USA > Colorado > Larimer County > History of Larimer County, Colorado > Part 54
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who was elected governor of Colorado in 1884. Our subject hired out to do construction work on the canal for Mr. Eaton, remaining in his employ for three years, and not only helped to build the largest irrigating canal in northern Colorado, but also the High Line canal near Denver, for which his employer was contractor. He returned to his Missouri home in 1884 and on Feb. 8th, 1885, he married Miss Jane Coy, the union proving a very happy one. In the fall of 1892, he moved his family from Missouri to Fort Collins, having decided that Colorado offered greater opportunities for a man of limited means for establishing a home and acquiring something for a rainy day than any other part of the country he had visited. He bought fifty acres of land two miles southwest of Fort Collins, then known as the Graham place. It was not a promis- ing piece of land, but he could do no better with the means at command, so he took it, going into debt for a part of the purchase money. Part of the tract was covered by a cat-tail swamp and the re- mainder was a dry knoll above water. The first hard work he did on the place was in draining the swamp and converting it into garden land. He ac- complished his purpose, however, and had the satis- faction of reclaiming about ten acres of what was thought to be a worthless swamp and making of it as rich and productive garden land as there is in Larimer county. He then began raising vegetables and small fruits for market in which he had re- markable success. He soon paid off the debt on his place and succeded in securing water for his dry knoll, finally bringing that under a high state of cultivation. About five years ago he sold his fifty acres of upland for $10,000, reserving the reclaimed swamp land for his own use. He sold the latter in the spring of 1911 for a big price and moved into Fort Collins, which has since been the family home. His faithful and devoted wife did her full share in bringing about prosperity, for while he was at work in the garden she would drive into town and sell the fruit and vegetables as they were produced on the place. Though, as stated, Mr. and Mrs. Tom- baugh never had any children of their own, they have brought up three foster or adopted children, to- wit: Mrs. Anna Payne, and Mattie and Edward Tombaugh.
BENJAMIN F. WILLIAMS was born in Jefferson county, West Virginia, in 1872. In 1875 his par- ents moved to Illinois and the following year found them again Westward bound until the Plains of Nebraska halted their onward march for a period.
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Again taking up the route to the setting sun, March, 1905, found Mr. Williams in Colorado, at Welling- ton. Looking about for a permanent location he was struck by the superior advantages of the Spring Canon ranch, then owned by Henry T. Miller, of whom he purchased in 1907. This is a fine ranch and is now in the hands of a competent and ener- getic farmer, who may be depended upon to keep up its fertility and productiveness. Mr. Williams has a willing helpmate, whose maiden name was Miss Ella Westberg, whom he married March 27th, 1910.
HIRAM PIERCE .- Born August 8th, 1852, at Waterford, Wisconsin; learned carpenter and join- er's trade; married Maggie White, May 12th, 1879, at Chilton, Wisconsin; three children, Rob- ert Ansel, mining engineer, Denver; Blanche, stenographer and Elizabeth, student; both daugh- ters at home; came to Fort Collins November 11th, 1878, and followed contracting and building until January, 1905, when he was appointed instructor in carpentry at Colorado Agricultural college, a posi- tion he still holds; has a fine home at 510 South Howes street.
FREDERICK J. SNYDER .- Mr. Snyder was one of the real pioneers of Colorado and a very early set- tler in Larimer county, locating on a farm near the present town of Timnath, in 1865. He walked the entire distance from Chicago to Denver in 1860, making the trip in 271 days. He came alone, carry- ing his bedding and provisions, excepting what he killed on the road, on his back. He was a good citi- zen, a kind and obliging neighbor. He died at his farm home on Nov. 23rd, 1892, aged 72 years. Two sons, William and Lincoln Snyder, survive him.
TWIFORD CORBIN .- The subject of this sketch was born October 11th, 1838, in Sussex county, Delaware. He spent his early years on his father's farm, having few advantages in the way of obtain- ing an education, but he was observing and through his intercourse with neighbors and friends acquired a good knowledge of business and political affairs. He left home in his early manhood to seek his fort- une with only $15 in his pocket. He traveled west- ward and spent a few years in Illinois, going thence to Missouri to engage in business, finally turning his attention to farming near Cameron in that state. In 1867 he was married to Sarah M. Selby, who died in 1869. For his second wife he married Mrs. Sarah J. Leffingwell in 1871. Three sons were
born to the second union only of whom Franklin, survives his parents and he is a resident of Fort Collins. In 1880 Mr. Corbin came to Fort Col- lins and purchased a lumber yard and this city was 'his home until he died, December 21st, 1896. He was an excellent business man and prospered in the lumber trade, accummulating a competence. He was an ardent member of the Christian church, and
TWIFORD CORBIN
aided materially in organizing that denomination in Fort Collins, contributing liberally of his means to the building of a church edifice for the congrega- tion to worship in. His religion was unostenta- tious and his record as a man and citizen was as an "open book". As a business man he was conser- vative and with wise foresight achieved success. He was manly and outspoken and had great admira- tion and strong friendship for men of that class. He took a great interest in public affairs, co-operating heartily in every movement calculated to advance the material and moral welfare of his chosen home.
WILLIAM THOMAS SHORTRIDGE .- The "Blue Grass State" added more than its quota to the long line of pioneers who crossed the Plains in the early
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sixties-and among the stalwart sons of Kentucky the name of William Thomas Shortridge promi- nently stands forth. Born at Lexington, April 3rd, 1831, he was married at Independence, Missouri, to Miss Polly A. Kelly, December 19, 1854. There was but one child born of the union, Mrs. Lou Wallace, long a resident of this city. Mr. Short- ridge came to Colorado in 1860, locating in Den-
WILLIAM THOMAS SHORTRIDGE
ver. He filled many political positions, a trusted and faithful public servant. A deputy U. S. Mar- shal and deputy sheriff in Denver, city marshal while a resident of Fort Collins, in 1882 and '83 and deputy sheriff under Sheriff W. T. Bransom in 1894. He was an old Plainsman-drove an ox team to Salt Lake for Ben Holladay in the sum- mer of 1852 and was wagon master later on for Majors, Russell and Waddell. He died at his home in Fort Collins, May 15, 1905.
PIERCE J. LANDES, son of Mr. and Mrs. M. L. Landes, was born May 10th 1885, at Livermore, Colorado; attended the public schools; married Rosalie Nugent, December 9th, 1908 at Laporte; farmer by occupation; went with parents to Cali- fornia in 1893, returning to Fort Collins in 1895,
his father having purchased what is known as the W. S. Taylor farm, near Laporte. Our subject now owns the farm and has resided on it since 1895, engaged in general farming, sheep feeding and sugar beet raising in which he has met with good success. His mother was a daughter of the late John Riddle, one of the early settlers of the Caché la Poudre valley. His father is a retired farmer and he and his family live in Fort Collins.
H. B. CHUBBUCK was born in Pennsylvania, October 6, 1817. When twenty-one years of age, he left Pennsylvania and went to Illinois, residing there about twelve years. In 1850 he went to Cali- fornia, where he remained two years and then came east as far as Nebraska. In 1858 he came to Colo- rado, locating near the present city of Denver, and was one of the original members of the loan com- pany which laid out the place in 1859. He located a claim on the west bank of the Platte in 1859 and in company with a man named Smith built the first bridge across that stream, hewing the timbers that were used in its construction from cottonwood trees growing on their claims. The bridge was known for many years as the "Old Chubbuck bridge" and was on the road leading to the Gregory mine, now Central City. He was engaged in business in what is now West Denver, then called Auraria, during the first years of its existence, besides opening up quite a market gar- den. He used for two or three seasons for cul- tivating his garden crop, a single ox, broken to har- ness and driven with lines. He assisted in build- ing an irrigating ditch to water his land, which was probably the first one built in Colorado. In the spring of 1862, he removed to the Big Thomp- son valley, locating on land later owned by David Hershman, where he resided until 1867, when he sold the claim and with his two sons opened up the farm on which he died October 9th, 1880, it being the first bluff farm taken up and improved in the county, and at that time considered a very risky investment. Mr. Chubbuck was the first county superintendent of schools for Larimer county and was elected sheriff in 1866, serving one term. He was a kind hearted man, greatly liked and re- spected, so much so that nearly everyone in the county was his friend.
ANNA M. MONTGOMERY, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Paul C. Johnson and wife of Albert Mont- gomery, was born April 24th, 1878, at Riverton, Iowa; attended school in Larimer county, Colorado; married June 25th, 1896, at Boulder, Colorado;
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has one child, Paul C., born May 2, 1897; came to Fort Collins in 1881 and was reared on a farm; housekeeper and dressmaker by occupation; resi- dence Fort Collins. Her parents born in Denmark, the father in 1852 and the mother in 1858.
PETER TURNER, the founder of the present town of Berthoud, was born in 1838 in Franklin county, Virginia, where he lived until he had reached the age of 17 years. He came to Iowa in 1857, and to Colorado in 1861, locating first in Russell Gulch. He followed sluice mining for two and a half years and then moved to Sunshine, Boulder county, and was the first settler in that camp. He came from there to the Little Thompson valley in the fall of 1877, and in 1880 laid off the present town of Ber- thoud from a portion of his farm. He is still a resi- dent of Berthoud, reaping the benefit of his early day investments. He has five living children, but his wife, the companion of his younger years, died about three years ago. Mr. Turner built the first house in Berthoud, and still occupies it.
LEWIS E. PARKER .- Born in 1864, when war's alarms filled the country with its fears and dreads, with its tears and sorrows, our subject first saw the light in Fountain City, Indiana- a state whose stalwart sons fought nobly on many a gory battlefield in behalf of the integrity of the Union. When 16 years of age he went to Iowa and about a year later moved to Denver, where he dwelt about six months and then came to Larimer county to make his home. He was still a boy in years with a man's ambition and soon found em- ployment on W. H. Peterson's farm near Timnath, then on George W. Baxter's farm in the Harmony neighborhood, putting in three years as a farm hand. He then filed a preemption claim on 160 acres in Coal Bank draw in Weld county on which he lived about four years and improved, serving two years in the meantime as road overseer of his district. On December 23rd, 1886, he led Nettie Cline, a daugh- ter of one of the real pioneers of the Cache la Poudre valley, to the marriage altar. Six children, five sons and one daughter have blessed the union. In 1894, Mr. Parker purchased a half section of land situated in the Cache la Poudre valley, nine miles southeast of Fort Collins, and there he and his family have since resided. He is a successful farmer and stock feeder and, through industry, strict attention to his own affairs and good manage- ment, has succeeded in laying by a goodly store of this world's goods for use in his declining years. His farm is one of the oldest in the valley having
been taken up as a squatter's claim by Mrs. Par- ker's father in 1860, before the country was sur- veyed and afterwards proved up on and purchased of the government. It is well improved, the soil rich and productive and kept in a high state of cul- tivation, and Mr. Parker seldom or never fails to reap a rich reward in products for his season's labor, care and attention. Besides being a good
MR. AND MRS. L. E. PARKER
farmer and stock feeder he is an excellent citizen who is doing well his part to develop the agricul- tural resources of his chosen home. He came to Larimer county a poor boy and has risen through his own unaided efforts to a proud position among the successful men of the community.
A. T. GILKISON was born on the 25th day of December, 1847, at Centerville, Michigan. The story of his life is one that will be read with in- creasing interest as the accumulation of years puts farther into the background the experiences, the hopes, the disappointments and the successes of the searchers for the hidden treasures of the mountains. His has been the life of the prospector which, in the limited space allowed for this sketch, must be
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told without embellishment or the ornaments of fic- tion. When Mr. Gilkison was but a few months of age his parents moved to Ohio, and before he was a year old his mother died. Left to the care of grandparents and then to other relatives he was kept under one roof hardly long enough to begin to call it home before he was passed into the hands of new guardians. About the year 1855 or 6, he
A. T. GILKISON
was taken to Chariton, Iowa, where he remained until 1866. Then, at the age of 19 years, he started to make a career for himself. He made the over- land wagon trip to Colorado in company with quite a band of emigrants and arrived in Denver on the 1st day of April, 1866, and immediately commenced his search for gold. We shall only be able here to follow him rapidly in his wanderings. He went to Nevada, in Gilpin county, Colorado, meeting there with very little success. On May second, 1869, he married Margaret J. Dalley who was at that time but 16 years of age. In the spring of 1871, he moved to Caribou, then a noted silver camp. He continued to prospect for gold and located many claims but found nothing that would produce the expected "stake." His experience was that of many
another prospector-hunting for the coveted ore as long as credit could be had for food. When credit was exhausted, a period of labor for wages until uneasy grocers and butchers were silenced and then another dash with pick and pan for the pros- pect field. The settling upon a piece of land and the raising of some hay and vegetables for sale to the miners were but incidents which interrupted for a short time the main object in life. The limit- ing of the family to one ration of meat a week, on Sunday morning, in order that money might be saved to buy a team, is a pointer to mark the finan- cial condition of the family. There were by this time two boys and a girl in the family. A mule team was finally purchased, partly on credit, and catching the "Leadville fever" the family started for that camp, sure that there was the long sought goal. Hardly landed at Leadville, he heard of the rich strikes being made at Gunnison and again the family were loaded into the wagon and the mules headed for that camp. But the drive was long and before Gunnison was reached the excitement had died out and Mr. Gilkison drove on to Gothic, a new camp just starting up. Here it was the old story-exaggerated reports, a frantic rush, feverish searching for prospects and-disappointment. Again the wagon was loaded and the drive made to Crested Butte. A halt was made at this place and here was found the end of the rainbow with its pot of gold. Going one day to the brook for water, Mr. Gilkison noticed the surface of a rock from which the soil had been removed by the boots of others who had used the same path. He examined the rock, removed a large fragment, and found it rich. This developed into a property his interests in which was sold for a sum of money which com- pensated him for the weary years of searching. He moved in 1880 to Larimer county and engaged for some years in farming and finally embarked in mercantile business in which he is still engaged. His father, James T. Gilkison, enlisted in the 104th Ohio Volunteers and was killed in battle.
FRANK E. MILLER .- Born December 8th, 1873, in Des Moines, Iowa, and received his education in Fort Collins, Colorado; came from Iowa with his parents to Colorado in 1874, locating first at Black Hawk, moving in March, 1883, to Fort Col- lins which has since been his home. Mr. Miller was united in marriage with Anna M. Dievendorf, of Boulder, Colorado, on November 23rd, 1897. They have no children. From 1901 to 1905, Mr. Miller served as deputy county treasurer under
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HISTORY OF LARIMER
COUNTY, COLORADO
Clark Smith, and was a popular and very efficient assistant in that office. Soon after retiring from public office he purchased what was known as the Killgore book store, which he has since conducted with a satisfactory degree of success. Mr. and Mrs. Miller have a charming home on S. Meldrum street and are hospitable and genial entertainers.
WILLIAM C. STOVER was born July 11th, 1841, in Bottetourt county, Virginia, his father, Jacob Stover, belonging to one of the first families of the Old Dominion. In 1850, when nine years of age, he emigrated with his father's family to South Bend, Indiana, where he attended school and re- ceived his education. Early in the spring of 1860 the subject of this sketch, then in his ninteenth year, left South Bend for the West. He crossed the Plains with an ox team in company with a long wagon train and arrived at Boulder, May 10th, 1860. From Boulder he came to the Big Thomp- son valley and located on a hay ranch. Here he celebrated his nineteenth birthday. He spent a portion of the years 1861 and 1862 in the Sweet Water country in Wyoming, returning to his ranch in the Big Thompson valley in the fall of 1862. Following the wake of the rush of gold hunters then pushing on to the new discoveries in Mon- tana, which were at the height of their excitement, he spent a portion of the years 1863-4-5-6 in that territory, during which he made a visit to his for- mer home in South Bend, Indiana. Here he and his brother, George, fitted up a train of ox teams and both came west to Virginia City, Montana, bringing with them a large quantity of groceries and provisions which they disposed of to the miners at a good profit. He returned to his home on the Big Thompson in the summer of 1867, and, in company with the late A. K. Yount, engaged in the mercantile business at old St. Louis, about one mile east of the present city of Loveland. In Janu- ary, 1870, having disposed of his interests and busi- ness in the Big Thompson valley, he moved to Fort Collins, and, in company with the late John C. Matthews, established a grocery and supply store in the old Grout building, where the firm remained until 1874, when the stock and business was re- moved to a new brick building which the firm erected on the corner of Jefferson and Linden streets. Shortly after moving into the new build- ing, Mr. Matthews retired from the firm and Mr. Stover became sole proprietor of the stock and build- ing. He continued to carry on the business alone until 1882, when he sold an interest to the late
A. B. Tomlin and the firm became A. B. Tomlin & Co. On the 11th of November, 1878, Mr. Stover and Mr. Charles H. Sheldon, the present cashier of the Poudre Valley National bank, opened and established the Poudre Valley bank in the Wil- son block on Jefferson street, moving a few weeks later to a new brick building erected for them on Linden street. The bank was moved on the com- pletion of the Loomis block in 1883, to its pres- ent location. Mr. Stover remained president of the bank until January, 1893, when, owing to ill health, he declined re-election, continuing, how- ever, on the board of directors and as vice-presi- dent until he died. In 1882, in company with Andrew McGinley, Mr. Stover engaged in the stock business near Fort Robinson in Western Neb- raska, where the firm of Stover & McGinley ran a large herd of cattle for many years, finally dis- posing of their holdings and winding up the firm's affairs in 1905. In 1892, Mr. Stover, Frank Chaffee and R. M. Ferguson organized the Collins Cash Clothing company, with Mr. Stover as president, a position he held at the time of his death. He had also been president of the Stover Investment company for several years. Up to 1893, when he declined a re-election to the presidency of the Poudre Valley bank, he had been an active business man, foremost in many enterprises de- signed to build up Fort Collins and advance his pri- vate interests, and had accumulated quite a large fortune. Since then, though continuing to retain an interest in a number of business enterprises, he sur- rendered the active management of them to younger men, exercising only a supervisory control. Mr. Stover was one of the early members of the First Methodist Episcopal church of Fort Collins and contributed liberally of his means to its upbuilding and maintenance. Many other Methodist churches have been established in Colorado through his gen- erous financial assistance. His benevolences were many and widely distributed, but always performed in a modest, quiet way, as he disliked publicity in such matters.
HIS PUBLIC SERVICES
Mr. Stover always took an active interest in pub- lic affairs and, during the earlier years of his man- hood, served his state, his county and his city in many places of trust and responsibility with marked ability and fidelity. He was elected a member of the Territorial council in 1873, serving one term. In 1875 he was chosen to represent Larimer county as a delegate to the constitutional convention, which framed the organic law of the state. This
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convention met in Denver on the 20th day of De- cember, 1875, and concluded its labors on the 14th day of March, 1876. In that convention Mr. Stover was a member of the following important standing committees: Legislation and legislature ; counties ; mines and mining and forest culture, and was also a member of several special committees. It was due to his efforts in the constitutional con- vention that the clause locating the Colorado Agri- cultural college in Fort Collins was adopted. In September, after Colorado had been admitted into the Union as a state, Mr. Stover was nominated for state senator by the democratic party, but was defeated at the election held the following October, by Norman H. Meldrum, the latter receiving four majority. At the democratic state convention held in Leadville in September, 1880, Mr. Stover was nominated for lieutenant governor, but went down to defeat with his ticket, although running many votes ahead of it in his home county. In the spring of 1883 he was elected a member of the city council, serving one term with distinguished ability. These honors came to him unsought and some of them against his protest, as he was never in any sense .a seeker after office. Mr. Stover was three times mar- ried. His first wife, Jane M. White, whom he mar- ried February 16th, 1869, and who was the mother of his three children, died February 27th, 1879. His second wife was Sarah A. White, a relative of his first wife, of Mercer, Pennsylvania. The three children, one of them an infant, were placed in her charge after their mother's death, and she reared them with all the care and lavished upon them the affection of an own mother. Mr. Stover married her in 1882. She died in November, 1904. He married his third wife, Emily Putnam, in Iowa, in the summer of 1907, and she and his children, Dr. George H. Stover of Denver, Mrs. Emma Put- nam of Los Angeles, California, and Judge F. W. Stover, of Fort Collins, survive him. He also leaves two brothers, George H. Stover of South Bend, In- diana, and Frank P. Stover of Fort Collins. Mr. Stover died at the home of his son, Dr. George H. Stover, in Denver, at 1:30 a. m., on October 8th, his wife and children being at his bedside.
EUGENE F. KERR was born on a farm in 1850 near Iowa City, Iowa, where he received his edu- cation. He came to Colorado in 1873, locating first at Longmont, then coming to Larimer county the same year. He engaged in wool growing which he followed a few years and then took up farming which is still his occupation. In 1882 he married
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