange National Bank in Colorado Springs. Furthermore, he served as vice-president and director of the Colorado Springs & Cripple Creek District Railway—the third railroad into the gold camp (Wilkins, 1983). He also owned large cattle ranches in Texas. 

This vintage color postcard depicts the Colorado Springs & Cripple Creek Railway (also known as the Short Line) at St. Peter’s Dome. This line provided one of the most scenic train rides in the state. William Lennox invested in this railroad and served as vice-president and director of the line. From the S.W. Veatch postcard collection. 

In 1902, Lennox built the Lennox Hotel at 226-228 N. Tejon Street with furnished rooms on the upper floors that served middle-class tourists and railroad workers. The ground floor was a storefront for the Knight-Campbell Music Company.

Lennox Hotel circa 1903. There is a sign "Lennox" over the second floor windows and hotel doorway. The Knight-Campbell Music Co. occupies the storefront on the left side of the building. Note the wide street with streetcar tracks. Photographer unknown. Courtesy of Special Collections, Pikes Peak Library District, 001-5622.

        By 1921, the Lennox changed its name to the Albany Hotel. The Albany sent cars to the railroad depots to pick up passengers who were staying at the hotel. The hotel offered a guide and touring cars for the “Four Hour Circle Trip” that included Garden of the Gods, the Cliff Dwellings, Cave of the Winds, Ute Pass Canyon, Manitou and the local mineral springs, and the foothills of Pikes Peak (Albany Hotel Brochure, 1921). The hotel offered longer excursions that took guests up Pikes Peak, to Cripple Creek, and to the Royal Gorge. These scenic auto trips, operated by the Colorado Touring Company for the hotel, left directly from the Albany and returned passengers to the hotel at the end of the trip.

Room rates in 1921 started at $3.00 (about $44 in today’s dollars) for two people (Albany Hotel Brochure, 1921). Today the Albany Hotel provides apartment units with the ground floor divided into a lobby and a separate retail storefront. 

Interior of an Albany Hotel guest room circa 1921.
Photo from a brochure promoting the hotel.
From the S. W. Veatch collection. 

View of the Albany Hotel, originally the Lennox Hotel. Architect Thomas MacLaren designed the three-story commercial brick  building at 228 N. Tejon for William Lennox as a variation of the Classical Revival style. Photo date March 2021 by S. W. Veatch.

Lennox, concerned with the progress of the community, always looked ahead for the development of Colorado Springs. And, as a member of the Chamber of Commerce, he worked tirelessly to promote the city. He was deeply interested in education, and from the year he moved into his mansion (1901), he served on the Colorado College Board of Trustees until his death on August 13, 1936, at 85. 

In his will, Lennox left his house to Colorado College. After receiving Lennox's home from his estate in 1936, the college engaged local architect Edward L. Bunts to design plans to remodel the home as a student center. The college spent $40,000 renovating the property for use as a multi-purpose student center that functioned as a place for student dining, recreation, the student government offices, the college newspaper, and social gatherings from 1937 to 1959. A few years after it opened as a student center, the college bookstore used the second floor. Henry E. Mathias, the former head of the Geology Department, acted as the center's director. 

In 1959, the newly constructed Rastall Center opened as the new student center. The Lennox house, after another remodel, became home to the Beta Theta Pi fraternity for 30 years. The college conducted an intensive German language program there in the summers. 

In 1989, the college renovated the building for use as a coed dormitory. The college listed the Lennox house on the National Register of Historic Places in 1999. Today, Lennox’s home is known as the Glass House, a co-ed residence for 20 students to explore and expand multicultural awareness. 

The Lennox House is an important landmark in Colorado Springs for its architecture and history. The building, built with money from Cripple Creek gold, shows the association of William Lennox, a Colorado Springs pioneer and a wealthy Cripple Creek mining investor, and the college that he financially supported. And the Lennox house still stands, just like Pikes Peak—defiant against time.

Acknowledgments

I thank Shelly Veatch and the Colorado Springs Oyster Club critique group for reviewing the manuscript, and Dr. Bob Carnein for his valuable comments and important help in improving this paper. 

References and Further Reading:

Albany Hotel Brochure, 1921, Advertising brochure promoting the hotel and Colorado Springs.

Central Downtown Historic Walking Tour, Colorado Springs, 2004: retrieved from https://coloradosprings.gov/sites/default/files/planning/cenwalkingtour.pdf, on March 15, 2021.

Lennox House, History Walking Tour, Colorado College: retrieved from https://www.coloradocollege.edu/basics/campus/tour/historic/lennox.html, on February 9, 2021.

Lennox, W., 1901, Century Chest Collection, 1901. Letter written August 4, 1901 to My Great Grand Children, Colorado Springs: retrieved from https://digitalccbeta.coloradocollege.edu/pid/coccc:10790, on February 9, 2021. Note: This letter, written by William Lennox, is from a time capsule, the “Colorado Springs Century Chest Collection, 1901. It was stored for 100 years in various locations on the Colorado College campus. On January 1, 2001, the chest was opened at the Tutt Library of Colorado College. The college scanned items from the chest and transcribed many of the letters.

National Register of Historic Places, 1999, Registration form: Lennox House, Colorado Springs, El Paso County, Colorado, National Register #99001266 United States Department of the Interior, National Park Service.

Newton, H. J., 1928, Yellow Gold of Cripple Creek: Anecdotes and Romances of the Mines, Mining Men, and Mining Fortunes: Denver, Nelson Publishing Company.

Portrait and Biographical Record of the State of Colorado: Containing Portraits and Biographies of Many Well Known Citizens of the Past and Present, 1899: Chicago, Chapman Publishing Company.

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

Wilkins, T. E., 1983, Short Line to Cripple Creek: The Story of the Colorado Springs & Cripple Creek District Railway: Golden, The Colorado Railroad Museum, Colorado Rail Annual Number 16. 

The Bill Sutton Story: Hard Rock Days During the Depression

 By Steven Veatch

Connecting with the past of Cripple Creek, a place that means so much to so many, came closer when I looked at a collection of photographs and ephemera that belonged to William W. “Bill” Sutton, who had donated this collection to the Cripple Creek District Museum. Sutton’s collection takes us back in time—over eight decades—to Cripple Creek during a part of the Great Depression. And the photographs bring back a group of men who were largely forgotten by history.

Photo of William W. Sutton. He was well-grounded in western mining and came to Cripple Creek to work on a gold mine. Photo date circa 1932. William Sutton collection, courtesy of the Cripple Creek District Museum.

Bill Sutton came to Cripple Creek in 1932—when the Great Depression was underway—to start a mine. It was a hard season for finding work. Because of the difficult times, there was renewed interest in the Cripple Creek mining district. The great gold camp carried with it the promise of something better, and men came looking for opportunities. Bill Sutton was one of these men and was ready to start work on the Geophysical mine, a new location on Carbonate Hill, northeast of Cripple Creek.

After Sutton arrived in Cripple Creek, he reported to Charlie Kuhlman, who had achieved a solid reputation in the district as a gold miner. Sutton’s first encounter with Kuhlman was tense. Kuhlman took one look at Bill Sutton and said, “You won’t last a week.” Sutton recalled, “I fooled him and stayed three years” (Sutton, n.d.).

William Sutton standing in front of Charlie Kuhlman’s house where he lived for 16 months. Photo date circa 1933. William Sutton collection, courtesy of the Cripple Creek District Museum.

This local boy was Sutton’s neighbor. During the Depression young men found their way into a world of mining in Cripple Creek that was larger than they could imagine. Photo date circa 1933. William Sutton collection, courtesy of the Cripple Creek District Museum.

Sutton roomed with Kuhlman in his rundown home on Crystal Street in Cripple Creek. Sutton wrote, “Al Mousseau and I lived with Charlie Kuhlman in his old shack and lived on boiled cabbage, black beans and sowbelly” (Sutton, n.d.). Kuhlman, who was born in Langendier, Germany in 1880, came to the district as a teenager in 1897, and latched onto mining like a bulldog with a fresh bone. He started out as a blacksmith in a mine and ended up as a gold miner. 

Al Mousseau, a Detroiter who worked with and lived with Sutton and Kuhlman, poses for the camera. William Sutton collection, courtesy of the Cripple Creek District Museum.

Officers of the Geophysical mine arrived in Cripple Creek in 1932 to meet and look at their investment. They were a diverse bunch, but a competent team. The mine had to be developed on a shoestring budget. The stakes were high. If they failed, they would lose all the money they had invested. As night fell on the day of their meeting, the men didn’t know enough to admit failure and so decided to go ahead with developing the property. They believed the district was still viable, with plenty of unknown and untouched ground. The men buzzed with energy and ideas. They were living an adventure story while looking for the sunburst dazzle of gold. With the future in front of them, they felt they had the luxury of time to find gold in Cripple Creek’s ground.

Photograph of the seven-person Geophysical mine group. Left to right: Bill Sutton, Al Mousseau, Karl Jorn (geophysicist), Charles Sutton (president), Mr. Williams (vice president), Mr. Hegee (secretary/treasurer), and Charlie Kuhlman. This group financed and operated the Geophysical mine on Carbonate Hill from 1932 to 1933. William Sutton collection, courtesy of the Cripple Creek District Museum.

Sutton, Kuhlman, and Mousseau began the hard work of developing the mine. With the help of Karl Jorn, a geophysicist, they located they platted out the mine on the ground.

Once the mine was located, they set up the gin pole that served as a temporary headframe. Gathering steam, Sutton climbed to the top of the gin pole and attached guy wires to stabilize it. Below the gin pole the men built a wooden foundation, in the form of a framed rectangle, that they assembled with bolts and iron pins on the ground.

Wooden planks form a foundation around the mine shaft. Two men are setting up the gin pole. Photo date circa 1932. William Sutton collection, courtesy of the Cripple Creek District Museum.

Sutton sits on top of the gin pole and attaches the guy wires to stabilize it. Photo date circa 1932. William Sutton collection, courtesy of the Cripple Creek District Museum.

Next, it was time to sink a small shaft to find the ore. There is a special intensity that descends on miners as they dig a gold mine. Attention is focused, tension mounts, and the work is hard. With picks and shovels, Sutton, Kuhlman, and Mousseau started digging the shaft. They drilled the hard rock by hand. When the drill steel dulled, they carried it three miles down to Cripple Creek where it was sharpened, and then carried it back to the mine. These three men also walked the same three miles from home and back each day. No one had a car. 

This view shows the pile of tailings that Sutton, Kuhlman, and Mousseau mined. Photo date circa 1932. William Sutton collection, courtesy of the Cripple Creek District Museum.

After drilling, the holes were packed with explosives, and then the rocks were blasted. The air got so dense with smoke from the blast that it was blue. Once the dust settled and the smoke cleared, the broken rock was mucked and sent up the shaft in an iron bucket. Because it was a small operation, a hand windlass (manual-powered winch) was used to hoist the bucket, filled with waste rock and any ore, to the surface. When the bucket reached the surface it was upended, and its load dumped (Twitty, 2005). This bucket continued to come up to the surface until the miners cleared the bottom of the shaft of broken rock; then they drilled and blasted another round (Twitty, 2005). This process was repeated: drilling, blasting, mucking, and hoisting. As a result, an expanding lobe of rock tailings projected out from the dumping area.

It was an all-day struggle of backbreaking work as they searched for gold. The crew spent the evenings playing cards, smoking, and telling stories between drinks. As the days wore on, they complained about geological conditions and conclusions. 

The days of mining blended together as the men deepened the shaft. When they eventually reached 64 feet, they hit a big vein of pyrite that signaled they were close to gold ore. This fueled Sutton’s optimism. In a moment of flashbulb clarity, Sutton knew what they had to do—dig deeper. Sutton wasn’t alone in this stance; Kuhlman felt the same way. At the depth of 64 feet, the shaft had passed the point where the gin pole would work safely. To go deeper, they needed to build a solid headframe over the shaft. Sutton and Kuhlman built a two-post gallows headframe since it was easy to erect and its cost was low. 

The men of the Geophysical mine drove on the vein an additional 21 feet. At the bottom of the deepened shaft they chipped off fragments of rock and found more pyrite, lots of it, but no gold. It was pin-drop quiet. A cloud of unease hung over the mine. Bill Sutton’s face changed, and he said they had “worked like hell seven days a week for an interest in another failure” (Sutton, n.d.). They abandoned the mine in November 1933, and the Geophysical mine faded into the district’s whispering rumors of gold.

After they left the Geophysical mine, this same group took up a lease on the old South Burns mine, near the celebrated Vindicator mine, and hired a few unemployed miners. They thought they would have better luck at a developed mine. The South Burns mine, once the property of the Calumet Mining and Milling Company, was purchased by the Acacia Gold Mining Company in 1895 (Hills, 1900). It was worked by the Acacia company as late as 1926, and then the Nuestra Ventura Mining Corporation took it over for the next two years (Munn, 1984). Sutton’s group worked a lease at the South Burns from 1933 to 1935. 

A view of the South Burns mine, Cripple Creek Mining District. Photo circa 1970. Gene Mourning photographer. From the Gene Mourning collection. Courtesy of the Western Museum of Mining and Industry. 

Sutton and his crew shipped decent gold ore from the South Burns which improved their financial condition. Sutton moved from Kuhlman’s place to the boarding house run by Babe Wolfkill and her daughters. A miner named Ed lived at the Wolfkill boarding house while he worked at the Blue Bird mine. In 1934, Ed was killed in an accident at the Blue Bird, and Sutton wrote, “We called his wife and asked where to bury him, and she said to throw him down the first old shaft you come to" (Sutton, n.d.). Sutton emphatically stated this was a true story. Whether Ed was thrown down a shaft, abandoned or otherwise, is not known. We can wonder if Ed’s wife ever saw the photo in which one of Mrs. Wolfkill’s daughters is holding Ed’s arm.

A Wolfkill daughter holds the arm of Ed, a local miner. He was killed in the Blue Bird mine in 1934. Photo date circa 1934. William Sutton collection, courtesy of the Cripple Creek District Museum.

Babe Wolfkill and her daughters standing in the yard of their Cripple Creek boarding house. Photo date circa 1934. William Sutton collection, courtesy of the Cripple Creek District Museum.

While working at the South Burns mine, Sutton was able to buy a car, a 1928 Dodge, and drove back and forth to work. With his Dodge automobile, Sutton moved in 1934 to what was left of Altman, one of the towns on the east side of the Cripple Creek Mining District. Most of the town had burned down in a 1903 fire started by arson.

Sutton’s accommodations were primitive in Altman. He called his place the “Pilch” and “batched” there for another year while he operated the South Burns mine (Sutton, n.d.). His Altman place must have been terrible for him to call it the Pilch. A pilch is a wrapper worn over an infant’s diaper.

A photo of Sutton’s ramshackle home  in Altman that he called the “Pilch.” Photo date circa 1934.William Sutton collection, courtesy of the Cripple Creek District Museum.

A group of gritty mining men who lived in Altman and worked with Bill Sutton during the Depression at the South Burns mine. Photo date circa 1934. William Sutton collection, courtesy of the Cripple Creek District Museum.

Ben McPherson, a weathered and salty miner, was Sutton’s neighbor in Altman. In the photo he wears a top hat, has one hand in his pocket, and a cigarette in his other hand. His downward gaze is sharp. Photo date circa 1934. William Sutton collection, courtesy of the Cripple Creek District Museum. 

Texas Art Roer and Clem Anette, both Sutton’s neighbors in Altman, relax by their car. Photo date circa 1934. William Sutton collection, courtesy of the Cripple Creek District Museum.

This photo shows good fishing below Cheesman Dam for Ed Anette, who was Sutton’s hoistman on the South Burns mine. Born in Kansas in 1875, Anette was in Cripple Creek as early as 1900. Photo date circa 1934. Anette lived in Altman. William Sutton collection, courtesy of the Cripple Creek District Museum.

According to Sutton, “we finally shipped enough ore to get all the stockholder’s money back and closed her [South Burns mine] down” (Sutton, n.d.). After the Sutton group gave up their lease and left in 1935, the South Burns mine produced gold ore for the Acacia Gold Mining Company through 1936. In 1937, Golden Conqueror Mines leased the South Burns and mined a large body of ore. Acacia Gold Mining Company operated it from 1938 until 1947 (Munn, 1984).

Bill Sutton and his crew spent their Depression-Era days chasing ore and most of their nights cursing their lack of finding it. Cripple Creek, though, offered them many diversions. Sutton described Cripple Creek as a “fun place . . . where the sky was the limit” (Sutton, n.d.). Saloons were busy and dance halls hummed. One favorite diversion was gambling. Bets were placed on donkey races, boxing matches, and everything in between. 

Sutton and his South Burns group wanted to make a good bet and improve the odds to win. To help win the bets they made on the local boxing matches, they brought in a young prizefighter by the name of Chief Stanley Fell to fight all of the local young mining toughs who stepped into the ring with him. Fell’s hometown was Lamar, Colorado. He was 6 feet 2 inches tall and weighed 200 pounds. He fought in the 1931 Kansas State Amateur Championship Tournament as a heavyweight. Fell later went professional and was managed by Hoot Burger. He won the 1934 Colorado Heavyweight Title against Carl Walker, at the match in Lamar, Colorado. 

Chief Stanley Fell, a boxer the Sutton group “imported to fight local boys in the ring.” Photo date circa 1934. William Sutton collection, courtesy of the Cripple Creek District Museum.

As the depression deepened, Charley Lehew, owner of the Cripple Creek Auto Company and the local Buick agent, wanted to stage events to bring people and their money to Cripple Creek in the summer. He decided to hold a donkey race: the “Grand Donkey Derby Day Sweepstakes.” Lehew, with his business partner, Bryan Jones, started the Donkey Derby Days in 1931. Lehew, Jones, and Mr. Lynch of the Palace Hotel started the “Miles High Club” to support the event (Summers, 2011).

Avis Welty’s membership card in the Miles High Club. This club was organized to support the Donkey Derby Days. The club later changed its name to the “Two Mile High Club” and continues to take care of the Cripple Creek donkeys. Courtesy of the Cripple Creek District Museum.

In addition to the donkey race, Lehew and Jones included a boy’s relay race, a girl’s chariot race, a tug-of-war between Cripple Creek and Victor businessmen, saddle-horse races, stock-car races, and a boxing match (Summers, 2011).

After the success of the donkey races, Lehew built a racetrack and added car races. According to Sutton, Lehew “furnished the shovels, picks, dump truck, and kept a keg of good old Cripple Creek whiskey for all who worked on the racetrack” (Sutton, n.d.). Sutton said Lehew held the auto races first, then the donkey races followed. Sutton never missed a Donkey Derby Days event while he was in Cripple Creek. 

A parade down Cripple Creek’s Bennett Avenue to celebrate the start of the Third Annual Donkey Derby Days. Photo date 1933. From the Wilkinson Family collection, Cripple Creek District Museum, CCDM 2000134.

Bill Sutton’s three years of working in Cripple Creek came and went, and we are as close to knowing Sutton’s story as we can come. After the crew ended their lease on the South Burns in 1935, things changed. Some of the people in this story stayed, others left. 

Bill Sutton slipped away into the long ago, and what happened to him after his three years in Cripple Creek is not known. Chief Stanley Fell left boxing and Cripple Creek to work at the CF&I steelyards in Pueblo. Fell died in 1986 in Pinedale, Wyoming. In 1936, Charlie Kuhlman married Gladys Adams. Kuhlman remained in Cripple Creek the rest of his life and died there in 1965. Ben McPherson later moved to Goldfield, where he lived with his wife and daughter. 

All of Sutton’s outfit had lived on the excitement of gold mining during those Depression years. Sutton’s manuscript and his photos conjure a story of men who belong to another time.  Because of Sutton’s donation to the Cripple Creek District Museum, we get to hear their story and meet those men while we learn about their mining adventures in Cripple Creek.

Acknowledgments

I thank Shelly Veatch and the Colorado Springs Oyster Club critique group for reviewing the manuscript, and Dr. Bob Carnein for his valuable comments and important help in improving this paper. 

References and further reading

Hill, F., 1900, The Official Manual of the Cripple Creek District: Colorado Springs, Fred Hill.

Munn, B., 1984, A Guide to the Mines of the Cripple Creek District: Colorado Springs, Century One Press.

Summers, D., 2011, Colorado Community Media, Donkey Derby Days Through the Years, retrieved from https://coloradocommunitymedia.com/stories/donkey-derby-days-through-the-years,81373, on November 13, 2020.

Sutton, W.W., n.d., untitled manuscript, Cripple Creek District Museum Archives.

Twitty, E., 2005, Riches to Rust: A Guide to Mining in the Old West: Montrose, Western Reflections Publishing Company.

Brothers

Photograph courtesy of the Cripple Creek District Museum

The photo you left

from gold rush days

turned up today.

It lasted over a century.

I would say go

to Cripple Creek,

again, grab

some gold.

Have some fun—

ride a burro,

and look down

the winding trail,

to a time that didn’t

last long enough.

By Steven W. Veatch

 

A Childhood Lost: Cripple Creek’s Minor Miners

By Steven Wade Veatch

Even though working in Cripple Creek goldmines mines was tough labor, occasionally, miners took a break from their deep underground toil. Some Cripple Creek miners wanted to memorialize their work in the goldfields by posing for group photographs in front of their mines. A few of these photographs have survived and are stored in various Colorado archives. Some of these photographs contained surprising faces among the cast of characters. As I studied some of these old and brittle photographs, I noticed the faces of young boys looking back at me. With a magnifying glass in hand, I looked deeper. In one photo, a young boy (figure 1) puffs on a spit-soaked cigar stuck in the corner of his mouth. With his dark eyes full of mischief, he poses with his adult coworkers at the Republic mine on the Mary McKinney mine property.

Figure 1. This photo depicts a young boy posing with the adult miners
at the Republic mine in the Cripple Creek Mining District.
Photo circa 1899, courtesy of the Cripple Creek District Museum. 

These boys were part of the mine’s workforce. Some historians argue that only a handful of them were there, but their number remains undetermined and their stories lost to time.

Cripple Creek mines were dangerous, and there were many ways to be killed or injured underground: rock falls (also known as widow makers), cave-ins, explosions from unignited rounds of dynamite, and accidents with machinery. These drastic situations—the injury or loss of a father—led some children of the stricken miners, all boys, to work in the mines (Wright, 1974). These boys were supporting families that had had a father die or injured in a mining accident. Others were orphans and lived on their own.

These “minor miners” were known as pick boys (figure 2). They ran errands, fetched supplies, and brought dull drills and picks to blacksmiths for sharpening (Wyman, 1979). The pick boys also lugged water to thirsty miners to drink. It is likely that these boys tended the donkeys who worked with them underground.

Figure 2. This closeup captures a moment in time where a pick boy
is sitting with a group of miners. Photo, circa 1902,
courtesy of the Cripple Creek District Museum.

The pick boys tramped deep underground through claustrophobic drifts (a horizontal passage underground that usually follows a vein) that wound through the gold-bearing igneous rocks. They worked amid creaking timbers, dripping water, and the threat of deadly gases. There was inadequate ventilation underground, and the fumes of blasting, candle smoke, and rock dust from drilling filled the air. Grime stained the boys’ clothes from the damp and muddy places they worked. The endless blackness of the mine swallowed the flickering light of their candles. The roar of blasting and the incessant racket of operating drills was constant. Despite these conditions, they likely labored with quiet deliberation and in their familiar routines to collect meager pay.

Some of the boys worked above ground in the ore-sorting houses. It was here that finely ground ore, considered richer than the coarser or oversized ore, was separated (Lindgren & Ransom, 1906). Some sorting houses used a process of hand sorting to separate the higher-grade ore, something a boy could do.

Lowell Thomas was 14 years old when he rode horseback for the Portland mine, gathering specimens from other gold mines to be assayed (Marist Archives and Special Collections, n.d.). The Portland mine, near the rough-and-tumble goldrush town of Victor, was one of the major producers in the Cripple Creek Mining District. Lowell Thomas grew up in Victor, where his father was the town doctor (Lee, 1958). Dr. Thomas took Lowell out for walks, where they looked for rocks and Lowell learned about geology (Lee, 1958, p. 239-240). Lowell Thomas came back to the mining district after college and worked in some of the mines and then edited several newspapers in the district for a short period (Lee, 1958, p. xii). Lowell Thomas went on to be a celebrated radio and television broadcaster, author, and world traveler.

Cripple Creek was not the only place where there were boy miners. In the Leadville district, boys left high school before graduation, usually to go to work in the mines and become breadwinners for their families (Crawford, 1959).

One miner’s account told of his mining partner at Colorado’s Climax molybdenum mine near Leadville. His partner was called “Scotty” because he was from Scotland. Scotty told him that one day when he was about 11 years old at home, the sun was low on the horizon outside, flooding his family’s kitchen with the ruddy light of sunrise. He was eating breakfast with his father. His mother was busy making his father’s lunch for work. Scotty’s father said, “Mom, fix a lunch for Junior.” The mother replied, “He’s going to school and will come home for lunch, and then go back to class.” The father said, “Not anymore. He’s goin’ to the mine with me. He’s had enough schooling.” Scotty never went back to school (G. Lewis, personal communication, 2020). Back then, children became "adults" much earlier than today, going only as high as completing eighth grade in most cases before going to work.

Colorado coal mines in the early 20th century used children in their workforce. According to Martha Todd, “The coal miners as a rule all had big families. The family of five was a small family. . . I’ve heard of families of 12 and 15 children. . .There were no child labor laws in those days and the boys were taken into the mine [at] 11, 12, 13 years old. And the girls, just as soon as they were able to take care of baby, were kept at home. They didn’t get to go to school much” (Margolis, 1985).

Child labor laws were slow in coming. In 1912, President Taft signed into law a bill creating “The Children's Bureau,” the first federal agency that focused on improving the lives of children. When the Department of Labor was established the following year (1913), The Children’s Bureau was transferred to it. However, child labor problems were far from solved.

Leadville’s Herald Democrat of October 18, 1921 featured an article about child labor. “In 20 states, boys less than 16 years old could be hired to work in mines and quarries. In 17 states, child workers under 16 years of age would not even be afforded the protection of the eight-hour workday. In 17 states there would be no law to prevent the child workers from being employed at night.”

The Walsh-Healey Act, enacted in 1936 as part of President Roosevelt’s New Deal, established safety standards, minimum wage, maximum hours, overtime pay, and child labor regulations on federal contracts. Finally, in 1949, the Fair Labor Standards Act prohibited child labor.

Since there were no social systems to take care of the families with a father killed or disabled in a mine, and no labor laws to protect them, some of the boys in Cripple Creek worked in the mines by necessity, becoming the breadwinners for their families. Some boys quit school and followed the lure of gold and the adventure of mining. They became the pick boys, the minor miners of the Cripple Creek Mining District. They endured the hard work and dangers of underground mining.

References Cited
Athearn, F. J., 2008, Early Mining in Northeastern Colorado Chapter 6. In The New Empire of the Rockies: A History of Northeast Colorado. Retrieved from https://www.nps.gov/parkhistory/online_books/blm/co/16/chap6.htm on April 1, 2020.

"Child Labor Still Issue." Herald Democrat, 18 Oct. 1921 [Leadville], p. 1.

Crawford, I. C., 1959, School Days in Leadville. Colorado Magazine, Vol. 36, p. 224.

Lindgren, W., and Ransome, F. L., 1906, Geology and gold deposits of the Cripple Creek District, Colorado. Washington: Govt. Print. Off.

Lee, M. B. 1958, Cripple Creek Days. Lincoln, NE: University of Nebraska Press., pp. 239-240.

Margolis, E., 1985, Western Mining as a Way of Life. Journal of the West, Vol. 36, p. 54.

Marist Archives and Special Collections: Lowell Thomas. Retrieved from http://library.marist.edu/archives/LTP/Graphic%20Materials/PhotographicPrints2.1.3/lowellThomas2.1.3.3.3.xml on April 5, 2020.

Wright, J. E., 1974, The Politics of Populism: Dissent in Colorado. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, (pp. 20-21, 24-27).

Wyman, M., 1979, Hard Rock Epic: Western Miners and the Industrial Revolution 1860-1910. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, p. 13.

To Stop a Thief: A Letter Warning Cripple Creek’s Winfield Scott Stratton

By Steven Wade Veatch

It began with a letter that Augustus Dominick Bourquin, a Colorado prospector, wrote to warn Winfield Scott Stratton, the Cripple Creek mining mogul and owner of the Independence Mine, about one of his employees at the mine.

W. S. Stratton (1848-1902) came to the Cripple Creek Mining District in 1891 when he was 42 years old and staked the Independence Mining claim on July 4, 1891. The Independence was among the major producing mines in the district and made Stratton a multi-millionaire. This image is in the public domain in the United States.

Bourquin’s letter is an exceptional illustration of a primary source that offers a first-hand eyewitness account of events. It helps us take a front-row seat to the unfolding of history. Bourquin’s letter is among Stratton’s historic papers that are stored at the Western Museum of Mining and Industry in Colorado Springs, Colorado.

In his letter, Bourquin warns Stratton that one of his employees, John Stark, is a thief. According to Bourquin’s letter, John Stark was an unscrupulous man that committed acts of larceny wherever he went. Stark even raided the caches of clothes and supplies miners left covered with rocks along the trail on their way to the Klondike goldfields, depriving those miners of necessary supplies. Bourquin’s letter also mentions the problem of high-grading or theft of gold in the Cripple Creek mining district. Here is his letter:

Aspen, Colo. Oct. 17th, ’98.

W. S. Stratton

Victor, Colo.

Dear Sir—

I feel that it is my duty to give you a little of the history of a man who is now in your imploy [sic]. A man who has proven himself a thief on every occasion where he has had an opportunity to pilfer from others. That man is no other than John Stark. Mr. Stratton, I returned in Aug. from the Klondike and was a partner during the winter with Stark. There was [sic] four of us in partnership on a lay, or lease, on Bonanza Creek.[1] Stark began pilfering aboard the steamship Cleveland on his way north from Seattle.[2] Stole his winter supplies from one of the Mercantile Co’s at Fort Yukon.[3] He robed [sic] one of our partners of every dollar of gold dust he had, on the pretense, that he, Stark, would take it down and deposite [sic] it with his own in Dawson.[4] Stark skipped the country between two days and carried off all the dust, leaving our partner stranded in Dawson where he is today.

Stark robed [sic] caches of clothing and provisions whenever he had an opportunity, against my protest. He stole clothing and provisions from the cache of some poor fellows who had to walk out of the country during the winter on account of a shortage of food. Stark robed [sic] me of nearly $200 of which I cannot recover as the theft was commited [sic] in Canadian Teritory [sic]. [5] The Mercantile Co. who he robbed in Fort Yukon were [sic] on his track in Dawson, when he, under an assumed name, left Dawson between two days in a small boat, about June 1st.

Stark often spoke of his work on the Independence mine. Said he has some rich ore from the mine; one piece worth eighty dollars. Spoke of your keeping detectives around all the time but they were not sharp enough to catch anyone. Said he had cut a rich streak of mineral fifteen inches thick and timbered it in, with the help of the Super, hoping someday to get a lease on the ground. According to his statement the superintendent stood in with him, but his name I have forgotten. This unscrupulous scoundrel spoke very disrespectful [sic] of you at different times. Said you had nicely furnished rooms in Cripple for no other purpose, that he knew of, but to take lewd women and have a good time. Mr. Stratton, I have given you simply an outline of the methods practiced by that scoundrel, that you may not be deceived by him. I regret to hear that he has secured a trusty position on your property when there are more worthy people to be had. I can make an affidavit to thease [sic] statements should you desire.

Very respectfully,

A.D. Bourquin

Although it is clear from the letter that Bourquin had a negative attitude toward Stark based on his alleged dealings with him, perhaps we can judge the veracity of his claims by studying Bourquin’s life story. Augustus Dominic Bourquin was born in 1852 in Tidioute, Pennsylvania. Known as “Gust” to his friends, this free-spirited young man craved adventure and excitement. 

Figure 2. Photo of A.D. Bourquin (1852 to 1899). His father was Swiss and his mother was French. Bourquin was noted in the Aspen newspapers as being a principal in the Austin Mining Excavating Company.  Photo source: Robert Clark (great-grandson). Used with permission. 

In 1875, Bourquin first moved west and worked a placer mine in Arizona. Later, he worked in the mines at Red Bluff, California and Reno, Nevada. Bourquin returned home in the fall of 1877 and worked on the family farm in Pennsylvania (Bourquin, 1951). Next, he traveled to Kansas in 1879, where he homesteaded (Bourquin, 1951). Bourquin moved to Kansas at a bad time—a drought held Kansas in its dry and dusty grip. The Manhattan Nationalist, on April 25, 1879, had this to say: “The wind made the bleeding soil of Kansas sift through a pine board on Monday [April 21]. The poor housekeeper that had just shaken carpets and cleaned windows, sighed mournfully as they [sic] saw the sand heaps on windowpane and floor” (Malin, 2018). This relentless drought ended his days of homesteading, and in the spring of 1880, Bourquin, along with his two brothers George and Jess, traveled west as they drove a team of mules and a wagon to Denver (Clark, 2018). The brothers then sold the mules and Bourquin trekked to Aspen, Colorado. He operated several mining claims in the area and served as councilman for the City of Aspen (Clark, 2018).

Bourquin caught a bad case of gold fever and joined the Klondike Gold Rush. After spending a season in the Klondike washing gold-laden gravels in Bonanza Creek, he returned to Aspen, Colorado.

Bourquin died a few months after he mailed his letter to Stratton. He had caught the flu while working on a mining claim and died five days later, on Jan 14, 1899, at the age of 46 (Clark, 2018). The Woodmen of the World, a fraternal benefit society designed to provide insurance and financial security for its members, buried him in the Aspen Grove Cemetery in Aspen, Colorado. Bourquin’s family then moved his body to the Red Butte cemetery after it opened in 1900. His mother Celestine is buried in the same plot, along with his brother Amos, Amos' wife, and their daughter.

And so, a letter reveals a first-hand account of an episode in the writer’s life. The letter led to research that painted a portrait of the writer, A.D. Bourquin, who spent a life well-lived as a miner and adventurer. He followed the trails that pointed to gold and silver deposits, no matter how difficult the passage.  All regarded him as fine man and a pioneer who guided his family to the West.

Although we will never know if Stratton answered Bourquin’s letter, it is known that John Stark, after his adventures in the Klondike, returned to the Cripple Creek Mining District and worked as Stratton’s foreman at the Independence Mine. Eighteen months later, Stark was promoted to superintendent of the Independence Mine (The Fortunes of a Decade, 1900). It seems that Stratton did not read Bourquin’s letter or believe what it said about his foreman, and as a result, we may never know the facts that surrounded Stratton’s decision to ignore the warning in Bourquin’s letter.

References

Andrews, C. L. (1916, January). Marine Disasters of the Alaska Route. The Washington HIstorical Quarterly, 7(1), 21-37. Retrieved December 2, 2018, from www.jstor.org/stable/40428352

Bourquin, G. M. (1951, October 22). Letter to Edna Florence Bourquin Reynolds.

Clark, R. (2018, December 2-5). Great-grandson of A.D. Bourquin. (S. Veatch, Interviewer)

Malin, J. C. (2018, December 1). Dust Storms: Part Two, 1861-1880. Retrieved from Kansas Historical Soceity: https://www.kshs.org/p/kansas-historical-quarterly-dust-storms-part-two-1861-1880/13031

McLaughlin, L. (2018, Devember 7). Yukon History. Retrieved from Hougen Group: http://hougengroup.com/yukon-history/yukon-nuggets/year/1897/#STARVATION

The Fortunes of a Decade. (1900). Colorado Springs: Sargent and Rohrabacher for the Evening Telegraph.

What Was the Klondike Gold Rush? (2018, June 28). Retrieved from Klondike Gold Rush National Historic Site: https://www.nps.gov/klgo/learn/goldrush.htm

Woodin, W., & Spude, C. H. (2016). All for the Greed of Gold: Will Woodin's Klondike Adventure. Seattle: Washington State University Press.

Notes on the letter

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[1] On August 16, 1896 prospectors discovered gold on Bonanza Creek, a tributary of the Klondike River in Canada’s Yukon Territory. The watercourse became the center of the Klondike Gold Rush (1897-1898). This discovery triggered a stampede of thousands of prospectors and fortune seekers to the area (What Was the Klondike Gold Rush?, 2018).

[2] The Cleveland, operated by the North American Trading & Transportation Company, was one of many steamships that carried passengers to and from the Klondike goldfields (Woodin & Spude, 2016). The company sold fares only to the “hardiest of men.” The demand for a ticket was high. After leaving Seattle’s docks, the Cleveland went as far as Fort St. Michael, where a connection was made with river steamers that took passengers and goods up the Yukon River to the mines. Fort St. Michael was established by the US Army in 1897 to establish order during the Klondike Gold Rush and served as a major gateway through the Yukon River to the area. In 1903, the Cleveland was lost in the Bering Sea and was never recovered (Andrews, 1916).

[3] Fort Yukon, during the Klondike Gold Rush (“Starvation Winter” of 1897–1898) took in 200 prospectors from Dawson City who were short of supplies (McLaughlin, 2018).

[4] Dawson City, the center of the Klondike Gold Rush, began in 1896, where it displaced a native encampment. The city grew into a busy place of 40,000 by 1898. A year later, after the gold rush ended, its population plummeting to 8,000 people.

[5] The stolen $200 is equivalent to $2,855 in 2018 dollars.