Legends, Labors & Loves William Jackson Palmer, 1836—1909

“His imagination created an empire with its cities, its homes, its factories, its educational foundations, where others ...

Author: Tim Blevins | Dennis Daily | Chris Nicholl | Calvin P Otto and Katherine Scott Sturdevant (editors)

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“His imagination created an empire with its cities, its homes, its factories, its educational foundations, where others saw only an arid plain stretching up to barren mountains. With prophetic insight he acted where others hesitated. By what he did we can know his character and those intellectual qualities which ranked him among America’s foremost men.” William F. Slocum, March 18, 1909

Regional History Series

ISBN 978-1-56735-261-0

90000 >

Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum

LLLbookCover23Feb2009.indd 1

Legends, Labors & Loves of W.J. Palmer

“The life of General William J. Palmer has been one of the most potent factors of the four decades in the upbuilding of the city of Colorado Springs, the state of Colorado, and the entire west.… Of his remarkable genius, of his charity and philanthropy, of his many benefactions to city and state, of the courage that [he] achieved on the battleﬁeld, and in the struggles of the pioneer west, of his splendid character, of his manhood and his broad humanity . . . there is due to him an everlasting debt of gratitude from the community which owes its very existence and its present-day prosperity to him, and to him almost exclusively.” Irving Howbert, March 18, 1909

Legends, Labors & Loves

of

William Jackson Palmer


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2/23/2009 8:44:29 AM

Legends, Labors & Loves William Jackson Palmer 1836—1909

Pikes Peak Regional History Symposium Sponsored by Special Collections, Pikes Peak Library District Friends of the Pikes Peak Library District Pikes Peak Library District Foundation In Partnership With Bessemer Historical Society CF&I Museum of Industry & Culture Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum Evergreen Cemetery Glen Eyrie Conference Center Pikes Peak Community College Western Museum of Mining & Industry McAllister House Museum

Project Director Chris Nicholl

Pikes Peak Regional History Symposium Committee Chris Nicholl, Co-Chair Calvin P. Otto, Co-Chair Steve Antonuccio Tim Blevins David Carroll Beverly Diehl Dolores Fowler Barbara Gately Lynn A. Gilfillan-Morton Carol Kennis Kathy Sturdevant Jay Trask Dee Vazquez

Legends, Labors & Loves William Jackson Palmer 1836—1909

Edited by Tim Blevins, Dennis Daily, Chris Nicholl, Calvin P. Otto & Katherine Scott Sturdevant Published by

with the

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Legends, Labors & Loves: William Jackson Palmer, 1836—1909 © 2009 Pikes Peak Library District. All rights reserved. First edition. Printed �� in the United �� States. “The Denver & Rio Grande Railroad: An Address Given to the Employees, January 28, 1920,” by William A. Bell, previously appeared as a monograph titled, Address by Dr. William A. Bell at a Dinner Given to the Employees of the Denver & Rio Grande Railroad at the Union Station, privately published, 1920, [Denver, Colo.]. “Westward March Of Emigration In The United States, Considered In Its Bearing Upon The Near Future Colorado And New Mexico,” by William Jackson Palmer, previously appeared as a monograph of the same title, published by Inquirer Print. and Pub. Co., 1874, in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. “�� General William J. Palmer, Anti-Imperialist, 1895-1905,” by George L. Anderson, previously appeared in Colorado Magazine, Vol. 22, No. 1, published by the Colorado Historical Society, http://coloradohistory.org. “General William J. Palmer and the Early Denver & Rio Grande Railway: An Annotated Select Bibliography,” by Victor J. Stone, previously appeared in The Prospector, Vol. 2, No. 3, published by the Rio Grande Modeling & Historical Society, http://drgw.org. “Tributes to the Late William J. Palmer From His Fellow Citizens In Colorado Springs,” edited by Mary G. Slocum, previously appeared in General Series No. 44, Social Science Series, Vol. 2, No. 2, published by Colorado College, http://coloradocollege.edu. This publication was made possible by private funds. Publisher’s Cataloging-in-Publication Data Legends, labors and loves: William Jackson Palmer, 1836—1909 / edited by Tim Blevins, Dennis Daily, Chris Nicholl, Calvin P. Otto and Katherine Scott Sturdevant.— 1st ed. p. cm. (Regional history series) Includes bibliographical references and index. LCCN 2009922142 ISBN 978-1-56735-261-0 1. Palmer, William Jackson, 1836-1909. 2. Railroads--United States-Employees--Biography. 3. Colorado Springs (Colo.)--History. 4. Denver and Rio Grande Western Railroad Company. 5. United States--History-Civil War, 1861-1865--Personal narratives. 6. Glen Eyrie (Colo.) I. Blevins, Tim II. Daily, Dennis III. Nicholl, Chris IV. Series. CT275 .P35 L4 2009 978.856‘03’092—dc22

About Pikes Peak Library District Pikes Peak Library District (PPLD) is a nationally recognized system of public libraries serving a population of more than 530,000 in El Paso County, Colorado. With twelve facilities, online resources, and mobile library service, PPLD responds to the unique needs of individual neighborhoods and the community at large. PPLD has an employee base of 425 full and part-time staff, and utilizes roughly 1,400 volunteers. It strives to reach all members of the community, providing free and equitable access to information and an avenue for personal and community enrichment. PPLD is rated ninth in the country among library systems serving populations greater than 500,000. Volume of circulations, number of visits, and hours of access contribute to the ranking. PPLD is also recognized for its commitment to diversity, its quality programming, and its excellent customer service.

Board of Trustees 2009

Robert Hilbert, President John Wilson, Vice President Calvin P. Otto, Secretary/Treasurer Jill Gaebler Kathleen Owings Katherine Spicer Lynne Telford

Executive Director Paula J. Miller

Regional History Series Currently In Print The Colorado Labor Wars: Cripple Creek 1903–1904 “To Spare No Pains”: Zebulon Montgomery Pike & His 1806–1807 Southwest Expedition Doctor at Timberline: True Tales, Travails, & Triumphs of a Pioneer Colorado Physician Forthcoming Extraordinary Women of the Rocky Mountain West

Regional History Series Editorial Committee Tim Blevins Dennis Daily Chris Nicholl Calvin P. Otto

Principal Series Consultant Calvin P. Otto

Acknowledgments

The Editorial Committee extends its grateful appreciation to the Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum and to Colorado College for participating in this publication and for providing photographs and text to complete this book. Our thanks go to Museum Director Matt Mayberry and the knowledgeable, and always helpful Museum staff, and to Colorado College Special Collections Librarian Jessy Randall for her obliging and enthusiastic assistance. Thank you to Victor J. Stone, who not only provided an excellent annotated bibliography, but also kindly shared many unique images from his collection. We have a special thank you for Kathy Sturdevant, who coedited this book and generously offered her time and her matchless writing and history expertise. As ever before, we extend limitless gratitude to the entire staff of Pikes Peak Library District Special Collections, and to the many others at PPLD who assist with these publications and the annual Pikes Peak Regional History Symposium. We wish to acknowledge the wonderful assistance provided by previous PPLD employees Steve Antonuccio, Rosemary Davis and Nancy Thaler. We also thank the Colorado Historical Society and the Rio Grande Modeling & Historical Society for allowing us to include articles previously printed in their publications. We are all also grateful to Rhoda Davis Wilcox, author of The Man on the Iron Horse. Her noteworthy book, commemorating Palmer’s legacy, was published fifty years ago and is still in print today. And finally, we recognize the writers of the chapters of this book. Their passion for research and willingness to contribute their efforts to Legends, Labors & Loves is a wonderful tribute to the memory of William Jackson Palmer.

The Editorial Committee

For purchasing information, contact: Clausen Books 2131 North Weber Street Colorado Springs, Colorado 80907 tel: (719) 471-5884, toll free: (888)-412-7717 http://www.clausenbooks.com

CONTENTS Katherine Scott Sturdevant� �� • �5 Introduction: Our Father Who Art in the Intersection, Or, Where Does William Jackson Palmer Belong? Joyce B. Lohse • 13 Young Palmer Travels Abroad Leah Davis Witherow • 27 A Question of Conscience: William Jackson Palmer & His Quaker Faith Mark L. Gardner • 43 One of the Most Gallant Men of the Army: William Jackson Palmer & the Medal of Honor Barbara Gately� �� • �� 55 An Abiding Bond: The Friendship Between Major Henry McAllister & General William Jackson Palmer Chris Nicholl� • �� 69 �� “My Darling Queenie . . .”A Love Story Delores Gustafson • 83 General William Jackson Palmer & the Mellen & Clarke Families William A. Bell •99 The Denver & Rio Grande Railroad: An Address Given to the Employees, January 28, 1920 E. M. “Mel” McFarland • 113 Connections West: William Jackson Palmer & His Railroad Routing Rivalries William Jackson Palmer • 137 The Westward March of Emigration in the United States, Considered in its Bearing Upon the Near Future of Colorado & New Mexico

Matt Mayberry • 185 General William Jackson Palmer & His Vision for Colorado Springs William Jackson Palmer� �� • �� 196 Letter to the Citizens of Colorado Springs of the Twenty First Century Judith Rice-Jones • 199 William Jackson Palmer: Park Builder Donald McGilchrist • 213 The Gardens of Glen Eyrie George L. Anderson • 249 General William J. Palmer, Anti-Imperialist, 1895-1905 Chris Nicholl • 273 William Jackson Palmer: Living While Dying Lynn A. Gilfillan-Morton • 291 General William Jackson Palmer’s Riding Accident, Palliative Care & Death, 1906 to 1909 Mary G. Slocum • 321 Tributes to the Late William J. Palmer From His Fellow Citizens In Colorado Springs William Jackson Palmer� �� • �� 344 Last Will & Testament Stephen Collins & Katherine Scott Sturdevant • 349 “Can You Not Give Up Some?”: A Puppet Presentation Victor J. Stone • 369 General William J. Palmer & the Early Denver & Rio Grande Railway: A Selected Annotated Bibliography Index • 385

FOREWORD Everyone in Colorado Springs knows General William Jackson Palmer—ask any child and they’ll tell you “he’s the man on the horse!” Ask an adult and they may add that city streets, a park and a school are named after him. But who was he? Perhaps more knowledgeable citizens would tell you, “General Palmer was the founder of Colorado Springs,” or “He was the president of the Denver and Rio Grande Railroad,” and others would declare, “He was a decorated Union soldier.” “Who was he?,” or “who was she,” is frequently answered by recounting the individual’s accomplishments in life. Some people have long résumés listing their incredible successes. Others are well known for their failures. There are some residents of the Pikes Peak Region who know William Jackson Palmer as a husband to Queen Mellen Palmer; a father to Elsie, Dorothy and Marjory; and a friend to everyone in the community. Still others would tell you that he was an environmentalist, a pacifist, and an entrepreneur. The second annual Pikes Peak Regional History Symposium, William Jackson Palmer, 1836-1909: Legends, Labors & Loves, endeavored to answer the question, “Who was William Jackson Palmer?” The day-long symposium on June 4, 2005, compared the man of myth with his life’s undertakings, as well as with what is known about his personal relationships. More complex questions come about when reconciling Palmer as a Union army soldier and spy with his Quaker upbringing; reconciling the massive manpower required to build Palmer’s western railroad and mining empires with his reputation as man of benevolence; and reconciling Palmer’s love for Colorado Springs with his intercontinental romance with his wife Mary Lincoln Mellen “Queen” Palmer. This “Palmer Paradox” intrigued Chris Nicholl, historian in Special Collections at Pikes Peak Library District, who cochairs the Symposium Planning Committee with Calvin P. Otto. Chris and Cal assembled many research talents of the region to attempt to reveal this man of Glen Eyrie. This book, Legends, Labors & Loves: William Jackson Palmer, 1836-1909, contains the keys to the many doors in Palmer’s own castle—

his personal life. However, there still are rooms, private and concealed, which no one can ever enter. This “unauthorized biography” of a truly remarkable and modest man will open every reader’s eyes to a new view of William Jackson Palmer. There is no scandal, nor is there deception. However, in these pages you will not only find integrity, leadership, and compassion, but you will also witness Palmer’s tenacious conviction, strength, and shrewdness—just how one imagines a true “founding father.” Paula J. Miller, Executive Director, PPLD Tim Blevins, Manager, Special Collections, PPLD

Half title page: William Jackson Palmer’s signature and image of his personal wax seal. Courtesy Calvin P. Otto. Cover: Portraits of Mary Lincoln “Queen” Mellen Palmer and William Jackson Palmer. The background is from the wood engraving, “On Line of D. & R. G. Railway. Marshall Pass,” by Paul Frenzeny, that appears in Marvels of the New West: A Vivid Portrayal of the Stupendous Marvels in the Vast Wonderland West of the Missouri River (The Minerva Group, Inc., 1887) by William M. Thayer. From Special Collections, Pikes Peak Library District.

Facing page: William Jackson Palmer. From Special Collections, Pikes Peak Library District.

The memorial statue of General William Jackson Palmer on a horse was unveiled on September 2, 1929, in the intersection of Nevada and Platte avenues. Dr. William F. Slocum, president emeritus of Colorado College, gave the principal dedication address and the statue was presented to the city by Edmond C. van Diest. The bronze monument was commissioned at a cost of $32,000, with money raised through subscription by the General William Jackson Palmer Memorial Association, and was created by Nathan Potter and his associate Chester French. The bronze was cast at the foundry of the Gorham Manufacturing Company, one of the country’s leading makers of silver ware and bronze statuary. The name of Palmer’s horse in the statue is an often-asked question. A tale has evolved suggesting that the horse is Diablo, Palmer’s “favorite horse,” however news articles printed at the time of the statue’s creation and unveiling simply refer to it as an “equestrian statue.” The name Diablo appears in a May 17, 1964, Colorado Springs Free Press article, “Diablo and the General here to stay,” regarding the proposed moving of the statue. Photograph by Stewarts Commercial Photographers, © Special Collections, Pikes Peak Library District.

Introduction Our Father Who Art in the Intersection, Or, Where Does William Jackson Palmer Belong? Katherine Scott Sturdevant When men and women become history, if the historians don’t take great care, the men and women suffer from oversimplification, from over- or undervaluation, from misinterpretation, and from their neighbors’ old first impressions that no one ever bothered to correct. Historians need to work on that for William Jackson Palmer and Queen Palmer. We are here today, about one hundred thirty-five years later, to work on that. Perhaps it helped my views of the Palmers to be a nonnative of Colorado Springs. Although Colorado is part of my family history, I first moved here in 1985. I remember many of my first impressions of Colorado Springs. My mother in San Francisco said, “You’ll love Colorado Springs. It’s such a pretty little town.” She had last visited it when she was 5 years old, in 1922. My husband had dreamt of living in the pleasant, quiet, small city. He had last lived here in 1970, stationed at Fort Carson. Needless to say, one of my first impressions was that Colorado Springs must have hit a few growth spurts. As I investigated the local historical community—colleges, museums, libraries, and sites—I gained another set of first impressions. This town seemed “gone on” its founder, General William Jackson Palmer. Even as a Western historian, I had never heard of the man. (Many historians have never heard of him.) Yet his name and likeness seemed to confront me, literally at every turn, the city of Colorado Springs paying homage to one man for its very existence. There were popular books lauding him but no recent, scholarly works to guide me. I remember • •

• INTRODUCTION

thinking this was an excellent example of historical inflation; by definition, one man alone cannot found a community, can he? There is a lovely breed of volunteers, donors, and docents— “The Friends of . . . ” (you fill in your favorite institution). We all know them. To know them is to love them. Some of us are them. In the 1980s, some of them gave me another memorable first impression. They all admired Palmer, but they did not like his wife. I could see it on their faces and hear it in their tones. “What was wrong with her?” I wondered. They portrayed her as pretty, so were they just jealous? Or could no woman be good enough for our founder? She was a spoiled little rich girl, they told me. She did not think Colorado Springs was good enough for her. He even built her a castle of her own and she would not live in it, they said. My colleagues and students will tell you that, as a historian, I like to find my own twist on a topic. The ones who know me best might even tell you I am twisted. A twisted historian can get away with having great fun, especially if she looks and sounds innocent, chooses her words carefully, and smiles sweetly. Now I knew the man, Palmer, could not be all good and the woman, Queen, could not be all bad. So, first, as a college and Elderhostel teacher and tour guide, I had to take on the excessive reverence for the man. I told my museum tour groups that they must genuflect before his larger-than-life portrait—and the museum director said he had a pillow just for that. On bus tours I announced into the microphone, “And now the driver will block traffic by parking next to this statue so you can all get out and salute the General.” I christened General Palmer, “Our Father Who Art in the Intersection, Hallowed be Thy Name,” with a curtsy, to group after group. Everyone trusted the research and teaching I was doing, so humor or lighter ways of interpreting history were acceptable because we were on solid historical ground. Everyone laughed. No one was offended, least of all the General who, after all, along with his iron stallion, had suffered many indignities over the years. My irreverence made inroads on the community. I caught docents, “Friends of,” students, and other teachers calling him

STURDEVANT •

“Our Father Who Art in the Intersection.” Ah, the subversive power of teaching! But time and growth can also subvert. Eventually, the new people of Colorado Springs lost their reverence, along with their historical memory, and complained, plotted, and came close to, horror of historical horrors, moving General Palmer’s statue! I found myself in many conversations, defending the statue’s status quo because the desire to move him seemed to come, at least sometimes, from historical ignorance. In urban-renewed downtown Colorado Springs, the statue had somehow hung on. Where does he belong? Our arguments about whether and where to move General Palmer’s statue serve as an allegory for a more significant historical question. Where does the historical subject of William Jackson Palmer belong, and why aren’t historians addressing that question? One of my fellow academic historians told me: “I thought of proposing a historiographical paper for the Pikes Peak Regional History Symposium on Palmer until I realized there is almost no historiography on him!” On that score, Palmer didn’t help much. He wrote no autobiography and discouraged his friends from writing biography about him. After his death, the family cooperated with John Fisher, who published A Builder of the West in 1939, and with local schoolteacher Rhoda Wilcox, who published The Man on the Iron Horse for young people in 1959. Western historian Robert Athearn wrote the history of Palmer’s railroad, Rebel of the Rockies, but even that goes back to 1962. One rare, recent scholarly treatment I’ve seen of a chunk of Palmer was Edwin Fishel’s The Secret War for the Union, in 1998, which focuses well on Palmer’s dangerous spy adventures, and I am often surprised how few local folks know of Palmer’s role in this activity or this book. Then there was Marshall Sprague. Modern-day boosters of Colorado Springs still point happily to his Newport in the Rockies (1961). It is something, after all, to have an accessible, entertaining, paperback, in-print, single-volume history of one’s community to market and recommend. Some city leaders recently initiated a project to gather and record Colorado Springs history from the last forty years and they called this

• INTRODUCTION

a plan to “update Marshall Sprague.” He stands there, then, as the authority, for many people. Any academic historians who take on local or Colorado history must acknowledge that biographers, doctors, journalists, secretaries, and school teachers were writing it when the academic historians were not yet paying attention. So as an incoming local historian, I learned to honor the outgoing ones. Each of them becomes a “colorful character” in the story of Colorado Springs. I remember Helen Jackson (the grandniece of Helen Hunt Jackson) riding her bicycle. And speaking of colorful characters, I will never forget one of my first speaking engagements at the Pioneers Museum. The “Friends of” invited me without publicity so we had that nightmare: what would you do if you held a lecture and nobody came? The Friends were graciously apologetic but we canceled on the spot. As I awkwardly wandered away through the building, I heard the strains of ghostly music from another era. It was elderly local author Gladys Bueler, who, seeing no reason to hang her head, sat at the museum piano and played songs the Palmers probably loved. “Beautiful Dreamer” echoed through the old courthouse as I crept out. How would scholarly historians “do Palmer” differently? First, we would do as many of us have done, and delve into the primary documents. There are rich collections that, having tasted them, are beckoning me to return. Second, the scholarly historian would bring a broader context. Local, state, and regional history, and the lives of the individuals who populate that history, all operated within national trends and patterns. That relationship should always form a backdrop for telling the local story, or the local story is inaccurate and narrow. To reach the largest audience, and to flow into the mainstream of historical research so that others might use it, local history needs national history. Third, it also needs the conceptual framework and scope that comes with applying thematic approaches to history. How will Palmer look through the lenses of modern social, military, economic, business, labor, medical, community, and even women’s history? When I questioned the “Our-Father-Who-Art-in-theIntersection” syndrome—the blind, admiring faith that one man

STURDEVANT •

could single-handedly found a community—I knew it takes a village to be a village. But when I studied Palmer, I realized he was a better example than I had ever seen of a man who carried out his dreams, and the communities he later founded were, initially, his sole idea. Those dreams and practices made Palmer a “man of his times” and as good an example of a Gilded Age industrialist as Vanderbilt, Carnegie, Rockefeller, Gould or Pullman. He was the visionary railroad tycoon and real estate developer, plotting his own tracks, town sites, fuel sources, and factories; the self-avowed capitalist using vertical integration; the non-attending Quaker, directing his reform spirit into secular actions; the paternalistic social engineer creating company towns and assuming his workers would be happy; the town booster luring tourists and healthseekers with extravagant rhetoric and dubious promises; the enthusiastic sponsor of institutions, such as Colorado College, enhancing his town’s ambiance; the railroad king defending his turf with hired guns; the moralist dictating temperance habits; the Anglophile imitating British style; and the philanthropist leaving long legacies. Our Pikes Peak Regional History Symposium, and this book, are two ways to chip away at the question of where Palmer belongs. We will learn from Mark Gardner how Palmer’s remarkable military career placed him among the Civil War heroes of Union. Lynn Gilfillan-Morton will help us realize that his wealth and taste for innovation led him to be even a “pioneer patient” as a quadriplegic. Matt Mayberry and Judith Rice-Jones will analyze how he modeled towns and parks after successes in Europe and the East. Barbara Gately and Mel McFarland will trace his camaraderie and conflicts through business partners. Delores Gustafson will reveal his paternalism through adopting his wife’s extended family. By means of the puppetry of Stephen Collins and company, we will sensitize ourselves to the private lives of a man and a woman, finding that, yes, the story of William Jackson Palmer even has a place in women’s history. And we will find romance, humor, and poignancy in Palmer’s story, because they can come to light naturally, when we return to the primary documents, and take only those liberties that we can all recognize as such.

10 • INTRODUCTION

Palmer in women’s history? Queen, that supposedly selfish bride, was one of my first local recovery efforts. Others of us, such as Celeste Black in her book Queen of Glen Eyrie, have taken up this cause as well. Just study women in the West, which had become a popular topic for 1980s historians. There was nothing remarkable about a woman going west just because her husband wanted to; about her being afraid of frontier dangers and reluctant to leave family and civilization behind; about her choosing to go back east if she had the means; about her realistically dreading ill health, childbirth, and early death; or about her pitching in and building community, church, school, and culture to make the best of her new home. Women’s history thus helps explain Queen in context, and her husband. Recently acquired documents also help make plain that Queen truly was ill and had medical advice to stay in England. Speaking of women’s roles, I have a concluding story about where William Jackson Palmer belongs. One day at a history event I sat next to another teacher. She was an older lady whose name was familiar as the author of one of the reverent Palmer biographies. I was startled to find myself next to that name. This lady wanted to save General Palmer from being forgotten, and save his statue from being removed. She was becoming frail. As we spoke about local history, she speculated on who would carry her torch. On this occasion, though, when I agreed with her, that the statue should stay put, she turned to me and spoke earnestly: “Someone needs to protect the General when they want to move him or tear him down. Will you do what I always thought I might do? When I’m gone, if they ever go to move it, will you chain yourself to the statue?” What did I say? What could I say? What would you say? Well, let’s just say I have strong motives for keeping away the bulldozers. And the best way to do that, is to rediscover and reinterpret William Jackson Palmer, to escort him into the greater historical limelight that he deserves. Now, let’s set to work on “Our Father Who Art in the Intersection.”

STURDEVANT • 11

Katherine Scott Sturdevant is Professor of History at Pikes Peak Community College. Her teaching specializations include Western, women’s, environmental, ethnic, Colorado, and Pikes Peak regional history. She is a well-known local and national speaker, an expert oral history interviewer, the author of two books on the scholarly approach to family history, and has won local, state, and national awards for teaching excellence.

Helen Jackson, grandniece of Helen Hunt Jackson, riding her bicycle south on Nevada Avenue in-front of the statue of William Jackson Palmer. April 1965. Photograph by Myron Wood, © Special Collections, Pikes Peak Library District.

Daguerreotype of William Jackson Palmer, about 13 years old, with his parents, John and Matilda Jackson Palmer, Philadelphia., ca. 1849, photographer unknown. Item 106 from the William J. Palmer Family Photograph Collection, PP88-42, Special Collections, Tutt Library, Colorado College, Colorado Springs, Colorado.

Young Palmer Travels Abroad Joyce B. Lohse Ship life is . . . remembered as a little period of fun and danger and novelty to be recalled in the future as an experience of things which are happening every day yet unknown to those who stay at home.1 William Jackson Palmer, 1855 In 1855, William Jackson Palmer, a teenager not yet 19 years old, undertook a journey across the ocean to Europe. He had finished his basic schooling in Philadelphia and joined the engineering corps of the Hempfield Railroad, to do fieldwork in the mountains of western Pennsylvania. As an apprentice, his research would take him to Great Britain to survey and study mining methods there, which amplified his education and launched him headlong into adulthood and a lifelong career in railroading and engineering. This proved to be a pivotal period in Palmer’s development. Paradoxically, the shy and reticent Palmer proved loquacious as a correspondent during his travels. In order to defray costs, or at least a portion of them, he sold accounts of his adventures to the Miner’s Journal in Pottsfield, Pennsylvania, for $4 per article.2 Lengthy essays sent to his family and friends can be attributed to his mission as a journalist, his literary interests, and his penchant to document every detail of his findings and observations in writing. Palmer was raised by parents who embraced the beliefs of the Hicksite Quaker religion, and the family was conservative, close-knit, and regimented. Born in 1836 on Kinsale Farm in Delaware, near the town of Leipsic in Kent County, William was 5 years old when his family moved to Germantown in Philadelphia. He attended Friends School and Zane Street School with his siblings, then Boys’ High School.3 Advanced higher education was not in his future. • 13 •

14 • YOUNG PALMER TRAVELS ABROAD

During his travels in Great Britain, Palmer wrote multiplepage letters, packed edge to edge with carefully penned small script. Addressed “Dear Parents,” his letters home arrived at weekly intervals, often beginning with “thee” and “thy” in the Quaker tradition. His natural curiosity about the world around him provided ample material to share with his family.4 Palmer’s observations provided a glimpse into life at the time as he perceived it and into his own character as he revealed it. Although his candidness emerged in many instances, it was often overshadowed by a healthy dose of youthful arrogance. His views fluctuated from pretentious, with contrived wording and occasional French flourishes, to a sense of wonder with a tinge of shyness seeping through to the surface, preventing his tone from becoming excessively superior. Overcoming hesitations as he approached the strange ship that would take him abroad, Palmer quickly developed an adventurous attitude and love of travel that would endure throughout his life. In a letter from Neath, South Wales, on October 28, 1855, he wrote of his voyage, I shouldered my traps one rainy June morning and marched down to the Tuscarora, half afraid she was gone, half afraid of going in her. . . . The three weeks of ship life spent between Delaware Bay and the Mersey [a river near Liverpool, England] are only remembered as a little period of fun and danger and novelty to be recalled in the future as an experience of things which are happening every day yet unknown to those who stay at home.5 Young Palmer wasted no time adopting a gregarious attitude aboard the Tuscarora, a less-than-luxurious vessel that offered passage across the Atlantic Ocean at a cost of $48.6 He realized the advantages of this. “It behooves passengers to lay aside all snobbishness and ‘gregularity’ and combine to make the tedious hours prove less tedious and the long long days of sailing, days of pleasure and not of ennui.”7

LOHSE • 15

The purpose of Palmer’s travels was twofold. Primarily, he was seeking the practical experience of a railroad apprenticeship in the areas of transportation and mining engineering. His uncle, Frank H. Jackson of the Westmoreland Coal Company, had suggested the trip.8 Palmer’s fact-finding mission helped him meet and develop important contacts and gather information, which would help him formulate foundations and theories applied later when building railroads, a lofty undertaking for a young man traveling abroad on his own. Beyond that, the trip provided the opportunity for Palmer to test his mettle and to explore his boundaries as he came of age. Although his strong family ties provided a safety net, he built and developed his own support system and attributes of strong character during his travels. In a few short years, while serving the Union army in the Civil War, his newly bolstered confidence would come in handy.9 His experience also carried with it the weighty responsibility to help support his family once he returned home. In addition to lengthy accounts in his letters, Palmer documented visits, observations, and encounters, good and bad, in the pages of bound journals. These contained detailed engineering notes with sketches of furnaces and bridges, and data tables. He indulged his literary passion as it pertained to mining in the front page of his 1855 journal with a poem transcribed for inspiration. Now stir the fire and close the shutters fast Let fall the curtains, wheel the sofa round And while the low hissing urn Throws up a steam column and the cups That cheer but not inebriate, exist in each To let us welcome peaceful evenings in Cowper Beautiful! [Palmer exclaims] Hurrah for those below Who digging they the ground Hurra for thinking minds above Who such a help have found Hurra man—Engine, come


Ye miners sing with me Lift your voices like a triumph “Eternal strength to thee”—by a Cornish miner [Palmer wrote:] Good & not exaggerated10 Palmer’s journals were bursting with details and data regarding transportation, mining, and the processes of daily life in England. A trip to the bank resulted in notes about the number of guards and the salary scale in British pounds of bank employees. Perhaps, even at his tender age, he was visualizing towns and services, with their attendant needs and problems, to be constructed along future railroad routes. When he rode the train, Palmer noted the number of wheels and drivers, the gauge of the road, the weight of the rails, the distance between sleeper cars, and the depth of the furnace. He studied the use of smokeless fuel, comparing anthracite to steam coal from South Wales. In a sample typical of his notes, he wrote, Fires in London—more than 100 a month on average. Mortality in London 1000 a week. In cold weather 1600. Visited Meux Brewery, Oxford Street, Dec 28—Food cook patent applied to furnace perfectly satisfactory saving of ¼ coal per week. Cast iron bridges intact—still good as new. No smoke whatever.11 Palmer visited a chemical production company to augment his background. He wrote, The chief first looked astonished at my impudence in daring to enter the premises sacred to alum & sulpheric acid & then cordially went round with me himself through the furnaces. These were long boilers somewhat on the Cornish principle with fire in the mobil flu.12 Notes continue regarding the particulars of fuel attributes, consumption, and ventilation, knowledge he would later apply to his railroads and planning for new settlements.

LOHSE • 17

With his future in mind, Palmer stated in a letter from Paris to his parents, I am to be a mining not a civil engineer. When I return if I was to become an authority on ventilation, I might hang out a shingle somewhere up in the wilderness of Saint Anthony [Pennsylvania] with the following edifying information for foreign & indigenous population viz. Coal Mines ventilated—at so much per breath per person per annum. Wm. J. Palmer (lately of Europe) N.B. refreshments for travelers.”13 [N.B. is the Latin imperative, Nota Bene, meaning to take notice or pay special attention to this.] In those instances when letters of introduction were lacking, Palmer took the situation in stride. He wrote the following in his journal about a failed attempt to visit a soap maker in England. Peyton & Roberts Soap, Wapping, Jan/55 Called & stated that I was an American & requested permission to inspect smoke consumer. Parkers—[type of equipment] “Have you got an introduction.” No. “We shall expect to have an introduce before we can open our door to strangers. Else you let everyone come.” “Ah—good morning.”14 Palmer went on to describe his next visit, putting the rejection quickly behind him. When Palmer entertained his family with lengthy essays, he often shared his evolving delight in British customs. Letters of introduction assisted with some of his lodging needs and led him to the household of Mr. Morgan in Wales. The family consisting of his wife and her servant, Mr. Morgan and a temporary resident in the shape of a nephew about to enter in the army, with myself, rose about 8 in the morning. Cold meat, toast, eggs, tea


and bread and butter were brought in by the servant about half past eight or nine, and Everyone sat down as he dropped in, without the slightest ceremony or fuss whatever, as each one entered the pleasant “salle a manger” warmed by a cheerful grate burning stone coal, the rest arose and shook hands with him bidding him Good Morning. This was a decidedly pleasant and cheerful social custom and ought to be introduced on the other side [of] the water, where we half the time carelessly interchange a “good morning” and as often as not forget or omit it altogether. After the shaking hands was got through with, the newcomer sat down along with the rest and the lady of the house helped him to a cup of tea. He then helped himself to a slice of cold meat or to an egg, took bread which the English very properly like dry and hard and sweet and not fresh and clammy and hot as we seem to do—and the processes of mastication and deglutilious and digestion go quietly on. This is all very nice and comfortable. The meal is very light, lasting perhaps 10 minutes, as each one finished, he leaned back in his chair or moved up to the fireplace with the Times or Cambrian and made himself as perfectly happy and contented as it is in the nature of such surroundings to allow.15 Palmer took sly pleasure in scrutinizing the wit and intellect of the other houseguest, the host’s nephew. Although they were of similar age, they apparently lacked common ground for friendship or lengthy discourse. At one point, Mr. Morgan apologized for his nephew’s lack of cultural literacy. Palmer overlooked this for the most part, but spent a fair amount of time curiously describing the “Warlike” nephew. The “Nevvy” [nephew] a young fine looking fellow of 20 or 21, who has passed the Examination and is daily awaiting his Commission as Ensign to come down from “the Horseguards,” is spending a couple of weeks with his Uncle in order to acquire a knowledge of “Surveying,”

LOHSE • 19

somebody having told him that his prospects might be materially brightened in India if he were acquainted with this branch. The uncle sent over for a mineral Surveyor to come and teach him the art—and that worthy, deep in drink with the five shillings too much which the Uncle sent to pay his Expenses, arrived whilst I was there and proceeded to instill into the cranium of the officerelect a knowledge of his craft. But the Nevvy not being grounded in Mathematics didn’t know an angle from a crooked stick or a meridian from a Merry Andrew or a base line from a base viol—and so I fear they made little progress.—As to myself, I usually spent the mornings (so called), in the mines with Mr. Morgan geologising or with the Surveying party as attache’.16 When Palmer’s letters became personal, he instructed his family, But all this is very gossipy and the letter containing it must not be read out of our own immediate family.— there it can do no harm and will only give you a sample of the transactions be going on in a country gentlemans home which in England is truly his castle.17 Regarding Palmer’s exposure to vices, his tone became eloquently teasing, elusive and a bit sarcastic. Perhaps he was skirting the issue or boldly testing the boundaries with an ocean between himself and the straight-laced criticism of relatives. [T]o return to the meal of the day. . . . The wine in two decanters, red and white was brought in at the very commencement and each one helped himself to whichever he preferred Sherry or Claret. Mrs. Morgan a refined and delicate lady generally taking one glass. Now I know what Aunt Jennette is going to exclaim, as well as if I were in the room at the time—“Did thee touch any of it, William?”—Ahem—does thee suppose, Aunt Jennette that a young man bred up in the principles of


the Society of Friends, and taught from Early infancy to curb the propensities of appetite and the temptations to indulge in good things of this world—who has been taught that singing and dancing and youthful sports and the pleasures of senses, are all Emanations from his clovefooted Majesty below and to be Enjoyed by none but the carnally-minded, is to be—caught by any such clever question as that. What a shame it would be to put a “quietus” upon all the curiosity and guessing and wondering and supposing with which a daughter of Eve can usually manage on slight foundations to set her head in a mist, by giving an answer direct to this cleverly contrived trap. No Madame—all the answer I can give is—“catch a weasel asleep.”18 Palmer’s observations continued, particularly in regard to food customs. The grand finale΄ to an English dinner is cheese—it is brought on whole, that is as much of it as is left whole after the service of weeks, perhaps months. It is always appreciated for its age and when strong enough to eat a hole in your tongue is considered prime. The master has it placed before him and sliced several microscopically small pieces into his plate; then passes it round for every one to help himself from. I mean passes the plate around, not the cheese “In toto.”—It is eaten with bread, without butter and a glass of beer. It forms a very good conclusion to the repast which (the family still sitting) is followed by the removal of the cloth—the Master again gives thanks Everyone lowering his head and Conversation of that peculiarly interesting style called “after dinner conversation” ensues. No one moves from his seat, but merely leans back and talks, while the Wine is again brought on the decanters having been replenished—“What” I hear Aunt Jennette exclaiming “Wine again”! “What a nest of drunkards thee must have fallen in with.” Not so, “Ma chere tante,” this is a

LOHSE • 21

highly respectable family, representative of that most to be envied English class, the Country Gentry.19 Perhaps out of boredom, young Palmer’s gossip further escalated when he repeated rumors about the recent visit of “Mrs. Stowe” in England. He was referring to Harriet Beecher Stowe, author the popular book, Uncle Tom’s Cabin, a tale about the cruelty of slavery in America’s South. The book caused a sensation and a resulting wave of anti-slavery sentiment on both sides of the Atlantic prior to the Civil War. Her visit to England was equivalent to that of a modern-day Hollywood star. Bad manners and poor judgment exhibited by Mr. and Mrs. Stowe were a topic for discussion on both continents. Palmer shared this version of the scandal with his family. Mrs. Stowe suddenly arose and left the room. Going out to the front gate, she met a gentleman’s carriage which had just brought the owner to dinner and was waiting to take him away when dinner should be over. The driver and footman were standing beside it when Mrs. Stowe went up to them and said “I want to take a ride—give me a ride.” “But I cant” replies the footman respectfully— “this is my masters carriage and I am ordered to remain here” “Do you know that I am Mrs. Stowe!” replies the lady with dignity. The coachman overpowered with the prestige of a name which was familiar to all England at that time opened the door and Mrs. Stowe sat herself upon the cushions and was soon being whisked through green hedges and by pleasant country houses, without bestowing a second thought upon the party of hungry celebrities waiting for her and the dinner at home. After an hours ride she returned and very enthusiastically described the scenes she had witnessed in strains that did no discredit to the author of Uncle Tom. Unfortunately however the descriptions were not appreciated, as the angry eyes of the fair ladies and the bent brows of the disappointed Lords fully testified.20


Palmer went beyond verbally expressing his opinions by writing a letter to the Welsh newspaper on the subject of burning coal. When his words were published and open to scrutiny, youthful exuberance turned to trepidation. He experienced some anxiety about going public with his beliefs. This penchant for writing articles to be published in newspapers, what an inconvenient thing it is. It takes up time and does no individual good to oneself. . . . Here’s the piece cut from the Cambrian. Well, upon reaching Cwyn Amman [in Wales] several days afterwards and putting up at Mr. Morgans, I learned from him how deeply interested their fraternity were in the breaking down of the prejudice against Anthracite [coal]. My half forgotten effusion then came to my mind and I wondered what the Anthraciters would say to it when it would appear in the Cambrian on the coming Saturday, a couple of days before I left Mr. Morgans. That gentleman and myself had just returned from a little geological tramp when entering the parlor there were the papers just arrived. Mr. M. handed me the Times and picked up the Cambrian himself. In a few minutes he remarked “This is your letter in the Cambrian” “it’s a good thing and I’m glad of it” “in a couple of days we’ll have that published in every paper of importance in ‘the Kingdom’.” I began to tremble at having done such an awfully tremendous thing and wished it were undone and that I had never been the humble means of raising such a thunder storm as was apparently brewing. But there was no help for it thereafter.21 Reluctant to end his adventures, Palmer revealed in a letter home his plans to extend his travels to Paris, France, then back through Great Britain before returning to the United States. A contact provided him with a “great batch of letters of introduction.” He learned that these references opened doors, which would take care of his needs and help attain his goals. He

LOHSE • 23

also developed the fine art of networking and raising funds, new skills he would later utilize heavily when building railroads. Palmer’s delight in sharing his experiences in writing presented a rather weighty postal problem as described in the following message. Liverpool—Dec 28, 1855—Dear Folks, My journal of Paris life for [sister] Ellen’s inspection grew so large that I was ashamed to send it by mail. I was afraid to count but if I remember right the folios numbered in the 40’s. Will bring it home myself shortly.22 The years following young Palmer’s travels abroad were filled with work for the Pennsylvania Railroad, a job that paid $900 a year. He became private secretary to company president J. Edgar Thomson, who had overseen his apprenticeship.23 This position allowed him close observation of railroad management. The 1860 U.S. Census listing Palmer and his family’s household in Germantown shows William J. Palmer’s occupation as a clerk, a reference to his job as railroad secretary. His father and brother worked in the tea trade.24 Anti-slavery sentiment in Philadelphia and throughout the northern United States continued to grow. Palmer was soon forced to take a stand and make a choice, whether to follow his religion as a conscientious objector to war of any kind, or to fight the evils of slavery. The urge to eradicate slavery got the better of him, and he joined the Union army during the Civil War. Life was never again so easily observed or explained as it was during his youthful travels abroad.


Joyce B. Lohse lives in Centennial, Colorado, with her family. For fifteen years, Joyce co-owned and operated The Letter Setters, a typesetting and graphics business in Colorado Springs. In the Denver area, she worked for five years in Littleton and Cherry Creek Public Schools as a library technician and secretary. Joyce’s award-winning book, First Governor, First Lady – John and Eliza Routt of Colorado, was published by Filter Press in June 2002. She previously wrote a book entitled A Yellowstone Savage: Life In Nature’s Wonderland. Her articles have been published in the Arkansas Valley Journal, Yellowstone Gateway Post, Colorado Springs Summer Magazine, Craft Range, Weaver’s Journal, Fiberarts, ArtCraft, and others. Her book, General William Palmer: Railroad Pioneer, will be published by Filter Press during 2009.

Notes

1. Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum, William J. Palmer Collection, Series 1, Box 1, letter to his parents from Neath, South Wales, October 28, 1855. 2. Wilson McCarthy, General Wm. Jackson Palmer, 1836-1909, and the D. & R.G.W. Railroad! (New York: Newcomen Society in North America, 1954), 9. 3. John S. Fisher, A Builder of the West: The Life of General William Jackson Palmer (Caldwell, Idaho: Caxton Printers, 1939), 19. More information about Palmer’s early years from Jim Sawatski, The Life and Times of General William Jackson Palmer [VHS], Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum Foundation, Colorado Springs, Colorado, 2004. 4. Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum, William J. Palmer Collection, Series 1, Box 1, letters and journals written while in Europe, 1855, 1856. 5. Ibid. 6. McCarthy, General Wm. Jackson Palmer, 9. 7. Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum, William J. Palmer Collection, Series 1, Box 1, letter to his parents from Neath, South Wales, October 28, 1855. 8. Fisher, A Builder of the West, 24. 9. U.S. National Archives and Records Administration, Compiled Military Service File, Civil War Records for William J. Palmer. See also: “The General’s Story,” Harper’s New Monthly Magazine XXXV (June 1867), 60–74.

LOHSE • 25 10. Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum, William J. Palmer Collection, Series 1, Box 1, poem in front cover of Palmer’s journal written during travels in England, 1855. 11. Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum, William J. Palmer Collection, Series 1, Box 1, Palmer’s journal of travels in England, 1855. 12. Ibid. 13. Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum, William J. Palmer Collection, Series 1, Box 1, letter to his parents from Paris, France, November 22, 1855. 14. Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum, William J. Palmer Collection, Series 1, Box 1, Palmer’s journal of travels in England, 1855. 15. Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum, William J. Palmer Collection, Series 1, Box 1, letter to his parents from Neath, South Wales, October 28, 1855. 16. Ibid. 17. Ibid. 18. Ibid. 19. Ibid. 20. Ibid. 21. Ibid. 22. Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum, William J. Palmer Collection, Series 1, Box 1, letter to his parents from England, December 28, 1855. 23. McCarthy, General Wm. Jackson Palmer, 10. 24. U.S. Census, 1860, Germantown, Philadelphia County, Pennsylvania, 209, lines 36–40.

Matilda Jackson Palmer and her husband John had four children: Ellen H., William J., Francis H. and Charles F., who were brought-up under the tenants of the Hicksite Quaker faith. John died during November 1863. Matilda later moved to Colorado where she lived to the age of 93. She died on July 2, 1898, and was buried with John in the Fair Hill Burial Ground in North Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, a cemetery where many Quakers who believed in equality and the abolition of slavery are interred. Courtesy of Starsmore Center for Local History at the Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum.

A Question of Conscience: William Jackson Palmer & His Quaker Faith Leah Davis Witherow The goodness of individual Quakers is measured not by the beliefs they hold but by their willingness to act on their faith, even in the face of opposition and even persecution.1 David Yount, 2007 Notwithstanding popular opinion to the contrary, William Jackson Palmer volunteered for military service in the Union army during the American Civil War due to his Quaker religious beliefs – not in spite of them. Born and raised a Hicksite Quaker, Palmer acted according to the principles of his sect and placed emphasis on individual behavior—not belief.2 Hicksites held fast to the fundamental tenets of the Society of Friends; namely, the presence of God in every person. Divine guidance expressed through an individual’s conscience or “inner light,” always led a person to do right.3 Unfortunately, doing “right” for nineteenth-century Quakers proved troublesome. Ironically, their egalitarian beliefs led Friends to face the difficult choice between abolitionism and pacifism. For William Jackson Palmer, the choice was clear. In September 1861, two months after the United States Congress authorized President Lincoln to raise five hundred thousand men, Palmer followed his inner light, acted according to his conscience and became a cavalry officer.4 When after the war meeting elders asked him to explain his military service despite traditional Quaker pacifism, Palmer expressed his thoughts clearly, “it seems to me that one of the most essential principles of Friends is obedience to conscience—much more essential than a belief in non-resistance.”5 Frequently interpreted • 27 •

28 • A QUESTION OF CONSCIENCE

as an act of religious disobedience, Palmer’s participation in the Civil War must instead be viewed as a conventional choice within a religion founded on conservative reform. Founded by George Fox in rural northern England around 1652, the Society of Friends sought to reform the contemporary church—not replace it.6 In 1643, 19-year-old Fox left his apprenticeship as a shoemaker and started wandering the English countryside. After numerous dissatisfactory exchanges and interviews with town priests, Fox began to experience a succession of intense visions from God.7 Well versed in biblical scriptures, Fox resolved to expose the “lifeless formalities of the established religion,” and argued that the Holy Spirit lived in common people who needed no interference from a paid clergy or the structure of a formal church.8 Continuing to travel and preach, by 1680 Fox gathered approximately forty thousand followers in England.9 The novel Quaker notion that God worked within each individual in the form of the Holy Spirit or inner light without clerical interference attracted small traders and artisans who had much to gain from a religion that preached social equality. David Yount recently summarized this powerful tenet: Friends believed that all persons of both sexes and all races and nationalities were equal in God’s sight and deserved to be treated equally . . . the presence of a Divine Light in every person, no matter how sophisticated or uneducated, that directly reveals God’s will to him or her and calls for adherence to that will. Quaker pacifism derived in part from the Friends’ egalitarian worldview. If all people were God’s children, participation in war meant killing your brothers and sisters. Acting within an ideology of reform, Quakers adopted an activist stance by advocating on behalf of the poor and protesting social hierarchy in England by refusing to doff their hats for citizens of a superior class. As an equalizing measure, Friends insisted on the use of pronouns thee, thy and thou in order to avoid the use of the pronouns you and your which held class implications in the seventeenth century.10

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In time, the radical egalitarian principles of the Society of Friends appeared to pose a threat to the British peerage system and monarchy which resulted in wholesale expulsions of Quakers from England. In July, 1656, Mary Fisher and Ann Austin disembarked in Boston as the first Quakers to arrive in the American colonies.11 Nearly two centuries later, members of the Society of Friends in America faced unprecedented challenges to their unity and their faith. The Market Revolution ushered in sweeping economic changes that imposed drastic social, political and religious transformations across the country.12 While nearly all religious orders in America experienced disquiet or schism during this period, the Society of Friends appeared uniquely affected in many ways.13 Quakers, who traditionally (although never exclusively) pursued occupations as small traders, artisans and farmers, now increasingly engaged in large scale industrial, commercial and other entrepreneurial ventures.14 Rising class divisions among Friends placed excessive strain on the workings of discrete meetings. During their two hundred years in America, Quakers strengthened internal meeting discipline which unsurprisingly led to the growing influence of elders. As wealthy Friends attained higher economic and social status in the increasingly urban economy of Philadelphia, they exerted their influence within the Society. Elders increased the observation of personal testimony for inappropriateness or potential heresies, and oversaw the usurpation of the inner light doctrine in favor of strict scriptural adherence.15 As a rift began to grow between wealthy urban elders and their more modest country and city counterparts, American Quakers moved away from their egalitarian roots and became stratified along class lines.16 While the roots of the 1827—1828 Hicksite schism “were complex,” some fundamental issues appeared obvious: rising class divisions among Friends, absolutism in regard to the Bible, the growing hierarchy within each meeting, and a strong central authority which hampered autonomy.17 Taking their name from Elias Hicks, a Quaker minister from Long Island, New York, Hicksites shied away from a strict adherence to the scriptures.


They embraced tradi� tional Quaker practices which included a weak central authority, the conviction that rev� elation was an ongoing process of divine mani� festations communicat� ed through every man and woman, and the preeminence of behav� ior over belief.18 Orthodox Quakers increasingly relied on the Bible for divine in� spiration and thought Hicksites gravely un� Quaker minister Elias Hicks (1748-1830). derestimated the power Drawn by H. Inman, engraving by Peter Maverick, published by Edward Hopper, and influence of Jesus circa 1830. From the Library of Congress Prints and Christ. Hicksites ar� Photographs Division. gued that their Ortho� dox brethren placed an emphasis on the Bible much like that of mainstream Protestants—only to ignore the more essential in� spiration of the Inner Light. As a contemporary Hicksite Quaker stated: The Strict scriptural adherence promoted by the Orthodox denies the spirit of revelation to this day. It is the doctrine of the so-called Evangelical churches, which virtually denies the existence of the divine principle as a guide and preserving influence in the souls of men, degrades the sacred writings to the level of a lifeless tradition, and makes an object of worship of the mere letter.19 The persistent disagreements over divergent beliefs and theological interpretations embittered Friends for more than five years and in April 1827 they divided into two separate sects.

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The 1827 Philadelphia Yearly Meeting presented a breaking point.20 After a period of increasing confusion which gave rise to hostility, John Comly, the assistant clerk of the meeting, led the “non-Orthodox” or Hicksite Friends out of the sessions dominated by Orthodox elders.21 The divisive schism proved lasting, dividing families and leading to court battles over the ownership of meeting houses. According to Quaker historian Margaret Hope Bacon approximately 18,500 members of the Philadelphia Society of Friends identified themselves as Hicksite and 7,350 members identified themselves as Orthodox.22 The separation between the two groups of Friends eventually created turmoil and schism in Quaker meetings down the Atlantic seaboard and in the western states of Indiana and Ohio, with Hicksite members retaining a numerical majority only in Philadelphia.23 Of note, historical records from 1828 list a teacher by the name of Jonathan Palmer, residing at 193 Pine Street in Philadelphia, the father of General William Jackson Palmer. William Jackson Palmer was born on September 17, 1836, at Kinsale Farm, Kent County, Delaware. John and Matilda Palmer moved their family to Philadelphia in 1841. John Palmer engaged in a variety of business pursuits and eventually settled in at 513 High Street, in Germantown.24 The family belonged to Hicksite sect of the Society of Friends, had many notable Quaker acquaintances and attended the Cherry Street meeting house.25 The second of four Palmer children and the oldest son, young William attended the Friends’ School, Zane Street Grammar School and most importantly, at the age of 12 years and 5 months entered the Central High School of Philadelphia.26 Paired with his Quaker upbringing, William Jackson Palmer’s elite education instilled in him a strong sense of personal integrity, service to others and accountability for his actions. The institution prepared, “young people for life both as citizens in a republic and as individual actors in a competitive marketplace.”27 His acceptance and attendance at such an prestigious institution are indicative of Palmer’s exceptionally bright intellect and propensity for hard work.


The Palmer home, 513 High Street, Germantown, Pennsylvania, January 2009. The current owner of the substantial home indicates that there is an unusually large kitchen and that the small third floor rooms were probably servants’ quarters. The house has been converted into three apartments. Photograph by Leah Davis Witherow.

Founded in 1836 by public school reformers and opened two years later, Central High School signified a radically new approach – the protection of republican values and the promotion of economic and social opportunity through free universal schooling.28 Alexander Bache, the school’s first principal, sought to provide an opportunity for boys of modest means to compete in the “pursuits of commerce, manufacture, and the useful arts.”29 The extraordinarily competitive school required an extensive oral and written examination for admission. Once accepted, students studied, “modern languages, natural sciences, elocution, trigonometry, surveying, navigation, bookkeeping, and phonography (Pitman method of shorthand).30 Entering Central High School in February of 1849, as student number 1777, Palmer attended the school for four years but left before graduating to take a clerk’s position with a local firm.31 Eager for work in the field of engineering and foreseeing the

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need to provide increased financial assistance to his family, William Jackson Palmer obtained a position with the Hempfield Railroad Engineer Corps in 1853 and embarked on his future.32 The next few years found the fearless William Jackson Palmer travelling abroad to study the use of anthracite coal in railroad locomotives. To finance his journey, Palmer agreed to write articles for the Pottsville, Pennsylvania Miner’s Journal and borrowed money from family and friends. “His uncle, and perhaps other relations, lent him money for this journey; the Palmers were not rich, and he had already been helping his family for some years.”33 Upon his return to Philadelphia in 1856, Palmer accepted a position with the Westmoreland Coal Company, where his uncle Frank Jackson served as an officer of the company. On June 1, 1857, he secured the coveted position as private secretary for J. Edgar Thomson, President of the Pennsylvania Railroad.34 Enjoying the challenges and successes of a rich professional life, William Jackson Palmer began to place his personal convictions into action. Antebellum Philadelphia lay on the front lines of the sectional conflict which was to rip the country apart in 1861. Historian Elizabeth M. Geffen noted, “As a pioneer center of abolitionism and the first large city north of the Mason-Dixon Line, Philadelphia had long been a mecca for escaping slaves and free blacks who hoped to better themselves.”35 Unfortunately, abolitionism often proved dangerous for Quaker activists such as James and Lucretia Mott who “were often the targets of mob violence.”36 The “specter of slavery” remained a constant presence in a city with such close commercial and geographic ties to its southern neighbors. During the summer of 1859, William Jackson Palmer and childhood friend and fellow Quaker Isaac Clothier devised a plan to stage a series of anti-slavery lectures in Philadelphia. Under the rather innocuous title, The Young Men’s Liberal Course of Lectures, the two hoped to attract famous abolitionists and fund the programs through admittance fees.37 As Palmer’s work with the Pennsylvania Railroad often kept him away from Philadelphia for weeks at a time, the responsibility for organizing the series fell largely to Clothier.


Nevertheless, the two corresponded frequently and Palmer provided guidance in detailed dispatches. An excerpt from August 19, 1859, “Tell Beecher we want to get up an anti-slavery or at least a liberal course – that we have secured Curtis and want Phillips and himself to complete the trio. That the effect would be beneficial on the minds of citizens.”38 A postscript reads, “If thee knows anyone who could introduce thee by letter to Beecher it would be better. Try Lucretia Mott.”39 The Palmers and Motts shared a long and friendly acquaintance as both families belonged to the Hicksite branch of the Society of Friends. When preparing for his travels in England, Lucretia Mott supplied William J. Palmer with a letter of introduction to English Quakers that warmly referenced his family’s anti-slavery beliefs.40 The lecture series provided unanticipated excitement for Palmer, Clothier and the Philadelphia police department as violence threatened the scheduled lectures of Wendell Phillips in November and George William Curtis in December 1859.41 While Phillips charmed his audience of both supporters and dissenters with his powerful eloquence, the Curtis lecture was threatened by violence before it even began. In the end, six hundred armed policemen surrounded National Hall and fended off repeated attempts from the growing mob on Market Street to gain entry. Palmer, Clothier and select others acted as a personal bodyguard of sorts for George Curtis who managed to deliver an understandably weak lecture just short of one hour in length. After the two friends paid expenses, Palmer requested that his share of the proceeds go toward the publication of antislavery articles penned by Lydia Maria Child.42 In addition to his busy professional life and the creation of The Young Men’s Liberal Course of Lectures, Palmer actively participated in the newly organized Republican Party. At the age of 24, Palmer became eligible to vote in his first presidential election in 1860. Palmer was selected recording secretary of Philadelphia’s Young Men’s Republican Club in the late summer of that year. Like many young, idealistic Philadelphians, Palmer and Clothier joined the local branch of the Wide Awakes movement known as the Republican Invincibles.43 In quasi-militia fashion, the two wore uniforms, attended political meetings,

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and marched in torchlight parades with their colleagues. As a young man, Palmer consistently placed his spiritual, social and political beliefs into action, a precedent that prepared him for the most consequential decision of his life. On April 12, 1861, Confederate troops fired upon Ft. Sumter and the Civil War that had threatened the country for months officially began. For Hicksite Quakers, the preeminence in their faith of the inner light doctrine over scriptural dogmatism, allowed members to adopt a variety of roles during the antebellum period and subsequent war. These were as wildly diverse as radical abolitionist and outspoken pacifist Lucretia Mott, countless conscientious objectors who adhered to Quaker peace testimony, and finally General William Jackson Palmer, commander of the Fifteenth Pennsylvania Volunteer Cavalry.44 In addition to volunteering for military service in the summer of 1861, Palmer recruited fellow Quakers to form a troop, later a regiment that despite considerable difficulties, went on to serve the Union with great distinction. Acting according to conviction and conscience, Palmer understood the personal and religious implications of joining the Union army and weighed his decision carefully.45 Understandably, John and Matilda Palmer did not approve of their son’s wartime service despite their Hicksite beliefs. They continually impressed upon William their distaste for his choice of duty, We read thy letters with a great deal of pleasure and are deeply interested in what is going on around thee; but thy Mother and I can never feel any love or admiration for the profession thee has thought it thy duty to engage in, and our fervent hope is that thee may have no opportunity to distinguish thyself or to acquire any honor on that most horrible of all earthly scenes—a field of battle.46 They both appealed to his sense of duty and devotion to his family, while making detailed emotional appeals regarding John Palmer’s failing health,


His cough continues very troublesome accompanied frequently with pain in the breast and side, sure symptoms of consumption I fear. Thee is very kind and thoughtful dear William to send that money to me, which is very acceptable, but oh how I do wish thee would come thyself too. What shall we do if father is removed while thee is absent. Expressing prudent concern for his safety, This great battle thee anticipated when thee last wrote, we have no accounts of yet, but we expect to hear of it every day, and what thy fate may be who can tell, what days and nights of anguish it may bring to us. Dear William does thee still think it right to place thy valuable life in such jeopardy? From his mother on June 10, 1862 came: “Dear William do come home, I think thee has fulfilled thy duty now. I feel truly thankful thee has been spared to have the opportunity to do so. I wish thee could feel thyself released.”47 Continuing the pattern of financial dependency that arose during William’s adolescence, the Palmer family sought his advice regarding outstanding bills and various debts even as he risked his life on the battlefield. Sending exhaustive financial accounts and papers that required his signature, John and Matilda Palmer expected their son to stay involved with their tenuous household finances and to come to their aid when necessary. For example, his father notes, “I received over $200 from Aunt Mary which enabled me to pay off the balance I owed Aunt Sarah $105, and some other debts. . . . leaving me about $50 towards the $90 interest due next month.”48 Near the close of this same letter on June 10, 1862, “Resign, come home, leave the army and enter into some useful business in civil life. The rebellion is virtually ended here. Thee can be of more use to thy country tenfold in this way than thee can ever become as a soldier.”49 Unfortunately, John Palmer died from his illness in December of 1863 with William not in attendance. After her

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husband’s death, Matilda Palmer reminded her son of her enormous emotional and financial needs and pleaded with her son to return home, “I hope thee will receive my letter, as I have therein stated my earnest desire for thee to return, and see us in our loneliness, and give us an opportunity to confer together regarding our future course. I feel that I can do nothing until I see thee.”50 The abundance of extant family correspondence provides ample evidence of the Palmers’ enduring dependence on William. Time and again, Palmer declined to return home from the field and instead provided his best financial counsel and attempts at emotional comfort through correspondence. He appeared resolutely determined to see his commitment through to the end. As he noted in a January 1865 letter to his brother Frank, “The loss of my services would have been trivial had I resigned the command of my company in June 1862— it would be greater now that an experience of nearly three years, with much more important commands, has been added.” He spoke of his dedication to his regiment, the 15th Pennsylvania Cavalry, “Its service is out next September, and I must stay with it to the end.”51 Palmer remained devoted to his men and to the cause, until after the war’s end in After joining the Union army, William Jackson Palmer recruited other Quakers April 1865. th In summing up the to join the 15 Pennsylvania Volunteer Cavalry. Courtesy of Starsmore Center for Quaker ethos, noted author Local History at the Colorado Springs Pioneers and speaker David Yount Museum.


has written, “Friends look first of all to how people actually behave—not to the creeds they profess or to how well they express themselves. Accordingly, it is well nigh impossible to be a Quaker and a hypocrite.”52 No hypocrite, Palmer sought neither to justify nor seek permission for acting upon his beliefs. As he stated succinctly to fellow Isaac Clothier, “I think that Peace is holy and should be encouraged constantly – and that an unjust War is only legalized murder. But the inner light made it very plain to me in the summer of ’61 that I should enter the army.”53 In 1867, meeting elders asked Palmer for an explanation regarding his participation in the Civil War. He responded, “while I believe war to be inconsistent with the teachings and example of Jesus Christ, and therefore wrong, yet I know that it would have been wrong for me to have refrained from becoming a soldier under the circumstances as they presented themselves in this country in 1861.”54 Repeating his feelings to Clothier he noted, “I have every desire to retain my connection with the Society, and hope they will look upon my case in that liberal and charitable spirit which I think distinguishes them from most other sects and which is one of the strongest incentives in my mind towards remaining a member of the Society.”55 He concluded, Under the same circumstances as existed in the Summer of ’61, I would act precisely as I did then, and I do not understand that Friends desire me to think or say otherwise – as they would be the last to believe that principle should be compromised for the sake of avoiding troubles. They might say however that they would not sacrifice one principle for the sake of another. Forty years later in the quiet comfort of Glen Eyrie, General William Jackson Palmer shared Civil War memories with Dorothy Comyns-Carr, a young Englishwoman on her first visit to Colorado Springs. Noticeably awestruck, Comyns-Carr left a detailed account of the conversations she shared with Palmer. Her diary entry for February 14, 1903, reads,

WITHEROW • 39

In the evening we had some more of the Battleground which brought up many interesting reminiscences of General Palmer. He was laughing over the puzzlements of the Quaker element in Philadelphia who disapproved of slavery and yet disapproved of war and didn’t know who to support. For Palmer, the answer in 1861 and in 1903 remained the same—one evil outweighed another. Placing beliefs into action, Palmer operated within the traditional tenets of his faith. The inner light of William Jackson Palmer committed him to abolitionism and service—his conscience remained clear. Leah Davis Witherow is the archivist at the Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum. She has a Master of Arts in history from the University of Colorado, Colorado Springs, where she has taught courses in material culture, public history and Colorado history. She is a graduate of the Modern Archives Institute at the National Archives, former president of the Society of Rocky Mountain Archivists, and has achieved archival certification through the Academy of Certified Archivists. She is a frequent speaker for archival and museum organizations.

Notes

1. David �� Yount, How the Quakers Invented America (Lanham, Maryland: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc., 2007), 74. 2.�� Robert W. Doherty, The Hicksite Separation: A Sociological Analysis of Religious Schism in Early Nineteenth-Century America (New Brunswick: New Jersey, 1967), 23. 3.�� William Wade Hinshaw, The Encyclopedia of American Quaker Genealogy: Pennsylvania and New Jersey (Baltimore, Maryland: The Genealogical Publishing Company, 1969), 780-829. 4.�� John S. Fisher, A Builder of the West: The Life of General William Jackson Palmer (Caldwell, Idaho: The Caxton Printers, 1939), 69. 5.�� Isaac H. Clothier, ed., Letters, 1853-1868, Gen’l Wm. J. Palmer (Philadelphia: privately printed, 1906), 88. 6.�� Yount, How the Quakers Invented America, 99.

40 • A QUESTION OF CONSCIENCE 7.�� Peter Brock, The Quaker Peace Testimony: 1660 to 1914 (York, England: Sessions Book Trust, 1990), 9. 8.� Ibid., 11. 9.�� David E. Swift, Joseph John Gurney: Banker, Reformer and Quaker (Middletown Connecticut: Wesleyan University Press, 1962), 10. 10.�� Yount, How the Quakers Invented America, 3. 11.�� Elbert Russell, The History of Quakerism (New York: the MacMillan Company, 1942), 37. 12.�� Charles Sellers, The Market Revolution in America: Jacksonian America, 1815-1846 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1991), 364395. 13.�� Russell Weigley, ed., Philadelphia: A 300-Year History (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 1982), 296. 14.�� Doherty, The Hicksite Separation, 72-76. 15.�� Margaret Hope Bacon, The Quiet Rebels: The Story of the Quakers in America (Philadelphia: New Society Publishers, 1985), 80. 16.�� Doherty, The Hicksite Separation, 31. 17.�� Weigley, Philadelphia, 296. 18.�� Doherty, The Hicksite Separation, 87. 19.�� Thomas H. Speakman, Divisions in the Society of Friends (Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott & Company, 1869), 40. 20.�� Doherty, The Hicksite Separation, 23. 21.� Ibid., 17. 22.�� Bacon, The Quiet Rebels, 75. 23.�� H. Larry Ingle, Quakers in Conflict: The Hicksite Reformation (Knoxville, Tennessee: The University of Tennessee Press, 1986), 213217. 24.�� Fisher, A Builder of the West, 19-20. 25.�� Lucretia Mott to William Smeal, May 13, 1855, folder 7, box 2, William Jackson Palmer Papers, Starsmore Center for Local History, Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum. 26.�� Board of Public Education, General Catalogue of the Central High School: From 1838 to 1890 (Philadelphia: privately printed, 1890), 39. 27.�� Walter Licht , Getting Work: Philadelphia, 1840-1950 (Cambridge, Massachusetts: 1992), 60. 28.�� Board of Public Education, 60. 29.� Ibid., 61. 30.� Ibid., 61. 31.� Ibid., 39. 32.�� Clothier, Letters, 9-13. 33.�� Fisher, A Builder of the West, 24. 34.� Ibid., 57.

WITHEROW • 41 35.�� Weigley, Philadelphia, 352. 36.� Ibid., 355. 37.�� Fisher, A Builder of the West, 59. 38.�� Clothier, Letters, 40-41. 39.� Ibid., 41. 40.�� Lucretia Mott to William Smeal, May 13, 1855, folder 7, box 2, William Jackson Palmer Papers, Starsmore Center for Local History, Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum. 41.�� Clothier, Letters, 121-128. 42.�� William Jackson Palmer to Isaac Clothier, 1860, folder 6 box 2, E. Q. Nicholson Collection, Starsmore Center for Local History, Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum. 43.�� Clothier, Letters, 109. 44.�� Charles H. Kirk, ed., The History of the Fifteenth Pennsylvania Cavalry (Philadelphia: privately printed, 1906), 741–743. 45.�� Clothier, Letters, 94-97. 46.�� John Palmer to William Jackson Palmer, April 2, 1862, folder 5, �� box 2, E. Q. Nicholson Collection, Starsmore Center for Local History, Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum. 47.�� Matilda Palmer to William Jackson Palmer, June 10, 1862, folder 5, box 2, E. Q. Nicholson Collection, Starsmore Center for Local History, Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum. 48.�� John Palmer to William Jackson Palmer, June 10, 1862, folder 5, �� box 2, E. Q. Nicholson Collection, Starsmore Center for Local History, Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum. 49.�� John Palmer to William Jackson Palmer, June 10, 1862, folder 5, �� box 2, E. Q. Nicholson Collection, Starsmore Center for Local History, Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum. 50.�� Matilda Palmer to William Jackson Palmer, December 8, 1863, folder 5 box 2, E. Q. Nicholson Collection, Starsmore Center for Local History, Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum. 51.�� Fisher, A Builder of the West, 117. 52.�� Yount, How the Quakers Invented America, 69. 53.�� Fisher, A Builder of the West, 71. 54.� Ibid., 71. 55.�� Clothier, Letters, 87-88.

During the American Civil War, in 1861, 24-year-old William Jackson Palmer joined the Union army. He soon organized the 15th Pennsylvania Volunteer Cavalry, serving as its colonel and commanding officer. Following the Battle of Antietam, Palmer was captured as a suspected spy behind Confederate lines and was imprisoned in Richmond, Virginia, before being released in a prisoner exchange four months later. Photograph by Broadbent & Co., Philadelphia, 1861, courtesy of Starsmore Center for Local History at the Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum.

One of the Most Gallant Men of the Army: William Jackson Palmer & the Medal of Honor Mark L. Gardner On exhibit in the Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum is an extraordinary artifact that represents the nation’s highest military decoration, a five-pointed star known as the Medal of Honor. On the reverse of this very special medal are these words: The Congress to Bvt. Brig. Genl. Wm J. Palmer, U. S. Vols., for most distinguished gallantry in action near Red Hill, Ala., Jany. 14, 1865. Most museum visitors viewing this medal assume that William Jackson Palmer received this highly-coveted recognition shortly after the event specified in the inscription. Yet Palmer was not awarded his medal until 1894, and only after the persistent efforts of devoted officers from his old regiment, the 15th Pennsylvania Cavalry. In fact, the “action near Red Hill” was not the “distinguished gallantry” for which Palmer was originally nominated by his men. The reason for these seeming idiosyncrasies has a lot to do with the history of the Medal of Honor itself. cacacacacaca President Abraham Lincoln signed many acts into law during his challenging administration, but the act he signed on July 14, 1862, amidst a bitter struggle between the North and the South, is one of the most enduring yet least known. The act • 43 •

44 • ONE OF THE MOST GALLANT MEN OF THE ARMY

authorized the president to issue Medals of Honor, in the name of Congress, that could only go to non-commissioned officers and enlisted men. The next year, the law was amended to include officers as well. Since that time, 2,404 Medals of Honor have been awarded to members of the U.S. Army. The standards for awarding the Medal of Honor for service during the Civil War are different from those that exist today. Many Civil War Medals of Honor were awarded for capturing the enemy’s flag or banner and for saving one’s own flag from capture by the enemy. Such an accomplishment may not seem so impressive in our time, but in the 19th Century, the flag, one’s colors, was extremely significant, and it was considered a great disgrace to lose the colors to the enemy. Some of the most intense fighting was often around the color bearers, men who were prepared to die before surrendering the regiment’s colors. On more than one occasion, color bearers—on both sides—ripped their flags into pieces and stuffed them into their uniforms to prevent the enemy from capturing their proud banners. Consequently, many of the Medals of Honor awarded for capturing an enemy flag were well deserved. It was not until long after the Civil War, however, that clear guidelines for earning the Medal of Honor were established. These came about, primarily, as a result of George Armstrong Custer’s staggering defeat at the Battle of the Little Bighorn on June 25, 1876. On that day, Custer and two hundred twenty-five men under his immediate command fell to an overwhelming force of resolute Lakota and Cheyenne. However, there were two 7th Cavalry battalions that survived the battle, a fact that is often overlooked. After the engagement, the commanders of these surviving units submitted nominations for Medals of Honor for a considerable number of their men. Their nominations were flatly rejected by Brigadier General Alfred Terry, who commented that “Medals of Honor are not intended for ordinarily good conduct, but for conspicuous acts of gallantry.” A review board was established to reevaluate the Little Bighorn nominations with the result that twenty-four men from that engagement were recognized with the Medal of

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Honor. This set the course for developing standards for which acts truly deserved the nation’s highest military decoration. During the 1880s and 1890s, many Civil War veterans submitted petitions recommending the Medal, and abuses of the Medal’s intent were not uncommon (some veterans sent self-nominations to the War Department). Understandably, previous Medal of Honor recipients wished to insure that future recipients had achieved an equal level of gallantry. Consequently, on April 23, 1890, Medal recipients formed the Medal of Honor Legion to maintain the Medal’s reputation and to press for stricter requirements for receiving it. On June 26, 1897, sweeping changes were made to how the Medal of Honor was awarded. There were to be no more self-nominations; only official records or eye-witness testimony under oath would be accepted as proof; and claims made after January 1, 1890, could only be made by a commanding officer or soldier who was an eye-witness. Furthermore, there would be a limited time period of one year after the distinguished act to submit the nomination. Despite these reforms, the Medal of Honor continued to be somewhat political, even controversial, at times, and, to a certain degree, it remains so today. In 1917, the Medals of Honor of five civilian scouts, one of whom was the famed showman William F. “Buffalo Bill” Cody, were revoked on the grounds that the scouts were not soldiers in the U.S. Army. Seventy-two years later, Cody’s Medal of Honor was restored to him (he does not seem to have ever returned the actual Medal). In 2001, Theodore Roosevelt posthumously received the Medal of Honor for actions that occurred at San Juan Hill, over one hundred years previous. Historians agree that Roosevelt deserved the Medal, but he had incurred the dislike of the Secretary of War, and, on top of that, had made the mistake of campaigning to receive the honor, something considered rather unseemly at the time. Presently, there is controversy surrounding the Medals of Honor awarded to members of the 7th Cavalry for actions against Big Foot’s village at Wounded Knee, South Dakota, on December 29, 1890. The Lakota, as well as scholars of the incident, consider the attack on Big Foot’s village a massacre.


The several Wounded Knee Medals of Honor issued to 7th Cavalry members are referred to by the Lakota today as Medals of Dishonor, and they are campaigning to have these Medals revoked. Fortunately, such controversy does not surround the Medal of Honor awarded to William Jackson Palmer. He justly deserved the Medal for well-documented acts of gallantry, but what was probably his life’s highest honor did not come easily. cacacacacaca On September 6, 1861, William Jackson Palmer wrote that “there is something about the Cavalry that accords more with my spirit than the other arms.” The Civil War was nearly 5 months old, and the 24-year-old Palmer, a Quaker by faith, had decided to join the fight. He would later explain that his obedience to conscience outweighed his belief in nonresistance. Young Palmer, like other men of ambition, set about raising a company of fighting men. It was to be an elite unit of cavalry intended to serve as the bodyguard for some highranking officer. The men were to be handpicked— in fact, they were to be nominated by upstanding representatives from various communities. Additionally, those nominated for this hand- Back: Adjutant J. C. Reiff, Quarter Master John W. Johnston, and Commander picked company were Charles S. Hinchman. Front: Major A. required to take an oath B. Garner, Lieutenant Colonel Charles not to partake of alcohol M. Betts, General William J. Palmer, and during their term of Major William Wagner. Betts, Hinchman, service. As was often the and Garner were among those who signed the petitions nominating Palmer case, the man who was for the Medal of Honor. From History of the responsible for organizing Fifteenth Pennsylvania Volunteer Cavalry (1906), the company was elected by Charles H. Kirk, ed.

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its captain. Captain Palmer’s unit was christened the Anderson Troop, for they were hopeful of becoming the bodyguard for General Robert Anderson, the hero of Fort Sumter. This did not come to be, but the name of the company was retained. A year later, Palmer’s commanding general was so impressed with the quality of the Anderson Troop that he requested Palmer to enlarge the company. Palmer enlisted twelve hundred men in ten days’ time. Instead of enlarging the Anderson Troop, these fresh recruits would be designated the 15th Pennsylvania Volunteer Cavalry, with Palmer as its colonel and commanding officer. As the 15th Pennsylvania was training at Carlisle Barracks, Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee was leading his Army of Northern Virginia on an invasion of the North. Palmer received orders to take as many men as he considered ready for combat to Hagerstown, Maryland, not far from Antietam Creek. It was during this period, immediately before and after the Battle of Antietam on September 17, 1862, that Palmer performed truly courageous acts, risking his life for his country on several occasions. He became, quite literally, a spy. Of his own volition, Palmer slipped behind Southern lines and gathered information on the enemy’s positions and planned movements. Unfortunately, the young colonel slipped behind the lines one too many times and was captured on September 18, 1862, and subsequently imprisoned in Richmond, Virginia. Because he was captured in civilian clothes and suspected of being a spy, Palmer had to use extreme cunning, and considerable luck, to escape the hangman’s noose. He used an alias, W. J. Peters, and with the help of friends on both sides of the line, who helped him carry on his charade, Palmer/Peters was exchanged months later for a Richmond citizen held in the North. “With the name of Peters I shook off that terrible nightmare of suspense,” Palmer wrote later about his ordeal. “I awoke, as it were from a horrible dream where I had been playing a part, where I had been a helpless actor to my own personality.” In February 1863, Palmer returned to the 15th Pennsylvania, then stationed in Tennessee. The colonel absorbed himself in reorganizing the regiment, which had suffered the last few


months without his guidance, and by the summer of 1863, he had turned it into a respectable fighting unit capable of any task. As part of the Department of the Cumberland, the 15th Pennsylvania saw service scouting, carrying dispatches, hunting bushwhackers, conducting raids, burning bridges and railroads, etc.—anything to hamper the enemy. Based on the recommendation of Major General George H. Thomas (popularly known as the “Rock of Chickamauga”), Palmer received the brevet rank of brigadier general of volunteers on March 22, 1865, to date from November 6, 1864. A brevet was a largely honorary promotion most often awarded for “gallant and meritorious service.” On May 8, 1865, near Covington, Georgia, while in pursuit of a desperate Jefferson Davis, President of the Confederate States of America, the 15th Pennsylvania captured Davis’ wagon train. When the cavalrymen looked inside the wagons, they discovered $185,000 in gold, $1,585,000 in bank bonds and securities, and millions more in Confederate notes and bonds. A little over two months later, on June 21, 1865, Palmer was mustered out of the service with his officers and men at Nashville, Tennessee. cacacacacaca Palmer left the 15th Pennsylvania to resume a career in railroading, a career that is well chronicled elsewhere in the pages of this book. But as the years passed, and as he and other veterans got on with a life of, for the most part, peace and industry, the men of the 15th Pennsylvania never wavered in their loyalty and admiration for their commanding officer (Palmer in fact brought some of his subordinates with him to the American West). On January 21, 1893, six former officers of the 15th Pennsylvania petitioned the Secretary of War to award Palmer the Medal of Honor for his services as a spy before and after the battle of Antietam. These men undoubtedly thought that this long-overdue recognition for General Palmer would easily meet the current criteria for the nation’s highest military honor. It did not. In a communication dated August 14, 1893, the War Department returned the petition, stating that “the services

GARDNER • 49

specified do not seem to constitute that conspicuous gallantry in action for which medals are issued.” This response from the War Department stunned Palmer’s supporters. Alexander K. McClure, a prominent Pennsylvania Republican and editor of the Philadelphia Times, had personally forwarded the petition to the War Department, and he was astounded that the petition was not accepted. McClure, formerly an assistant adjutant general of volunteers and the only officer in charge at Chambersburg, Pennsylvania, during the action at Antietam, wrote a long letter to Secretary of War Daniel S. Lamont in defense of the petition. McClure emphasized that he had been in close communication with Palmer during the period elaborated on in the petition, and he testified to the fact that Palmer crossed the lines and got information for General McClellan on seven to nine separate occasions. He closed his letter thus: I have not seen General Palmer for more than twenty years, and have never had any communication with him on this subject. As I stated at the beginning of this letter, I had nothing to do with the application for the award of the medal of honor, but when presented to me doubtless signed it, and forwarded [it]. Now that his case has been considered and a formal decision rendered that he is not worthy of this distinction, I feel that it is my duty to say to you that this case should be reopened, and that the honor should be awarded to him. . . . I ask you as a matter of justice to one of the most gallant men of the Army to reopen this case, and revise the judgment already given. McClure received an immediate response from the Secretary of War, who again pointed out that the law regarding the Medal of Honor stated specifically that the recognition was reserved for those soldiers who had most distinguished themselves “in action.” Palmer’s spying, regardless of how dangerous or heroic, did not take place on the field of battle. However, Lamont left the door open for Palmer’s supporters. “The service record of this officer is a most creditable one,” he wrote, “and I have no


doubt that some of his surviving comrades will be able to bear testimony to some specific act of gallantry of his in action which will bring his case within the terms of the law and will enable me to award him the medal to which I feel sure he is entitled, and which I should be glad, both on his account and yours, to award him now if the evidence before me would warrant my doing so.” Another petition was submitted to the War Department on September 8, 1893, nominating Palmer for distinguished gallantry in action at Red Hill, Alabama, on January 15, 1865. On that date, Palmer, with one hundred eighty men of the 15th Pennsylvania, surprised rebel Brigadier General Hylon B. Lyon and two hundred of his men. Palmer’s command took ninetyfive prisoners, one hundred twenty horses, and one piece of artillery, losing only one man in the engagement. “At a critical moment,” the petition read, “when Gen. Lyon was endeavoring to form one of his regiments to stay our progress, Col. Palmer, with his staff and a few men, made an attack on the force which completed its discomfiture and left us complete master of that part of the field.” Five months later, a very surprised Palmer received a letter from Colonel F. C. Ainsworth, chief of the Record and Pension Office at the War Department, informing him that he had been awarded the Medal of Honor. His medal was being forwarded to him via registered mail (today, the President of the United States personally awards Medals of Honor). In a letter of March 4, 1894, Palmer thanked Ainsworth for “conveying this testimonial to me” and requested the names of those men who had nominated him. “I should like to thank these unknown friends for their kind offices,” Palmer wrote. What did Palmer think of his Medal of Honor? He was touched, of course, and quite proud. In 1896, the War Department issued a new ribbon and knot (the knot or rosette to be worn in lieu of the Medal) to better distinguish the Medal of Honor from other medals. Palmer wrote in to request both the new knot and the new ribbon. It is that 1896 ribbon that is attached to Palmer’s Medal of Honor today. Most of all, though, the Medal of Honor represented to Palmer a great cause won and a lifelong

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camaraderie formed through shared hardships, joys, losses, and victories. It is not uncommon for young men and women who go through life and death experiences together – literal trials by fire – to form extremely strong, enduring bonds. Palmer’s men nominated him for the Medal of Honor as the greatest tribute they could think of for their commander. Their act tells us how much they respected and loved him. Those feelings were mutual. In an introduction to a history of the 15th Pennsylvania Cavalry published in 1906, Palmer wrote the following: It was a great and pure cause for which they fought, and if war is ever justifiable, their consciences are clear that this one was so. That I am proud to have commanded and to have since retained the respect and confidence of such a body of men goes without saying. Mark L. Gardner is a professional historian, author, and musician with a broad range of publications—both popular and scholarly—focusing on the American West. He has written several interpretive histories for National Park Service historic sites, including Little Bighorn Battlefield, Fort Laramie, the Santa Fe Trail, and Bent’s Old Fort. He has also written biographies of frontier icons George Armstrong Custer (2005) and Geronimo (2006). He lives with his family in Cascade, Colorado. Visit his web site at http://www.SongOfTheWest.com.


Sources

William Jackson Palmer’s Medal of Honor, along with its ribbon and original wooden box, is currently on display on the third floor of the Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum. Palmer’s Medal of Honor file, which contains much of the correspondence I have quoted in this essay, resides in the National Archives, Washington, D.C. An excellent history of the Medal of Honor is found in George Lang, Raymond L. Collins, and Gerard F. White, Medal of Honor Recipients, 1863-1994, 2 vols. (New York: Facts on File, 1995). For a history of the Anderson Troop and the 15th Pennsylvania Cavalry, see Charles H. Kirk, ed., History of the Fifteenth Pennsylvania Volunteer Cavalry (Philadelphia: Privately Printed, 1906). This regimental history contains dozens of first-person accounts from members of the 15th, as well as numerous revealing letters from Palmer. Unfortunately, there is only one substantial biography of Palmer, John S. Fisher’s A Builder of the West: The Life of General William Jackson Palmer (Caldwell, Idaho: Caxton Printers, 1939). Obviously, Fisher’s work is quite dated and does not do justice to the wealth of archival materials now available relating to Palmer and his various business enterprises. It remains a useful overview, however.

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The Medal of Honor awarded to General William Jackson Palmer is on exhibit at the Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum. On July 12, 1862, President Abraham Lincoln signed the law authorizing this recognition of “such non– commissioned officers and privates as shall most distinguish themselves by their gallantry in action, and other soldier-like qualities, during the present insurrection”—the American Civil War. Courtesy of the Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum.

Facing page: Ribbon for the 15th Pennsylvania Cavalry 35th Reunion held in Colorado Springs during August 1907. The pin-back hanger (top) and medal (bottom) would have originally been joined together with a gold ribbon and measured 4 inches long and 1.75 inches wide. The medal shows General Palmer in high relief, with the words “GENERAL WM J. PALMER.” The obverse reads “COLORADO SPRINGS AUG. 17-26, 1907.” From the collection of Victor J. Stone.

District.

Two hundred eighty surviving members of the “Fighting Fifteenth” Pennsylvania Cavalry, from a regiment of twelve hundred men, joined with their former commander, Brevet Brigadier General William J. Palmer at his Glen Eyrie home. Palmer and his daughters are seated in the center. Forbidden by his doctors to travel to Pennsylvania for the 35th annual regimental reunion in August 1907, Palmer, at his own expense, invited his old comrades to join him for a week of festivities in Colorado Springs. From Special Collections, Pikes Peak Library

An Abiding Bond: The Friendship Between Major Henry McAllister & General William Jackson Palmer Barbara Gately Major Henry McAllister and General William Jackson Palmer were true friends. Webster’s dictionary defines a friend as a person whom one knows, likes, and trusts or one who is attached to another by esteem and affection; it says that a friend is an intimate associate; a supporter. These two men trusted one another, liked each other and they certainly held each other in high esteem throughout their long and close friendship. There are no personal journals or diaries written by the men about each other that we can research to help us understand their special relationship, but their actions, and inter-actions with one another, and their interwoven lives, can give us a glimpse into just how close and true their friendship was. These two men fought together in the Civil War, or the “War of the Rebellion,” as it was called at that time. They worked together on a railroad building project, a great adventure, that began as the dream of one, William Jackson Palmer, and that became both a dream and a life’s work for the two of them. It could be said that Palmer and McAllister were destined to become friends. The two had a long and faithful association, but they might also be considered “born friends” because of the coincidence of the time and place of their birth. Both Henry McAllister and William Palmer were born in Kent County, Delaware, only three days apart. Henry was born on the “14th of the ninth month” (September) in 1836 near Brandywine. William was born on September 17, 1836, near Kinsale. And although the two men became close friends from the time they served together as young men in the Civil War and would remained lifelong friends, there is no record that they knew one another when they were very young when their families were still in Delaware.1 • 55 •

56 • AN ABIDING BOND

The similarities of their early lives continued beyond the coincidence of their close birthdates and place of birth. Both were born into Quaker families. Both families moved to Philadelphia where the boys attended school. Their lives diverged when they were young men in Philadelphia. At age seventeen, at the behest of his uncle, Frank H. Jackson, William Jackson Palmer traveled to England and France to study the use of coal as fuel in the railroads and how coke was smelted. Henry McAllister graduated from high school in Philadelphia. After a diligent study of the mercantile business he went to work for his father, a Philadelphia merchant. Both young men pursued their chosen professions and were getting on with their lives when Fort Sumter was surrendered to the Confederates in April 1861, thus igniting the Civil War. This event permanently intertwined the lives of the two men. Palmer immediately enlisted in the Union army and organized the elite Anderson Troop, commissioned with the rank of captain. Palmer’s troop later grew into the 15th Pennsylvania Volunteer Cavalry. Six months later, in September 1861, McAllister enlisted as a private, although he could have easily obtained a commission. In October 1861, he joined the 15th Pennsylvania.2 In September 1862, Palmer was captured and imprisoned for four months in an old tobacco warehouse in Richmond that had been converted into a Confederate prison. Without their commander, the unit became disorganized, began to disintegrate, and many deserted. By the time of Palmer’s imprisonment, McAllister had risen to the rank of sergeant. He remained loyal to the unit and loyal and faithful to his commander. Upon his release in early February 1863, Palmer rejoined his regiment at Nashville and reorganized his men. Among the list of new officers was the name of Henry McAllister. The great historian Samuel Eliot Morison wrote: The new officers were Palmer’s own choice: the best soldiers of the regiment, who had all been sergeants, and ‘every one a gentleman’—and they were his friends, and he could rely on them. . . . By the beginning of June he had made that disorganized rabble into the fine body

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he was to lead through all the long, bitter campaigns of the months and years to come.3 Henry McAllister became first lieutenant of Company G in the reorganized unit, thus beginning the friendship with William Palmer that would continue for the rest of their lives. In May 1863, McAllister was promoted to captain. A courier and scout, he remained in close contact with Colonel Palmer. Palmer later remarked, “As the regiment campaigned actively in every southern state east of the Mississippi river (except Florida & Louisiana) and also in Pennsylvania and Maryland, it Major Henry McAllister was may be supposed that . . . it enjoyed a life-long friend to William a rather adventurous career.”4 Palmer. This is one of the few known portraits of the Major. McAllister’s mishaps in the battle Courtesy McAllister House Museum. of Dandridge, reveal the truth of Palmer’s statement, for McAllister was twice wounded. The second time, his horse was shot out from under him. Later, in reminiscing about his wartime experiences with General Palmer, McAllister recalled how he and the other men felt about their commander, I remember that upon one particularly strenuous campaign we were off our horses but 6 hours in 5 days. We did not and could not complain, for our commander rode at our head. He asked us to do no more than he was willing to do. . . . A member of General Thomas’ staff told the writer that he once heard the great general say that he always felt more comfortable when the 15th Pennsylvania cavalry was scouting in his front, he felt that the danger of a surprise was reduced to a minimum by its presence there. Our services were thus highly


regarded because our Colonel so well knew that the best use to which our arm of the service could be put was to discover the exact position of the enemy.5 At the war’s end, in April 1865, the regiment pursued Confederate President Jefferson Davis as he fled through North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia. By that time, Captain McAllister had been named acting assistant adjutant general on General Palmer’s staff. This was an administrative office with great responsibility and much power at the time. Although they did not capture Davis, the adventure of the chase was worthwhile. As Palmer described it, “I succeeded in throwing my division in front of Jeff Davis, which caused him to disband his four brigades of cavalry escort (except what surrendered), and to take it ‘a la Scotch Cap,’ that I am now hunting him at every cross-road, ferry, and bridge.” And Palmer soon learned that Davis’ capture was due “chiefly” to Palmer’s force, which was credited with driving him into the hands of his captor, General James H. Wilson. 6 It is no wonder that men who shared such daring and difficult experiences would remain connected and would consider each other comrades and brothers-in-arms. And in some cases, as with General Palmer and Major McAllister, their closeness translated into enduring trust and friendship. On June 1, 1865, McAllister was commissioned a Major in the Union army; his regiment mustered out of the army on June 21, 1865, at Nashville, Tennessee. For a time, the lives of the two friends once again diverged. McAllister returned to Philadelphia. He began working for the American Iron and Steel Association. McAllister, as did many other Civil War veterans, including Palmer, followed the custom of using his military title for the rest of his life. On January 17, 1866, Major Henry McAllister married Miss Elizabeth Cooper. Both were of prominent Philadelphia families and that city’s mayor, the Honorable Morton McMichael, conducted their wedding ceremony.7 General Palmer’s wedding gift to his wartime comrade and his bride was a set of parlor chairs, called a lady’s and a gentleman’s chair, and a matching footstool.

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While McAllister lived and worked in Philadelphia, General Palmer was learning more about the railroad business in the west. There he met his future wife, Queen Mellen, and they soon married in Flushing, New York, on November 7, 1870. The General’s good friend, Henry McAllister was among those seeing the couple off on their honeymoon voyage to England on the S.S. Scotia.8 Soon, however, McAllister would join his friend Palmer in the General’s great dream in the West. Major McAllister along with fifteen members of their military regiment would, at one time or another, hold various positions in Palmer’s railroad-building dream. Of his “Dream Railroad,” General Palmer wrote,

Photograph of Elizabeth Coop� er McAllister at the age of 73. Henry McAllister’s beloved “Lizzie” was his wife and com� panion for 46 years until her death in 1912. Courtesy McAllister House Museum.

I thought how fine it would be to have a little railroad a few hundred miles in length, all under one’s control with one’s friends, to have no jealousies and contests and differing policies, but to be able to carry out unimpeded and harmoniously one’s views in regard to what ought and ought not to be done. In this ideal railroad, all my friends should be interested . . . all would work heartily and unitedly toward a common end . . . and a host of good fellows from my regiment should occupy the various positions . . . then, I would have every one of these . . . no matter how low his rank, interested in the stock and profits of the line. . . . How impossible would be peculation, waste, careless management on ‘Our Road.’9


Palmer’s railroad eventually stretched south from Denver to Mexico. Being able to actualize his dream on the land at the foot of Pikes Peak was very enticing to William Palmer, and it was equally appealing to his close friend and wartime comrade, Henry McAllister. McAllister was one of Palmer’s most important friends, helping him to realize his dream. The two men shared the same strong values and work ethic. They also had in common similarities of character and outlook and they even shared a love of poetry.10 In light of these similarities, they continued to be good friends with common goals. Because of his faith in Palmer’s vision, McAllister accepted the presidency of Palmer’s National Land and Improvement Co., organized to develop lands along the General’s proposed north south railway. Since the company had offices in Philadelphia as well as Colorado, McAllister remained in Philadelphia to work for the General while continuing as secretary of the Iron & Steel Association.11 But McAllister was one of the General’s devoted friends and shouldered the responsibility of performing the daily tasks that would create a new community on the frontier of the Rocky Mountains. Palmer wrote that he did not want a wild frontier town; rather his dream was of a place of schools, colleges, science and an almost utopian society. Families would have a good life. The company would help to care for, uplift, and protect them. It would provide schools, bathhouses, libraries, lectures, and everything that would give the town’s inhabitants a healthy life, physically, mentally and spiritually. Workers would prosper by participating in the capitalistic achievements of the General’s dream. They would invest in his railroad, becoming capitalists themselves, thereby eliminating many social problems of the day. From his eastern office, McAllister promoted the town and railroad by advertising widely and distributing promotional material as far away as England, seeking investors for the new town and railway. McAllister worked hard to implement Palmer’s blueprint for the area. Later, McAllister recalled that time, describing the tremendous amount of planning and hard work it took to secure financing and the physical labor

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that went into developing both the city and the railroad. To persuade the Mexican government to allow him to build his railroad to Mexico City, in March 1872, Palmer undertook a long, strenuous journey to Mexico. In his absence, Palmer knew that he would need someone in Colorado to look after his concerns. That person would need to be a strong, trustworthy, firm and able leader. Palmer’s ability to handpick reliable lieutenants, demonstrated in his military years, was well known among his business associates. Another official in his various enterprises said of him, “He did not himself push his various projects. He would decide on what course, in his opinion, was the one to be taken, and then leave the work to others. He had able lieutenants.”12 Palmer urged McAllister to leave the Philadelphia office and come to Colorado as superintendent and director of the Fountain Colony. Palmer needed the help of his trusted friend to realize his “wide awake dream” of building his railroad and his town. He could, with full confidence in the ability of his trusted lieutenant, leave McAllister in charge. Agreeing to become the director of the General’s land company, the Colorado Springs Company, McAllister traveled to Colorado Springs in 1872. Major McAllister later wrote that his welcome in Colorado was not “an hospitable one.” His train was stopped in Deertrail by a blizzard with winds of seventy-five miles an hour that blew ice pellets though the clothing of the passengers. Unable to move through the icy snow, the train and its passengers were stranded for six days. When he finally arrived in Colorado Springs at midnight of April 10, 1872, the place was cold and damp and his first impression of Colorado Springs was ‘not favorable.’ The city at that time had about twenty buildings and two hundred fifty inhabitants.13 In Colorado Springs the Major began his work as director of the General’s land company. Planning to bring his family from Philadelphia, McAllister bought half a block of land on Cascade Avenue between Boulder and St. Vrain Streets. There he began to build a sturdy and comfortable brick cottage for his family to live in. While his house was under construction the financial panic of 1873 was spreading throughout the United States. Banks


failed, people lost investments, and companies went under. There was little confidence that the Colorado Springs Company would be able to survive. Many of the company’s investors had lost their investment wealth and were encountering grave financial difficulties. Investors feared the new city could not weather the dismal financial climate. However, an article in the August 30, 1873, Colorado Springs Gazette Newspaper, allayed the fears of some: The foundations of a brick and stone villa for Major McAllister are already laid in the center of half a block on Cascade Ave. Some of our candidates for office have been trying to catch a vote or two by reporting that the Colorado Springs Company will soon sell out all their interests here. It scarcely looks like it, when the executive director is just entering upon the work of building himself a costly residence.14 The early years were difficult for the Colorado Springs Company, financial crisis and crop failure produced hardships. The devastating economic depression of 1873 temporarily ended all construction of the Rio Grande railway and affected McAllister’s friend General Palmer in a very personal way. While the Major’s stately home was under construction, the Palmer family was unable to maintain their Glen Eyrie home. To economize, in the mid-1870s, Palmer rented a cottage in Colorado Springs.15 No profits were realized until the 1880s. Despite this, McAllister continued to help Palmer realize his vision. The city was managed by a board of Town Trustees, of which McAllister was a member, serving as president of the board from 1875 to 1877. The Colorado Springs Company set aside one third of all its lots and lands for profit and the other two thirds, over the cost of $15 per acre, for the town improvements, including trees, ditches, churches, etc. McAllister planted five thousand cottonwoods from the Arkansas River Valley throughout the downtown region. He helped raise funds for libraries, for schools and other needed materials. He had

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irrigation ditches dug to provide water for residents and made other improvements to the city. To make his town more attractive to settlers and to carry out his utopian ideal, Palmer’s Colorado Springs Company set aside land for a future college, overlooking Monument Creek. McAllister helped persuade the Congregational Church and Reverend Thomas Nelson Haskell to locate their proposed college in Colorado Springs rather than Denver, by donating land and cash valuing $35,000 to supplement the $40,000 that the church would invest. In a letter to Reverend Haskell, McAllister wrote, We are aware that we have offered liberal terms, terms that even Denver will not offer: but we properly appreciate the value of your institution to our town, and we are willing to go even beyond any risk of competition. . . . The college is worth what we offer . . . and we offer our land and money freely.16 The Colorado College was established in 1874, and both McAllister and Palmer became trustees. In everything he did, McAllister was helping Palmer realize his dream and together they carried out the plan that both friends had envisioned. McAllister remained involved with the Denver and Rio Grande Railroad, especially when Palmer was away on business trips. Track had been laid beyond Pueblo south to El Moro and more was planned westward through the gorge of the Arkansas River. It would then travel north to reach Leadville and its busy mines. The Atchison Topeka and Santa Fe also wanted to build track through the gorge. By April 18, 1878, the D&RG crews were set to begin work at the mouth of the Royal Gorge. After learning of the D&RG’s plans, officials of the Santa Fe sent workmen ahead so that the Rio Grande crews would not be able to work. When the D&RG crews arrived, they were unable to start work since the unfriendly Santa Fe crew blocked the way. The right of way through the Gorge to Salida had been granted to the D&RG and the company would not relinquish its rights. Both groups built camps. Rock and stone forts were


constructed and occupied by armed men for months. After a yearlong standoff, the D&RG needed supplies. McAllister set out on June 5, 1879, to take thirty pistols and twenty carbines (he had “cached” them in the closet in the library of his house) to the D&RG camp. His young son Harry sat beside him in the wagon so that no one would suspect what cargo he was transporting. The courts finally settled the matter in favor of the D&RG without any shots being fired. After working for Palmer for several years, McAllister resigned in order to go into business for himself. Although no longer working directly for Palmer, McAllister was always available to help promote the city and lead it to greater prosperity. He became involved in the manufacture of coke, which was used in the smelting of metals. He also ranched east of Colorado Springs, and worked as the chief county clerk for El Paso County. He was part owner of Palmer’s Out West Printing Press that published the Out West newspaper, later the Colorado Springs Gazette Telegraph. McAllister was a confidant and steadfast friend to Palmer when he experienced set backs in his private life. When Queen Palmer left Colorado Springs to live in New York, and later England, McAllister and his wife Elizabeth were there to keep him involved in the social life of the community as well as to bolster his spirits on a more personal level. After Queen died of a heart ailment in 1894, Palmer brought his three daughters Elsie, Marjory and Dorothy to live at Glen Eyrie, his home. Palmer became even more shy and removed from people in the town. His reserve was seen as aloofness by the townspeople, but Elsie helped him become more involved and the Glen took on a more carefree aspect with the help of some of his old friends, including McAllister and his children. In 1907, a year after the accident that left him paralyzed and unable to travel to Philadelphia for a regimental reunion, Palmer hosted a reunion of the 15th Pennsylvania Volunteer Cavalry in his beloved city of Colorado Springs. Palmer paid for everything for the two hundred seventy-eight men who came to the reunion. McAllister served as the reunion’s major organizer. Headquarters for the reunion was Palmer’s Antlers

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Hotel although some men were housed at the dormitories of the Colorado College. There were parades, picnics, speeches and attractions including riding the cog railway to the summit of Pikes Peak and touring the Cave of the Winds. For a week in August 1907, the General and his men shared a very happy and special time together. The attention of the entire nation was caught by this story and Americans everywhere applauded this reunion.17 Both Henry McAllister and William Palmer were men of extreme modesty. Both men refused to take the title of “true pioneers,” as they considered this honor reserved for the original gold rush settlers in Colorado Springs. However, later generations considered them both very much true pioneers. Neither man came to the Colorado Springs area to seek their fortunes in the fever for gold and silver that had brought so many to Colorado. They had other visions. Palmer said, “There is some music in the inception of large enterprises.” McAllister delighted in the “illimitable grassy plains, rolling hills, dark canyons, towering mountains and brilliant sunshine.” 18 In a paper written for the El Paso County Pioneers Association, of which he was a founding member, McAllister paid tribute to his dear friend and regimental commander, General William Jackson Palmer: In previous papers I have not dared to speak, even in a restrained way of the part played by the General in the settlement of El Paso County and the whole state of Colorado. There is a name, however, that stands preeminently forward among those who were instrumental in founding and laboring for the growth of Colorado Springs. I of course, allude to General William J. Palmer. . . . Some years ago, the state historical society asked Dr. W. A. Bell and myself to prepare a life of General Palmer, primarily for the state archives. The General promptly vetoed the arrangement; he could not be made to see that he had done anything in his life to merit such distinction.19


McAllister included in his paper part of a letter that he had written to those who attended the 15th Pennsylvania reunion one and a half years earlier. After the reunion, he wrote more openly regarding the importance of his friendship with General Palmer. He spoke about the General’s many accomplishments in Colorado and the West, and of his dream of building a beautiful city that would be a wonderful place to live and visit. In closing his letter to the men who had attended the reunion he wrote, But greater than his triumphs upon the field of battle to which we bore witness: greater than his triumphs over the forces of nature, as illustrated by his great work in Colorado, are the triumphs in his character. Of those attributes which we are in the habit of considering as appertaining to the heart rather than to the head, triumphs which have won for him the undying love of his old comrades in arms, of the people of this community, and of all whose privilege it is to know him.20 Only six months after his steadfast, dedicated friend, Major Henry McAllister, read his paper to the Pioneers Association, General Palmer passed away in March 1909. Among the honorary pallbearers was William Jackson Palmer’s lifelong friend, Henry McAllister, who lived on until 1921. Although both men were extremely modest and did not consider that they should be singled out for special praise, they were true pioneers who built a lasting legacy in the West and in the city of Colorado Springs. It is to be hoped that Major Henry McAllister will be remembered not only for all that he was and all that he did for the city of Colorado Springs, but also as an example of a good and true friend. Barbara Gately received her B.A. (summa cum laude) from the University of Colorado, Colorado Springs, with majors in both Geography and Environmental Studies, and Spanish, and with a minor in History. As a former curator of the McAllister House Museum, Gately offers a unique insight into the lives

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of the pioneers of the Pikes Peak Region. She participated in the bicentennial celebration of Zebulon M. Pike’s expedition in the West and specializes in the history of the Victorian Era. Gately enjoys reading historical novels and mysteries, as well as researching historic costumes and needlework.

Notes

1. Polly �� King Ruhtenberg and Dorothy E. Smith, Henry McAllister: Colorado Pioneer (Freeman, S.D.: Pine Hill Press, 1972), 8. 2. �� Ibid. 3. Samuel �� Eliot Morison, The Oxford History of the American People (New York: Oxford Press, 1965), 611. 4. Charles �� H. Kirk, ed., History of the Fifteenth Pennsylvania Volunteer Cavalry, (Philadephia: The Historical Society of the Fifteenth Pennsylvania Cavalry, 1906), 9. 5. Henry McAllister, El Paso �� Pioneers Association paper, September 1908. 6. �� William Jackson Palmer letter to Frank Jackson, May 6, 1865; Palmer letter to Frank Jackson, June 1, 1879, reprinted in Kirk, History of the Fifteenth Pennsylvania, 730, 734. 7. �� Ruhtenberg, Henry McAllister, 11-12. 8. Marshall �� Sprague, Newport in the Rockies (Denver: Sage Books, 1961), 48. 9. �� Ruhtenberg, Henry McAllister, 12. 10. �� Sprague, Newport in the Rockies, 48. 11. �� Ruthenberg, Henry McAllister, 12. 12. �� George A. Krause, Colorado Springs Gazette & Telegraph, September 1, 1929. 13. �� Ruhtenberg, Henry McAllister, 17-20. 14. �� Ibid., 33. 15. Doris �� B. Osterwald, Rails Thru The Gorge A Mile By Mile Guide for the Royal Gorge Route (Denver: Western Guideways, Ltd., 2003), 77. 16. Henry �� McAllister, letter to Rev. T. N. Haskell, December 10, 1873. McAllister House Museum Archives. 17. �� Marshall Sprague, Newport in the Rockies. (Athens: Swallow Press/Ohio University Press, Fourth Revised Edition, 1987), 147. 18. �� Ruhtenberg, Henry McAllister, 45. 19. �� Ibid., 47. 20. �� Ibid., 49.

Mary Lincoln “Queen” Mellen Palmer, possibly on her wedding day November 7, 1870, in Flushing, New York. Courtesy of Starsmore Center for Local History at the Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum.

“My Darling Queenie . . .” A Love Story Chris Nicholl Do not hesitate, my darling, to tell me how much you love me. You cannot spoil me in that way. You would not fear to if you knew what an inspiration it is to me— and not only an inspiration, but a shield.1 William Jackson Palmer, 1869 William Jackson Palmer penned those romantic words to his fiancée Queen Mellen in June 1869. Mary Lincoln “Queen” Mellen, a 19-year-old beauty, was charming, kind and well educated. William, a 32-year old Civil War hero and railway builder, was charismatic and intelligent. The couple had much in common. They enjoyed art, poetry, literature, and they shared a passion for travel. Within weeks of their April 1869 meeting in a rail car—a business trip for William and a pleasure excursion for Queen—the couple was betrothed. Their courtship was a long-distance one, carried on through letters, telegrams and brief visits by Palmer whose business drew him from west to east and back again. In November 1870, they married. Although marked by frequent and lengthy separations, theirs was a grand and bittersweet love story, but it endured a lifetime. How could William resist the beguiling Queen, whose many charms included “a mental sparkle,” “unfailing kindness,” “dread of sham and show,” “a wonderful mezzo voice?” Indeed the author of those sentiments, wrote, “can anyone wonder that men were her devoted slaves, and such women as understood her, loved her to distraction.”2 Another admirer, a woman friend, touched upon both Queen’s vivacious beauty and her capacity to surround herself in the splendor of literature and music and the solitude in which to enjoy it, • 69 •

70 • MY DARLING QUEENIE

Queen Palmer, climbing stock in hand, rebellious curly hair flying, cheeks aglow, moving as on winged feet, was the spirit incarnate of inaccessible heights. Hats she scorned. She laid claim to beauty as her rightful heritage, whether in a moated English house in Surrey, or in the spacious room in the third story of “Glen Eyrie,” where she gathered books, heard musicians, and never permitted any but an invited friend to enter.3 A memoir of Anna Held, the German governess for Elsie Palmer and companion for Queen, who lived with the Palmer family from 1876 into the mid-1880s, recalled Queen as, “A woman, sensitive, fine, alive to beauty and poetry in their varied manifestations . . .”4 And William spoke of how she captivated others, by her charming ways and mesmerizing gaze. In a letter to her, he reported that upon first meeting her, an acquaintance admired Queen. This sentiment delighted him, as it agreed with his own estimate. “I did not know how you were regarded by staid and disinterested people whom you had not had an opportunity of suborning, by being sweet to them—and stealing away their candid judgement by looking into their eyes.”5 How could Queen resist such a man who could so poetically describe his feelings? William told Queen his dreams for their future life. And what fantastic dreams he had! He loved the West, finding inspiration in its majestic mountains, and he envisioned developing its resources and opening it to settlement. The couple looked forward to a life, rich and varied, a life imagined and achieved by few others in history. Together, in the magnificent Colorado landscape, they would establish a new railway reaching from Denver to Mexico and a new colony of cultivated souls. At the foot of Pikes Peak, they would build a castle; nestled in the canyon they called Glen Eyrie. Upon their railway, they would travel in a private little house-car. In January 1870, William mused, Could one live in constant view of these grand mountains without being elevated by them into a lofty plane

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of thought and purpose? And then our future home occurred to me, and I felt so happy that I would have such a wife, who was broad enough, earnest enough, wise and good and pure enough to think that a wild home amidst such scenery was preferable to a brown stone palace in a fashionable city.6 And in February 1870, William wrote of a home site that he called “Queen’s Park, after a certain Royal Creature.”7 Queen first visited Colorado Springs in April 1870. Enchanted by the remote, sublime location nestled in the Garden of the Gods, she began designing a three-storied home with spacious rooms for the children she dreamed she would raise, the guests she would entertain, and the servants she would employ. And in October 1870, a month before their wedding, Queen told William, “My Beloved . . . I love you with all my heart . . . God bless my Will—and keep him always—My prayers are all yours—My soul itself lives but for you—dear Love.”8 In a plain Quaker ceremony, the Palmers were married at the Mellen home at Flushing, New York, on November 7, 1870. The day following, they sailed to Europe for a three-month long combined honeymoon and business trip for William. In October 1871, Queen Palmer arrived to live in Colorado Springs. William, away on business, welcomed his bride with letters. Before their wedding, William had mused that in the founding of their new colony, “I wonder which will be the busiest, you or I?”9 Generous with her time and talent, within weeks of her arrival, Queen had answered William’s question: she would be as busy as he. While William pursued his business interests, Queen, left to entertain herself in his absence, captivated the hearts of her new neighbors and inspired the cultural foundations in her new home. A 1905 news account, written by Edward Wright, the son of a pioneering Colorado Springs family, detailed Queen Palmer’s delightful persona and her diligent efforts as the town’s founding mother. “Mrs. Palmer, who was in many ways a moving spirit in her husband’s


enterprises” not only named the city’s streets, but within weeks of her arrival, she founded and taught the city’s first school.10 Wright’s memories harkened back to earlier days when as a youngster he attended school under Queen’s tutelage. Only a few years younger than his teen-aged teacher, Edward’s adoration of her spills out. Fearing that memories of Queen’s “sweet personality” and of her early “influence” might fade away, Wright’s memoir reveals that the beautiful young Queen was a most generous woman, a naturally gifted teacher and an unusually sensitive and sympathetic person. Because Wright’s memoir offers a delightful, eyewitness view of Queen, a lengthy excerpt follows. Mrs. Palmer . . . a beautiful young bride. . . was the originator of the idea of the school, and it was her work to carry it out in every detail. She supplied the schoolroom and all its furniture, including a good cabinet organ; she invited personally every boy and girl in reach to be there on the day for opening. When we came, some twenty in number, on an early October morning, we found all possible books and supplies of every sort in quantities very generous; and beyond all this, Mrs. Palmer had installed herself as teacher. She gave herself to the work without stint, coming from Glen Eyrie every morning by 9, either driving or riding, for she loved fine horses, bringing her noon lunch, and so working until 4, every day for months. It was a kindness and self-forgetfulness so rare that I have never personally known any instance comparable to it. Mrs. Palmer was a rarely beautiful woman, and, to me at least, living in the new west, with its homely, plain people, the elegance of her dress, and grace and charm of her manner, her genuine refinement and her unvarying patience and kindness, her soft, musical voice as used in reading or talking and in her beautiful singing, for she was fine both as reader or singer, all combined to give my first Colorado Springs teacher a marked influence over me. We all brought lunch at Mrs. Palmer’s request, then at noon we all ate together, and talked and then a fine

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Portrait of a young Queen Palmer. Caption on back reads “Mrs. Mary Lincoln ‘Queen’ Mellen Palmer, circa 1870, possibly soon after her marriage to brevet brigadier-general William Jackson Palmer.” Photographer’s stamp on back reads, “Berlin Photograph Retouched. Bell, Photographer, 1200 Chestnut St. Philada. PA.” From the collection of Victor J. Stone.


croquet set was brought forth and all were marshaled out into the sunshine, and we were taught the game. On one afternoon each week Mrs. Palmer would read to the school from stories of Greek mythology a subject wholly new to every one of us. So our interest was intense as we heard . . . ‘Pegasus’, and the ‘Labors of Hercules,’ and the ‘Gorgon Mudusa,’ and ‘Pandora’s box,’ and others. We all began to write essays which were corrected and commented on with care and kindness, and the best ones read aloud by Mrs. Palmer herself, and she sought earnestly to train each one to read effectively both prose and rhyme. All were invited once to write an essay on the subject, ‘The Home I left and the home I Came to.’ [O]ur daily work was in every sense genuine school work, with hard lessons and painstaking teaching, so that all the time we learned, from books or while resting or playing, our very games being made to contribute, for instance, to our knowledge of correct speaking. For both others and me there was more of real comprehension of the subject from the influence of those months than from years of study of grammar and rules. If Mrs. Palmer decided that any pupil ought to take any study she promptly arranged for it in some way. I needed bookkeeping, as she thought, and she said: ‘I do not myself know sufficiently well how to teach this subject, so I have arranged with General Palmer to have you go three days in the week to his office and have your lessons there.’ I have always deeply regretted that because of Mrs. Palmer’s residence abroad for her whole life after about 1883, she is almost forgotten in the community whose first life and earliest institutions, as well as plans and hopes and aspirations, she did so much by her energy and good sense added to all the lovely qualities . . . to both create and mould in the direction of the best things,

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and I long to see her name honored as it should be in the city she loved, now grown to a size and beauty, I verily believe, beyond her fondest hopes.11 The record suggests that the Palmer family were part-time residents in Colorado Springs. Palmer’s business required frequent travel, at times for extended periods and he was often away from Glen Eyrie. In October 1872, following a business and pleasure excursion in Mexico, the Palmer’s first child Elsie was born in New York. Still, the Palmers traveled; while on a February 1875, Parisian voyage, Queen noted that they had traveled nearly constantly. The Palmer’s governess, Anna Held and her young sister, Helene, who enjoyed many visits at Glen Eyrie, mentioned the frequency and duration of the family’s journeys. Anna recalled, “The Palmers traveled extensively as they followed Gen. Palmer on his business trips. London and New York were the usual destinations.”12 While on a sightseeing excursion to Leadville in the summer of 1880, tragedy struck. Queen suffered a heart attack. Within weeks of that traumatic event, her daughter Dorothy was born at Glen Eyrie. Slightly over a year later, in England in the fall of 1881, the Palmers welcomed their youngest child, Marjory.13 Explaining why Dorothy’s birth occurred in Europe, Anna Held noted that as Palmer was called to England for business, they “decided that Mrs. Palmer would travel to London to be near him during the time of confinement.” Describing the complexity of Palmer travel arrangements, Anna recalled “a somewhat overwhelmingly large party that set forth from Glen Eyrie for London. . . . Mrs. Palmer, Elsie, Dorothy, two governesses, the family doctor and two maids.”14 In his perennially popular history of Colorado Springs, Newport in the Rockies, Marshall Sprague created a lasting negative impression of Queen. He wrote that she “was unable to accept Glen Eyrie and Colorado Springs” and that, “she allowed herself to hurt [Palmer] by turning against his Pikes Peak dream which he was realizing for her” and “the marriage broke up for good [in 1883] when Queen left Glen Eyrie on the grounds that a ‘heart condition’ required her to live at sea level.”15


However, the letters and diaries of Queen and Will, and the assurance by their descendants that the Palmers remained a devoted couple, suggest that Sprague was mistaken. In reality, throughout those early years and often through difficult economic times, Queen’s “life centered around Will, her family and her step-sisters and brothers who also lived at Glen Eyrie.”16 But, ultimately for Queen, “the altitude of Colorado Springs made long continued residence there inadvisable,” she journeyed “to New York and repeatedly to England. More and more time was spent in and about London, Gen. Palmer providing splendid homes and being as frequently with his wife and children as his business activities would permit.”17 In 1885 or 1886, following a last four-month visit at Glen Eyrie, Queen left her beloved home in Colorado Springs forever.18 Continuing the itinerant life to which she was accustomed, Queen sought a healthful climate, staying for brief times in Newport, R.I., Morristown, N.J., and in New York City. Finally, around 1887, Queen and her daughters settled permanently in England. Throughout the twenty-four years of their marriage, William’s extensive real estate holdings and frequent travel suggest that his family might have enjoyed his company in a variety of locations, had he been free to devote his time to hearth and home. He owned thousands of acres throughout Colorado, from Denver to the San Luis Valley, a castle near Mexico City, apartments in New York City and London.19 But the evidence suggests that Palmer, the pioneer promoter of railways and towns, was much distracted and on nearly constant junkets. It mattered not whether Queen dwelled in London or at Glen Eyrie, as the following August 1883 newspaper account illustrates: At the last annual meeting of the directors, General Palmer was practically relieved of the principal portion of his duties by a resolution placing the control of operation in the hands of a managing committee, whenever General Palmer was absent from New York. He has been away from the main office of the company much of the time for the past two years, his Mexican railway projects requiring a great deal of attention.20

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It was Queen’s ill health that held her captive in England, not a rupture in the Palmers’ relationship. In 1887, she wrote, “My Dear Will—I told [the doctor] about my house in Colorado—and my desire to get back to it as soon as I am able.” Her physician advised that she remain in England’s moderate climate. A most revealing picture of Queen’s devotion to William appears in an undated draft in which she asked, Is it quite impossible for you to come to England?— with only an occasional visit to America? Can you not give up some of your responsibilities there—and with a smaller income in consequence—be happy with your little family here? I should look for a house a little larger than this—in a beautiful part of the country—where we could all be so happy together—and then—after a few years that I ought to remain here—we might all be able to go back to our own home in Glen Eyrie . . . Do consider this well—it would be a rest and change for you, too, that would probably do you good, as well.21 It is unknown if Queen mailed that appeal to William. That he did not permanently join his family in England suggests that she withheld the letter or that she acknowledged, as she had done in the early days of their courtship, that her greatest competitor for William’s attention and even affection was his business interests. In May 1870, she had written, You may imagine my disappointment on the receipt of your note Saturday—still, I suppose I may as well get used to these sudden moves of yours and accept my fate with mild resignation—I had anticipated such a pleasant Sunday!—However—I know it was right for you to go—and where duty interferes with pleasure, pleasure must always give way.22 Like his wife, William missed the companionship and solace of family. But his powerful sense of responsibility is revealed in an 1882 letter, written aboard a ship returning him to New York from England, where his family remained.


My Darling Queenie . . . I have taken it easy aboard Ship . . . I shall plunge into the Maelstrom however tomorrow. My single purpose now is to rescue the various Enterprises from the gulf which seems to yawn for them and save my friends and the other investors from a final loss if possible. . . . My little family is the oasis—the only green spot to which my mind can turn without distress & disappointment. . . . And you my dear wife whom I have so often cruelly distressed & whose young affections I allowed to be Estranged because I was hard & cold & blind and stupid & wretchedly wrong altogether, and Reckless. . . . at a heaven would life seem now, if with vigorous health, one had nothing to do but start without a penny to make a home for this beloved flock.23 Still, Queen and William delighted in the other’s company. In the spring of 1889, together they toured France and Italy. Revealing the intimate understanding they shared, built over a lifetime, Queen wrote that at one point while riding in a carriage, she buried herself in reading a magazine, “with an occasional interruption when something is too good not to share it with P. who always understands.” And in Florence, her senses flooded with magnificent art and architecture, Queen wrote, “I am almost wild with the joy of living and seeing and healthy in this air—saturated with the beauty of the past and present.”24 On December 27, 1894, forty-four year old Queen Palmer died. Notified of her worsened condition, William departed for England. But her life slipped away so quickly. William was not at her deathbed. From first to last, separations defined Queen and William Palmer’s relationship. In death they would be together. William died on March 13, 1909. A simple stone marks his ashes, buried at the Evergreen Cemetery. Eighteen months later, Queen’s ashes, transferred from an English churchyard, were buried near those of her beloved Will.25 Queen’s death signaled the end of a love story, scripted some thirty years before. In the summer of 1864, at a Tennessee military encampment, William Jackson Palmer composed for

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a friend a poignant marriage blessing that would describe his own and Queen’s enduring love story: I wish you and your fair consort a bountiful share of all those joys and blessings which heaven showers upon the married life of those who love and live for each other. I do not hope for you that the honeymoon may be perpetual, but that the burning love of this happy period may give place to that pure and steady flame which shall go out only with life.26 Chris Nicholl had been employed in the Special Collections at Pikes Peak Library District since 1993 where her duties include assisting researchers with answering regional history and genealogy questions. Ms. Nicholl has occasionally served as an adjunct instructor of history, teaching college level courses for CSU-Pueblo and for the Pikes Peak Community College. Ms. Nicholl organized and served as co-chair for five successful Pikes Peak Regional History Symposia.

Notes

The photograph of Queen Palmer on page 73 was unveiled to the public during the PPLD symposium. Formerly unknown to the participants, it was an eBay discovery by Palmer collector Victor Stone who then shared it with all of the Colorado Springs photograph repositories. Stone bid on the cabinet card about nine months before, “terrified that some large institution would bid a great deal of money for it . . . pictures of Queen in her late teens or around the time of her marriage are very scarce.” He put a huge maximum bid but in the end paid only $34. All agreed that it showed better than any previously known image the girl with whom Palmer fell in love, and was thus used in the symposium puppet show to represent that Queen Palmer. 1. Celeste Black, Queen of Glen Eyrie: The Story of Mary Lincoln Mellen Palmer, Wife of General William Palmer (Colorado Springs, Colo.: Black Bear Publishing, 1999). Palmer to Queen, May 30, 1869, 18. William Jackson Palmer was born in Kinsale, Kent County, Delaware on September 17, 1836. He grew up in the Germantown

80 • MY DARLING QUEENIE section of Philadelphia, and was educated at the Friends school. The 1860 U.S. census reports Palmer’s father John’s occupation as tea merchant. “Queen” Mary Lincoln Mellen was born March 26, 1850, at Prestonburg, Kentucky. Her mother Isabel died when she was four years old; her father, William practiced law in Illinois and Ohio, was an official of the U.S. Treasury Department in Washington, D.C. and following the Civil War, Mellen settled in Flushing, New York, practicing law until he partnered with William Jackson Palmer after 1869. 2. Colorado Springs Gazette Telegraph, April 8, 1923, quoted in Black, 122. 3. Frances M. Wolcott, Heritage of Years: Kaleidoscope Memories (New York: Milton Balch and Co., 1932), 88. 4. Mary D. DeHay Collection, 1991-1994, MS 0313, “The Joyous Child - A Personality Sketch of Anna Held Heinrich,” Special Collections, Tutt Library, Colorado College, Colorado Springs, Colo. 5. Black, Queen of Glen Eyrie, 17. 6. Ibid., 25. 7. Ibid., 26. 8. Ibid., 30. 9. John S. Fisher, A Builder of the West: The Life of General William Jackson Palmer (Caldwell, Idaho: Caxton Printers, 1939), 182-183. 10. Edward F. Wright, “Some Reminiscences of Pioneer Days in the Pike’s Peak Region,” Colorado Springs, The Sunday Gazette and Telegraph, February 5, 1905, 19. 11. Ibid. While a pupil in Palmer’s office, Wright was tutored by Maurice Kingsley, Palmer’s accountant and secretary. 12. Queen’s travel journal described in Black, Queen of Glen Eyrie, 39; Anna Held’s memoir quoted in, Mary C. Hampel DeHay, “A Good Inheritance,” Special Collections, Tutt Library, Colorado College. 13. Elsie, born October 30, 1872, in New York, Dorothy, born October 29, 1880, in Colorado Springs, Marjory, born November 12, 1881, in England. 14. Mary D. DeHay Collection, 1991-1994, MS 0313, “The Joyous Child - A Personality Sketch of Anna Held Heinrich,” Special Collections, Tutt Library, Colorado College; in his “Queen and her General,” Richard Gehling offers a different account, “In the fall of 1881 . . . Glen Eyrie was scheduled for remodeling. The General took this opportunity to move the Mellens to England so that the three boys might attend Oxford. He also took Queen and the girls along.” 15. Marshall Sprague, Newport in the Rockies: The Life and Good Times of Colorado Springs (Chicago: Sage Books, 1961), 30-31. Later

NICHOLL • 81 historians have rejected Sprague’s pejorative descriptions of Queen. For examples, see Celeste Black’s Queen of Glen Eyrie, Doris B. Osterwald’s sparkling Palmer family biography, “General Palmer and Family,” in A Mile by Mile Guide for the Royal Gorge Route (Denver: Western Guideways, Ltd., 2003), 75-82; and “Queen and Her General,“ by Richard Gehling, http://www.geocities.com/peaker1939/. 16. Osterwald, A Mile by Mile Guide, 77. 17. Mary D. DeHay Collection, 1991-1994, MS 0313, “The Joyous Child - A Personality Sketch of Anna Held Heinrich,” 25, Special Collections, Tutt Library. 18. Rocky Mountain News, December 29, 1894, “Mrs. Gen. Palmer Dead. She continued to live at Glen Eyrie until 1883, when a trouble of a valve of the heart compelled a removal to a lower level. She has resided since chiefly in New York and England, with two visits to Glen Eyrie. The last was for four months in 1885.” A family portrait that includes Queen, taken in 1886 at Glen Eyrie, reveals that Queen was in Colorado at least as late as that year. See photo on page 88. 19. For Denver holdings, see Rocky Mountain News, July 29, 1889; for Mexico, San Luis Valley, London, see Colorado Springs Evening Telegraph, March 11, 1909. 20. Rocky Mountain News, August 11, 1883. 21. Black, Queen to William, July 9, 1887, 97; Queen to William, September 20, no year, 113. 22. Black, Queen to William, May 30, 1870, 18. 23. William to Queen, January 2, 1882, quoted in Gehling. 24. Black, Queen’s journal entries, March 8, 1899, 102; March 29, 1889, 108. 25. Although Queen’s death occurred in late 1894, the 1900 U.S. census for El Paso County, Colorado, shows William’s status as married for 30 years. 26. Isaac H. Clothier, ed., Letters, 1853-1868, Gen’l Wm. J. Palmer (Philadelphia: privately printed, 1906), Palmer to Clothier, August 5, 1864.

Queen Mellen Palmer’s four sisters, Maud, Charlotte, Helen and Daisy, were photographed in 1895 shortly after Queen’s death in Frant, East Sussex, England. From Delores Gustafson, courtesy Marjorie Mellen Van Oostveen.

The William L. and Helen Sclater residence was referred to as Orchard House, and later as White House. The home was commissioned by William Palmer and built in 1907 by MacLaren and Thomas architects on the Chambers Ranch property near Garden of the Gods. Photo by The Photo Craft Shop, Special Collections, Pikes Peak Library District.

General William Jackson Palmer & the Mellen & Clarke Families Delores Gustafson If you visit the Rock Ledge Ranch, at the entrance to the Garden of the Gods, you likely will see the seven-thousandsquare-foot Orchard House, built in 1907. You will learn that the Orchard House was built for Charlotte Mellen Sclater and her second husband, William Sclater, by General William J. Palmer. Charlotte was Queen Palmer’s sister. Now that is a generous brotherin-law. Does it make you wonder why he built it? Perhaps an excerpt from my biography in progress will make you wonder more. It is called, “An 1892 Visit.” In this excerpt, Charlotte, General Palmer’s sister-in-law, is recounting her memories after her divorce from Ernest Stephenson. After my divorce, I was a bit at loose ends. I was living with mother in New York City. I had been feeling a bit unwell and when General Palmer came to visit us that December, he suggested I try the healthy air and refreshing solitude of Glen Eyrie once more. My brother, Clark, also decided to join us and find a place for himself in Colorado. We traveled on the Nomad, the General’s private train car and made a two day stop at Chicago to view the almost completed World’s Fair, The Colombian Exposition. As we traveled on to Colorado, the General read us passages of Mr. Checkley’s new book on restoring health through proper exercise. He suggested deep breathing with arm raises, deep bends from the waist and always, proper breathing. I laughed as the General read that I must do these with loose or no undergarments, in private with good ventilation. I agreed with Mr. Checkley’s tenet that women needed a • 83 •

84 • THE MELLEN & CLARKE FAMILIES

reform of their clothing. The corset, though somewhat modified, was still a confining and unnecessary evil. I was pleased that General Palmer was interested in my well-being. I did practice these exercises and also went riding every day at Glen Eyrie, remembering to use both left as well as right handed saddles to stay properly aligned. One lasting memory of that trip was the stir I caused at the El Paso Club Annual Ball after Christmas. The General escorted me and we were met in the reception room by old friends, Dr. and Mrs. Solly. They were pleased to see me, divorced woman or not. As we ascended the smilax wreathed staircase to the dining room, I heard the guarded whispers of the women below. I remember the gossip of acquaintances back in 1888 when I received my final divorce decree. I was not considered quite a proper person, I guess. It was brave and kind of General Palmer to escort me about on his arm. I knew he usually avoided these public displays. I truly felt like someone of worth.1 Now that I have introduced you to Charlotte Mellen Stephenson Sclater, a lady I will speak of again, I would like to look at General Palmer’s relationships with more of the Mellen/ Clarke families. They were the families of Queen Mellen Palmer and Charlotte Mellen Sclater. General Palmer had two sincere loves: Glen Eyrie and Mary Lincoln Mellen, known as Queen Palmer. Queen spent almost thirteen years searching for a place to live where her heart problems would diminish. When she was living in England for her health about 1886, the General was asked to choose between these two loves. He found he could not. Fortunately, he was wealthy enough to try to keep both. Part of Queen’s letter from that time reads like this. Now my dear Will about my health. . . . and prospect of being able to live in America. I gave you the opinion

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of the physicians who know my troubles best. . . . and nothing has happened since to change their opinion. That New York is on a level with the sea is quite true… but the strain of the climate even there might be fatal for me at present. . . . the heart is so quickly affected. … Is it quite impossible for you to come to England with only an occasional visit to America? Can you not give up some of your responsibilities . . . and with a smaller income in consequence . . . be happy with your little family here? . . . then after the few years that I ought to remain here . . . we might all be able to go back to our own Glen Eyrie.2 It is said that love can bring happiness. Was he successful in his efforts to keep both loves? Maybe it depends on how you view true happiness. In a letter to his father-in-law, General Palmer gives us a peek into how he viewed Glen Eyrie. He was writing as he embarked on another trip to Mexico. “Tell Mrs. Mellen, [his mother-in-law] I am sorry to lose so many more months of Glen Eyrie . . . but it seems to be a sort of paradise to which only the elect can be permitted to go.”3 Perhaps we can try to look at Palmer’s association with Queen from his viewpoint. When he met Queen late in 1868, he probably did not ask about her health. Who does when they fall in love? We can assume he learned of her background slowly. Here’s what he may have learned. Queen’s Grandmother, Charlotte Clarke, was a pioneer who traveled to the frontier of today’s Minnesota in 1819 with her husband, Lieutenant Nathan Clarke, to establish the first fort in that Indian territory, Fort Snelling.4 This sounds like good sturdy family stock to me. However, Queen’s mother, Belle Clarke Mellen, had died at age 25. What accounted for that? Let us take a look at some family history that General Palmer may have learned early on. Queen’s mother, Belle, married Mr. William Mellen when she was 17 years old. He was fifteen years her senior and a widower with a 4-year-old son. She was a brave strong lady, it seems. But wait, the Mellens’ first two children died before they were a year old. Not a good sign. Mr. Mellen and Belle


moved from Cincinnati to Kentucky coal country up the Big Sandy River. They were hardy pioneers, like Grandmother Clarke. Mary Lincoln Mellen, Queen Palmer, was born there in 1850, and named after her favorite aunt, Mary Clarke Lincoln in Cincinnati. Grandmother Clarke named her granddaugh� ter, Queenie, yes, Queenie. Perhaps this was because grandmother’s favorite daughter, Belle Mellen, finally had a child that seemed strong. Civiliza� tion came to Kentucky and Mr. Mellen built a large lovely home for his family, now of two children. Queen’s moth� er, Belle, always had many health problems. Grandmother Clarke and Belle’s youngest sister, Ellen moved in with the Mellen family to help. Ellen Clarke Mellen, third wife of William In fact, they helped Belle P. Mellen, was Queen Palmer’s aunt and the through two more births, mother of Charlotte Mellen Sclater. Courtesy a brother and sister for of Delores Gustafson. Queenie. But here is the warning of problems ahead. Queen’s mother died at age 25, a few months after that fifth child was born. Well, five children in seven years . . . not easy.5 Belle’s sister, Ellen Clarke, took over the care of the four motherless children. Within two years, Queen’s aunt Ellen married William Mellen. She was 19 years his junior, but it seemed a natural event for a widower to marry within his wife’s family in those days. Queenie was not yet 5-years-old. She and her siblings retained little memory of their mother. Grandmother Clarke, however, often spoke about Queen’s

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mother. In letters from 1863 and 1868, she stated, “She [Queen] reminds me very much of her precious mother. . . . May she live and be like her mother in pureness of heart.”6 I wonder when General Palmer learned about all of Queen’s health history? Maybe not until after they were married, since he was working on the Kansas Pacific Railroad for much of their courtship and irregularly visited her. Health is not something you talk about when you have short visits. At any rate, there were more warning signs in the Mellen family. Both of Queen’s siblings, Malcum and Isabel, died within a month of each other during the Civil War. Queen alone, at age 12, remained as a mirror of her mother, Belle. By the time General Palmer met the Mellen family in 1869, Queen had five brothers and sisters: Helen, Charlotte, Nathan, Chase and Clark. When General Palmer first visited Queen and the family, they were temporarily living in Washington, D.C., but had a large home in Flushing, New York, on Long Island. Grandmother Clarke was also living with them. A bit of a letter from Grandmother gives you a clue about the family. “You would feel quite at home in our large family as never less than twelve sit down at table.”7 The General came from a small quiet Quaker family. This must have been an adjustment. Those are some of the facts the General may have known about Queen before he married. But he was in love and his dream of making a home in the West for her must have been very strong. Never mind the health history. They married in November 1870, and left for England combining a honeymoon and business. A letter that General Palmer wrote to his in-laws shows some of his feelings. [Queen] is very well and happy and becomes a favorite with every one who meets her, as she ought to. She is a great contrast with the reserved shell-enclosed English girls. . . . and takes by storm, the hearts of the numerous friends we are making here. . . . From the day I first met Queen, I have formed a higher opinion of her character the longer I knew her. And I now respect, admire and love her more than ever before. This is a different thing from love at first sight. . . . But like all really good things,


her character and her heart gain by a more thorough acquaintance. Her father and mother who have formed this character are still more respected for it and endeared to me by the inestimable boon they have conferred upon me.8

The Mellen family enjoying a picnic at Glen Eyrie—all are present except Nathan. William J. Palmer is sitting in back, with Queen Palmer in front of him. Charlotte “Lottie” Sclater is third from the left in front, holding her son Cyril. Photo ca. 1886. From Delores Gustafson, courtesy of Rhoda Wilcox.

Now that you know something of the Clarke/Mellen family connections. I will return to Charlotte Mellen Sclater, called Lottie. Lottie was Queen’s half-sister. They never thought that, of course. They considered themselves sisters. They had the same father and their mothers were sisters who lived together much of their lives. Lottie was 8 years younger than Queen. I think she was a bright brash child. Here is a letter she wrote to General Palmer, or “Uncle William” as she called him, shortly after he met Queen. “Please write to me separate in another envelope like you send Queen, will you. Goodbye from your sincere friend, Lottie Mellen. PS. Please write soon.”9 Lottie was almost 12-years-old. When General Palmer built the original Glen Eyrie in 1871, it was not a cottage for two. He built it large, to house his in-

GUSTAFSON • 89

laws also. He had asked his father-in-law to join in his railroad venture. Mr. Mellen was a lawyer, who knew all about coal mining, and had served as a Treasury Department special agent in Washington, D.C., and up and down the Mississippi River during the Civil War. He knew influential people with money to invest. He was an asset to developing Colorado Springs and the Denver and Rio Grande Railroad. Lottie Mellen with her parents and five siblings, ranging in age from 14 to 1-year-old Daisy, arrived in Colorado Springs the last day of 1871. Maud was born in October 1972. Glen Eyrie was not ready for the two families so they became pioneers for a while, camping in Manitou. This was just like Grandmother Clarke again. Two things occurred to make Lottie a bit of a rebel. Her adored Grandmother Clarke died while on a visit to Glen Eyrie in 1873. She was buried on the hillside behind Glen Eyrie, with a lovely rock for her headstone. Four months later, Lottie’s father died. Lottie had been on her first solo trip with him, visiting relatives in Cincinnati and planning to go on to Washington. These were too many changes, too fast for a 15-year-old girl. General Palmer became surrogate father to the whole Mellen family. His own daughter, Elsie had been born just a year earlier and another Mellen daughter, Maud, had arrived about the same time. That meant he had eight children depending on him. Also he was in the midst of developing a railroad and a city. This was quite a man. Lottie Mellen may have felt a bit cheated by those deaths in the family. She had missed out on so much. Queen had gone everywhere with their father after she turned 15: Chicago, Denver, Minnesota, Niagara Falls, Washington and even on a boat trip to southern ports after the Civil War. Lottie defied her mother and asked General Palmer for permission to marry. She had not yet turned 17. How did General Palmer handle this situation? He gave in. Lottie Mellen and Ernest P. Stephenson were married June 5, 1875, at Glen Eyrie in a family only affair with General Palmer and Lottie’s older sister, Helen, as witnesses. A son, Harold, was born 9½ months later. General Palmer then took over, trying to make sure this marriage would survive.


Lottie’s husband, Ernest, had been in real estate. He was doing alright, but General Palmer gave him the job of collector for his newspaper, the Gazette. Ernest became general manager very quickly. The General also elected Ernest to the Rocky Mountain Club of mountain climbers and put him on the board of managers of the La Veta Town Company, to develop lots in that area as the railroad went up La Veta Pass. Ernest was right in there with all the big names in the new city. The General helped them buy their own home on Tejon Street. They had been living with Lottie’s mother in a large home overlooking Manitou. The Palmers and Mellens were no longer living together at Glen Eyrie. General Palmer had assisted Ellen Mellen in that move shortly after she was widowed. It seems to have been Ellen’s choice. Perhaps she felt Queen needed a home of her own now that she had a daughter, just as Lottie deserved a home of her own. The death of Lottie Mellen Stephenson’s only son at 11 months was a blow to the family. But recovery came with the birth of two more sons, Eric and Cyril. Problems in Lottie’s marriage began developing just after the birth of her third son, Cyril, General Palmer’s godson. Ernest Stephenson had been selling lots and investing in silver mines. General Palmer had even purchased ten lots north of Colorado College from Ernest. Did he realize that Ernest was in financial trouble? Ernest announced in the newspaper that he was leaving his position on the Gazette to pay more attention to his silver interests in Silver Cliff and Leadville.10 He probably lost money. This time General Palmer did not bail him out. Perhaps there were other problems, as by 1881, Lottie Stephenson owned the deed to her home and Ernest was gone. General Palmer gave the ten lots to Lottie, putting one half in trust for his godson, Cyril Stephenson. That is a neat godfather. General Palmer assisted the whole Mellen family’s move to London to further the boys’ education in the summer of 1881. Lottie sold some property, and with her two sons joined her mother in the move. General Palmer had his own family to consider. Queen’s health problems had appeared before the

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birth of her second daughter, Dorothy. Queen went to England about the same time as her mother where her third daughter, Marjory, was born. The General was still traveling to Mexico, dealing with his dream of a railroad to Mexico. Palmer took time to set up trusts for the seven Mellen children. He tried to get them to stay on a budget but Ellen Mellen was not a good manager. Lottie appealed to him for help. This is part of his reply to Ellen, So Lottie has thought your business development required that my ‘lecture’ should reach you. I have given you up long ago as hopeless and have . . . merely sought to save the rising generation. I have placed on going to Mexico with Walter Hinchman in trust for you $35,000 D&RG Consolidated Bonds bearing 7 percent interest.…which, the trustee is directed to . . . pay to you while you live. After your death to pay the same interest for the support and maintenance of your unmarried daughters, etc. With your rent from Manitou, you need not feel that you are dependant [sic] upon anyone or running any risk.11 He went on to explain what he had set aside for education expense for all the children. He was not a father in name only. He was also a benefactor. In 1887, Lottie Mellen Stephenson, with her mother and sisters, returned to Glen Eyrie. General Palmer had come to the rescue again for Lottie. In order to divorce her husband Ernest, she had to live in El Paso County for a year before her case would be considered. Once again Glen Eyrie had a family as Lottie’s two sons busily examined their new home. Finally, on her son Cyril’s eighth birthday, the divorce was granted. Whether all the facts were accurate, only Lottie knew. The statements given by Lottie, her mother and sister, all repeated the same thing. “Plaintiff [Lottie] has resided with mother since 1881. Have not heard of defendant [Ernest Stephenson] since 1883. Ernest left the family and provided no support. He said that he was no better able to support a family in 1883 than when he went


away.”12 The attorney for Lottie was Lyman Bass, an old friend of General Palmer. I believe the ladies were well drilled in how to answer the questions. The divorce was granted. Lottie and her sons left Colorado with her mother and moved into Washington Square in New York City. Her brothers were there studying architecture and law. In 1892, Lottie returned to Glen Eyrie for the short visit I already told you about. Now you know the rest of the story. After her brief Colorado visit, Lottie returned to England to enroll her sons at Eton. She lived in Wrotham at first, just north of Frant, East Sussex, where Queen was living. General Palmer continued to visit Queen, who had been in England for six years, and any Mellens living there. He wrote regularly to his daughters and the Mellen girls, giving advice and admonition as needed, and sent Christmas gifts to all, even Lottie’s sons. In 1894, the General visited Southhampton, Long Island, where Ellen Mellen had moved from New York City. Lottie’s sister, Daisy Mellen, was to marry Robert Wolterbeck, a classmate of her brother Nathan. General Palmer gave the bride away in a highly fashionable wedding. After the wedding, Mrs. Mellen moved to England again.13

The Palmer daughters in England with their riding instructor, from left to right, Marjory, Dorothy and Elsie.” From Delores Gustafson, courtesy of Rhoda Wilcox.

GUSTAFSON • 93

In December 1894, Queen died at the age of 44. All of Queen’s sisters were present. General Palmer arrived too late to say goodbye. He had kept his beloved Glen Eyrie but lost the love of his life, Queen. I believe she beat the odds by moving to England. She probably had 10 extra years of life, though more sedentary, than she would have had in the high altitude of Colorado Springs. In 1895 the General took his three precious daughters back to his waiting Glen Eyrie. Lottie Stephenson continued to pop up in General Palmer’s life. She married William L. Sclater, a noted English ornithologist. His mother had tried to prevent the marriage of her son to this divorced woman. When Mr. Sclater was appointed curator of the museum in Capetown, South Africa, they defied her. They married in February 1896 and sailed to Capetown. General Palmer began traveling with his daughters to England and Europe, looking for items for the planned new and larger Glen Eyrie. The three Mellen sisters, then all married, were living in the Frant area, as was Mrs. Mellen. Lottie and Mr. Sclater often returned to England for Mr. Sclater’s scientific meetings. I am sure the Mellens and Palmers often met over those years. Herein lies a puzzle. In 1899 Lottie received an expensive gift from General Palmer, a Tiffany wristwatch. It was inscribed to CSS from WJP, October 1899, Zoological Society, London. What was the occasion? Lottie had been one of the founders of the Field Force Fund in Capetown which gave packets of comforts for the troops during the Boer War. However, she did not receive her award for that until 1902. Lottie also assisted her husband in the editing of the many books he wrote. Mr. Sclater and his father, Philip Lutley Sclater, also an ornithologist, did complete a book about that time. Whatever the reason, the gift was likely presented in person as General Palmer and daughters were in England at that time. I am still searching for the answer. General Palmer was generous, but his gifts to individuals were usually not that extravagant. In June 1902 Lottie and William Sclater were in London for the awarding by the King of the Royal Red Cross for her work during the Boer War. General Palmer was there with his


daughters, Dorothy, called Dos, and Marjory. Lottie joined them when they sailed back to the United States. It was a very rough voyage and everyone became seasick and stayed in their cabins, rolling and tossing. Upon arrival in New York, they toured, visited Lottie’s brothers, Chase and Nathan Mellen, and Lottie even tried out a new drink, called a highball. They traveled to Colorado on the Nomad, the General’s private train car. The next month at Glen Eyrie was filled with picnics, parties, and invigorating rides into the foothills. Lottie was an accomplished horsewoman. The General had written his daughters in England, to seek Lottie’s advice in all riding questions. Lottie was an active, intelligent and well-read woman of her day. She had been hostess for her husband’s many social events in Capetown, often entertaining nobility. Now Lottie and General Palmer had a chance to ride in his mountain kingdom, no matter what the weather. His own daughters were not enthusiasts of outdoor activities. Lottie Sclater was 23 years younger than General Palmer. I believe he looked on her as the kind of daughter he had always wanted. In 1905, General Palmer invited Lottie’s husband to come to Colorado College to prepare a museum that would be the best in the West. The Sclaters left Capetown, going overland from Zanzibar to Nairobi and down the Nile by safari and boat, taking photographs and recording their trip for a slide presentation later. Lottie was a pioneer in her own way, shades of her beloved Grandmother Clarke. The Sclaters arrived at Glen Eyrie in July 1906. There was plenty of room for them in that new and improved castle. They went camping at Wagon Wheel Gap, attended the festivities of the Pike Centennial, and explored the area on birding expeditions. In October, General Palmer’s life as he knew it, ended. He was paralyzed and bedridden after a fall from a horse. An ordinary man would have given up. A new chapter in the life of General Palmer and Lottie Mellen Sclater began. As part of the General’s therapy while recovering, his daughters and Lottie would take turns reading his correspondence, many letters of encouragement, business affairs and even letters from Lottie’s brothers, sisters and sons.

GUSTAFSON • 95

By Christmas the General’s world looked better as he inquired about plans for the holiday and began giving instructions to all. He was back in the game of life. Glen Eyrie became filled with doctors, nurses, extra help and endless visitors. Lottie’s two sons came, Cyril from New York and Eric from Egypt, where he was stationed with the British army. Lottie’s sister, Maud Mellen Van Oostveen, and her three small daughters came from London. They stayed over a year and Maud’s last daughter was born at Glen Eyrie. The castle became too busy and noisy for Mr. Sclater. He was writing a book about the birds of Colorado at the General’s request. Glen Eyrie was not conducive to quiet times for writing. Plans for the building of the Orchard House were begun. Mr. Thomas MacLaren was the architect, but I think Lottie had a hand in making it in the Cape Dutch style similar to her home in Capetown. The Sclaters rented a home on Wood Avenue in the interim. By fall 1907, the Sclaters moved into the Orchard house. Lottie spent much of her time at Glen Eyrie. The General’s daughter, Dorothy, went to London to nursing school and Marjory was not well. I am sure Lottie was a great help in the entertaining of guests, especially as in 1908, Elsie Palmer was married to Leo Myers, a friend of Lottie’s sons from Eton. Plans for Marjorie’s wedding to an Englishman, Lieutenant Wellesley, were also being made. That summer in 1908, the Palmers and Sclaters sailed for England for the planned marriage but Marjory Palmer had changed her mind. She had fallen in love with her father’s physician, Dr. Henry C. Watt. I would have loved to have heard that conversation between father and daughter. Upon the return to Colorado of the whole extended family in November, the General was weak after a bout with bronchitis and Marjory Palmer was ill with tuberculosis. Elsie arrived with her new baby, Palmer’s first granddaughter, Elsie Queen. Maud’s daughters continued their happy circus time with the General in his bedroom. By the end of February 1909, the General was visibly failing. In March, General Palmer was gone. His daughter Elsie wrote “[His was] the truest example of courage. The end was peaceful. Couldn’t have wished for a more gentle ending.”14


General Palmer was more than a man of his time. He was a man ahead of his time. He was able to found a railroad and a city plus care for two families. I believe he found his happiness with Queen, his three daughters and Glen Eyrie. But what about Lottie Mellen Sclater? I think he was very proud of all her accomplishments and truly treated her as a fourth daughter. The Orchard House today stands as the visible monument to their relationship. Delores Gustafson, a long time resident of Colorado Springs, became inspired to learn more about General Palmer’s family through her volunteer work at the Rock Ledge Ranch Historic Site. Her research has concentrated on Charlotte Sclater, Palmer’s sister-in- law and Queen Palmer’s half sister. Gustafson has researched her subject for over a decade, has met with family descendants in England, and has uncovered historic photographs and other documentation about the Sclater and Palmer families. In addition to her research and public speaking about Charlotte Sclater and Palmer, Gustafson is also active as a volunteer for several Colorado Springs institutions including the Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum and PILLAR. She is originally from Minnesota and graduated from St. Olaf College.

Notes

1. Delores Gustafson, William J. Palmer biography in progress for Rock Ledge Ranch. 2.�� William J. Palmer to Mr. and Mrs. William P. Mellen, September 26, 1885, Nicholson/Palmer Collection, Starsmore Center for Local History, Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum. 3.�� William J. Palmer to Mr. and Mrs. William P. Mellen, January 15, 1873, Mellen Family Papers, George J. Mitchell Department of Special Collections & Archives, Bowdoin College Library. 4. Mary Mitchell White, Genealogy [of the Van Cleve family] 1937-1938. 5. Horatio P. Van Cleve and family papers, 1827-1970, Minnesota Historical Society.

GUSTAFSON • 97 6. Letters from Charlotte Clarke, in Kentucky, to her daughter, Charlotte Van Cleve, in Minnesota. Horatio P. Van Cleve and family papers. 7.�� Charlotte Clarke to Charlotte Van Cleve, July 28, 1868, Horatio P. Van Cleve and family papers. 8. William J. Palmer to William P. Mellen, December 10, 1870, Mellen Family Papers. 9.�� Charlotte Mellen to William J. Palmer, March 13, 1870, enclosed with at letter to Queen Palmer, William J. Palmer Collection, Colorado Historical Society. 10. Colorado Springs Gazette. Undated article in author’s collection. 11.�� William J. Palmer to Ellen Mellen, August 5, �� 1880, Mellen Family Papers. 12.�� District Court, Colorado, El Paso County, records November 26, 1888. 13. New York Times, July 27, 1894. 14.�� March 29, 1909, Nicholson/Palmer Collection.

Maud Mellen Van Oostveen’s three daughters enjoyed playing circus time while their uncle, William J. Palmer, encouraged them from his bed. The bedside sling provided excellent entertainment. From Special Collections, Pikes Peak Library District.

Dr. William A. and Cara Georgina Whitmore Scovell Bell. After marrying in 1873, William and his wife Cara lived in their home, Briarhust, in Manitou Springs, Colorado. Both died in England—William in 1921 and Cara in 1923. Courtesy of Starsmore Center for Local History at the Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum.

The Denver & Rio Grande Railroad: An Address Given to the Employees, January 28, 1920 William A. Bell NOTE: This chapter is reprinted with only minor format and spelling revisions to the original version. The rapid development of the United States is largely due to the few men of exceptional ability who have opened up the country by various systems of railroads. They may justly be called empire builders, such for instance as Henry Villard who founded the North Pacific Railway System; James J. Hill, who opened up the whole North West; Mr. Harriman in the South with the Southern Pacific did wonderful work in developing that region. With these General William J. Palmer ranks as the developer of southern Colorado by means of the construction of the Denver and Rio Grande Railroad and of much of Mexico by founding the Mexican National Railway, the early history of which I have the pleasure of describing. It is a topic of extreme interest and it will be my fault if it does not appeal to you. My earliest association with General Palmer dates from the Kansas Pacific Survey of 1867, an account of which is given in a book of travels called New Tracks in North America, which I published in England in 1869. On that survey we shared the same tent for many months and over the camp fire we discussed his plans. The Kansas Pacific Railway, a St. Louis company with John D. Perry as its head, had then reached Salina, Kansas, and, from his knowledge of the country, General Palmer endeavored to persuade his codirectors to change the route they had then determined on, to reach Denver by the Smoky Hill route, the way the road now follows, and instead of doing this to follow up the Arkansas to Pueblo, and thence north to Denver, thus occupying the valley • 99 •

100 • ADDRESS TO THE D. & R. G. EMPLOYEES

of the Arkansas as well as the mountain base from Pueblo to Denver. General Palmer’s project was this, that, if he could not persuade his directors to follow up the Arkansas, he would build a road of his own from Denver southward indefinitely along the mountain base, of such a character as to reach the mines in the mountains through the cañons abutting on the plains as rapidly as they were discovered, and so tap the sources of business ahead of all other competitors. His directors did not follow his advice, and in consequence, when in September 1870, the Kansas Pacific reached Denver and the Denver Pacific had made connections at Cheyenne with the Union Pacific to the north about the same time, the General incorporated his railroad in October of that year. As the then existing laws of the territory of Colorado were not altogether satisfactory, application was made to Congress for a charter direct from the United States government, which he obtained the following year. This charter proved to be very important. It gave no land grant, as land grants had then ceased to be popular, but it conveyed to the company a right-of-way 200 feet wide, and twenty acres of the public domain for depot purposes, limited to one tract in ten miles of road. He further developed his scheme for the extension of the road, not only southward to El Paso, but thence to the City of Mexico, following approximately the line now occupied by the Mexican Central. The work he mapped out in 1870 was prodigious. The country south of Denver was practically undeveloped, with little traffic on which to base the construction of a railroad. Realizing this, not only had the railroad to be constructed, but traffic had to be created by the laying out of towns, the opening of coal fields and iron mines, the starting of industries, all of which he organized with the greatest energy. The question of gauge was the first thing to be determined. The day after his wedding, on November 8th, 1870, he started for England. I met him in London and there we consulted the great engineer Fowler and General Richard Strachey, R. E., who had introduced narrow gauge railroads into India with the meter gauge. We visited the Fastiniog Railway, a two-foot

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gauge road in Wales, and we finally adopted a three-foot gauge for the new enterprise. Rails were at once ordered from Wales, 30 pounds to the yard. Grading was started, and by August 1871, the railroad was completed to the new town of Colorado Springs, which had in the meantime been located and laid out on broad lines, but which had but one finished house on the townsite when the railroad reached it. Early the following year the track was finished to Pueblo and the Cañon City coal fields. Hand in hand with the railroad came the opening up and development of the country through which it was to pass. To fully realize General Palmer’s position at this time, it is well to state that he had associated with him no large capitalists, and had, therefore, the serious problem of finance entirely on his shoulders. My father, a distinguished London physician, had many wealthy clients amongst his patients. General Palmer had a number of Philadelphia friends and associates. From these two sources came the first money to build the road. These private individuals were offered subscriptions to pools, which were formed in the following way. Land companies were formed, to which the townsites along the road were conveyed, such as Colorado Springs and Manitou, and the stock of these companies was given to the subscribers with the railroad securities. In the same way the coal and iron fields which were discovered further south, and the Nolan grant of some 40,000 acres, covering the land immediately south of the Arkansas River up to the borders of the old Mexican town of Pueblo, were conveyed to a company called the Central Colorado Improvement Company, incorporated January 1872, which company, when its coal fields became developed, was converted in December 1879, into the Colorado Coal and Iron Company. In 1881 the Durango Land and Coal Company was incorporated. Meanwhile the town of Durango, now the capital of Southwestern Colorado, was located and started by Governor A. C. Hunt, and smelting works were erected there a year before the arrival of the railway. The townsite and valuable


coal properties in the neighborhood, as well as at Crested Butte, were conveyed to this company. I became its president and have had charge of its affairs down to the present time. Returning to the beginning of things, in the early seventies, I have a little of interest to relate about the Mexican end of General Palmer’s great conception and how his railways in Mexico were started. Early in ‘72 I went to San Francisco to arrange with General Rosecrans for the acquisition for General Palmer of valuable railroad concessions, which he had obtained from Juárez, the then President of the Mexican Republic. And, having accomplished my mission, on my return journey to Colorado I was snowed up on the Central Pacific in February, ‘72, for no less than twenty-one days, the Central Pacific Railroad, as it was then called, having been only recently completed and not in a position to battle successfully with the winter snows. Meanwhile, General Palmer went to Mexico, where General Rosecrans had gone to meet him, and laid the foundations for his railroad system in Mexico, and was back in the United States and at Richmond, Virginia, by July 4th, 1872, where I met him. His trip through Mexico had been a very arduous one. He was accompanied not only by his young wife, but also by Miss Rose Kingsley, the elder daughter of Charles Kingsley, the wellknown author. I, in the meantime, had married my present wife in England, and she also formed one of the party on the 4th of July at Richmond. The years 1870 to 1873 were years of great prosperity in Colorado. The four counties through which the Denver and Rio Grande had been built, Arapahoe, Douglas, El Paso and Pueblo, had an assessed value of $6,689,000 in 1870, and of $18,600,000 in 1873. Mining was active and the receipts of the new railway were entirely satisfactory. Immediately following this hopeful outlook came the panic of that year, which did not seriously affect Colorado until ‘74 and ‘75, but when it reached the Rockies it naturally caused a serious check to the Rio Grande enterprise, so that it was not until ‘76 that the railroad was pushed to the coal fields of El Moro and over La Veta Pass to Alamosa as terminus for the time being.

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The importance to the whole undertaking of the coal and iron developments was realized from the first, and in ‘74 I went to London and succeeded in negotiating bonds of the Coal Company sufficient to push vigorously the coal and iron production and to start the erection of the steel works at Pueblo. In 1879 the Colorado Coal & Iron Company was formed. The first directors were William J. Palmer, Charles B. Lamborn, William A. Bell, Lyman K. Bass and Hanson A. Risley. In 1880, the South Pueblo Iron Works having been erected, 284 tons of merchant bar iron were produced. In 1881, 6396 tons of pig iron were turned out, and on April 12th of the following year the first 30-foot rail was rolled. Mrs. Bell and I were present, and the appearance of the first rail was hailed with great enthusiasm by all present. In that year 16,265 tons of rails for the railroad were rolled. In 1884 General Palmer retired from the management of the Colorado Coal & Iron Company and Henry E. Sprague became president. The year of 1884 was one of great depression. There was a great miners’ strike, from October 1884, to February 1885, and also a railroad strike. The Leadville smelter was largely shut down. Low prices and business depression prevailed. Coal production was the exception, 562,660 tons having been produced by the company. The Colorado Coal and Iron Company continued to grow until, in 1892, it consolidated with the Colorado Fuel Company, controlled by Mr. J. C. Osgood and others, and thus was formed the Colorado Fuel and Iron Company, which has grown to such vast dimensions. J. C. Osgood was its first president. But to return to the railway. By the close of ‘78 there had been constructed 373 miles of the road. Meanwhile the Santa Fe, our rival company, had pushed up the Arkansas to Pueblo and down to Trinidad, thus depriving us of getting any of the Santa Fe trade, and, what with the general depression and the difficulties of obtaining capital at this time, the company was in a difficult plight. Under these conditions, we decided to lease our completed lines of road to the Santa Fe Company, retaining our franchises and extension rights, and thus ends the first episode of the


railway. The Santa Fe Company took possession on December 13th, 1878. I shall now give a brief account of the influence which the great mining camp of Leadville had on the railroad situation. In the summer of 1877, I well remember that General Palmer, McMurtrie, our chief engineer, and I rode on horseback into Oro, the name given to the small village now known as Leadville. We found Mr. August Meyer, the smelter magnate, superintending the digging of the foundation of the first smelter, and I bought a clump of dates at the grocery store of the little village, which was presided over by H. A. W. Tabor, who was to become noted soon after as the great mining millionaire. General Palmer realized the importance of the mining discoveries and immediately on his return proceeded with his plans to recommence railroad construction under his United States charter. He began active operations in the Raton Pass, where his surveying parties found the Santa Fe Company already established. He then began operations from Cañon City through the Royal Gorge, and, on April 19, 1878, his men came into conflict with those of the Santa Fe, and thus commenced the active fight between the two companies for right of way through the cañon, which lasted for two years. The contest involved wider issues. During the time that the Santa Fe operated the Denver & Rio Grande, it operated it entirely in the interest of its long eastern haul and to the detriment of all Colorado interests, so that public opinion was strongly roused on behalf of the old company, and the whole controversy caused the greatest excitement throughout the state and in the east. The Santa Fe road practically barred freight coming from the east over the roads centering at Denver, intended for Pueblo and southward, by charging as much on freight from Denver to Pueblo as from Kansas City to Pueblo over the Santa Fe. In fact, ever since December of 1878, when it began to operate the Rio Grande system under lease, it operated it in the most arbitrary manner. Furthermore, it allowed the physical condition of the road to run down. These breaches of contract, as it was claimed, were brought before Judge Bowen, the judge of the State District

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Court, at Del Norte, which had jurisdiction over the territory operated, and application was made by General Palmer for a receiver in the interests of the bondholders. The appeal was granted, and Hanson A. Risley was appointed receiver, on the grounds that the Santa Fe was not operating the road fairly and in the interests of the bondholders, and that they were not in many respects acting up to the terms of the lease. The Santa Fe claimed that the state court had no jurisdiction and refused to turn over the road and appealed to Judge Hallett of the United States District Court, who, on May 8th, 1878, decided that the prior right to build through the cañon rested with the San Juan Railway Company, a local corporation representing for present purposes the Santa Fe Company. In anticipation of such action, General Palmer had marshaled his followers and took possession of the road by force and turned it over to Risley, the receiver on behalf of the bondholders, on June 11th, 1879. On the Santa Fe appeal, Judge Hallett decided that the state court had no jurisdiction, and on July 16th the railroad was restored to the Santa Fe, and was then operated by the Santa Fe until August 14th, when the United States court appointed its own receiver, Mr. L. C. Ellsworth, who took charge until April 5th, 1880, when it was restored to its original owners under the United States Supreme Court decision of March 27th of that year. What immediately followed the Supreme Court decision I will give in the notes kindly furnished me by Mr. R. F. Weitbrec, who was then general manager of construction and was one of the most active employees of the company during all this troublous time: News of the Supreme Court decision in the Royal Gorge case reached Colorado Springs during the afternoon of the day it was handed down. A couple of days later General Palmer started for New York, where he asked for five million dollars to extend the road. In three days ten millions were subscribed, of which he accepted seven. How different from the former days, when it took a year or more of the hardest work to raise a million.


As soon as the Rio Grande’s success became assured, the Santa Fe manifested a willingness to settle. After more or less dickering they proposed to call it quits, if the Rio Grande would pay for the actual cost of construction west of Cañon City and their expenses in the fight. To this the General agreed, and in a few days the bargain was closed on that basis and peace reigned. The market was booming; General Palmer had the prestige of success in the great fight, and during the ensuing three years he raised for Colorado, Utah and Mexican enterprises fifty million dollars. The present generation has little conception of the work done by General Palmer. It is apt to think of later men as the builders of the Rio Grande. The road is his monument. Those who followed have builded on the foundation he laid. His work was in a virgin country in which he believed as few men are given to believe. He thought and acted in a big way. He was an adroit diplomat when negotiation was wise and he was an admirable fighter when the battle was on. As a builder he was easily the leading citizen of Colorado, and Colorado Springs can testify to his public spirit. The terms of settlement between the Rio Grande and the Santa Fe are as follows: The Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Company agreed for ten years not to build through any portion of Colorado west of the north and south line of the Denver and Rio Grande Railway (except a coal road to their coal mines near Cañon City), or in that portion of New Mexico north of the 36th parallel (approximately), and west of the summit of the Spanish range; while the Denver and Rio Grande Company agreed for the same period not to build in Colorado east of the same north and south line, or to Trinidad, or in that part of New Mexico east of the Spanish range or south of the 36th parallel, except in the western part of New Mexico.

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But to resume my narrative of the road. From December 13th, 1878, to June 10th, 1879, the road was operated by the Santa Fe; from June 11th to July 15th, 1879, it was operated by a receiver nominated by the Denver & Rio Grande; from July 16th to August 14th, 1879, it was again operated by a receiver nominated by the Santa Fe; from August 15th, 1879, to April 4th, 1880, it was in the hands of a receiver appointed by the court, and not until April 5th, 1880, did the company resume permanent possession. The years 1880 and 1881 were years of great activity in construction. The road was built from Cañon City to Leadville, 117 miles, by July 20th, 1880; to the Robinson mine, near Kokomo, 16 miles, by December 27th; across the Tennessee Pass to Red Cliff, 9.6 miles, by November 22nd; the branch to Manitou, 9 miles, was finished August 1st, and the New Mexico Division was extended from Antonito to Española, 91 miles, by December 31st, besides stone and coal spurs, 11 miles; in all 347 miles. In 1881 the road into the Wet Mountain Valley was built, 33 miles, and the San Juan Division was extended westward 116 miles. At the close of ‘78 there were 373 miles of constructed road; by the end of ‘82 there were 1281 miles; by December, ‘83, 1317 miles. Apart from railroad extensions 1880 is especially memorable on account of General Grant’s visit to Colorado, made that summer. I had the pleasure of taking him by the first train over the little road to Manitou and of showing him at Briarhurst, my home, the well-known painting by Thomas Moran of the Mount of the Holy Cross, which I had just purchased as a memento of our Royal Gorge victory. The next day we took General and Mrs. Grant over the road to Leadville, just completed. We were six hours late (a bridge having given way at Pueblo), and did not arrive until dark. Leadville was alive with bonfires, an escort of fifty mounted men bearing flaming torches was provided, and dynamite was exploded to such an extent that Mrs. Grant refused to sit behind the four restive horses which were to draw her and the General in state through the town, so that Mrs. Bell had to exchange places with her. I saw two shanties on fire, but the fire brigade was in the procession and no notice was taken of them.


Meanwhile General Palmer was vigorously extending the Rio Grande Western. In ‘82 he constructed 154 miles; in ‘83, 175 miles; by April 1st, ‘83, it was completed to Salt Lake City, and by May 18th to Ogden. The Western was being built at this time as the extension westward of the Rio Grande, and in ‘82 it was leased to that road under the Palmer management, only to be returned to its original owners under President Lovejoy two years later. The prosperity of the years ‘80 and ‘81 was not destined to last. It was followed by dull times, aggravated by strikes and the continued depression of silver. Money had been spent so rapidly on extensions that earnings did not fully meet the expectations of the New York capitalists. They complained of the management, which the General had good reason to resent. He told them plainly that they must find a new president, as they were not satisfied with his management, and nothing would induce him to reconsider that decision, although the dissatisfaction was not deeply placed. Some able men were proposed to succeed him, but they were so highly prized in the positions they occupied that negotiations to secure them failed, and Mr. Lovejoy was finally chosen in a hurry, having proved himself a good manager in the express business, but never having had charge of a great railway system. Towards the close of ‘82 several new eastern men joined the board, L. H. Meyer, A. J. Cassett, William L. Scott and Peter Geddis, replacing myself, who had been the vice president of the company for nine years, Lyman K. Bass, Hanson A. Risley and J. W. Gilluly. General Palmer resigned the following year, to be succeeded by Frederick Lovejoy. Poor management and hard times soon brought the company to temporary insolvency, and William S. Jackson became receiver from July 24th, 1885, to December of that year, when he became president for ‘86 and ‘87, after which Mr. David H. Moffat assumed the management of the company and retained the presidency until 1891-1892, when Edward T. Jeffery was appointed and has practically controlled the destinies of the company to the present time. Both the Denver and Rio Grande

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and the Rio Grande Western were absorbed into the Gould system in 1901. I cannot close this address without a few words about some of the many interesting and able personalities inseparable from the life of the road and the development of this western country. Governor A. C. Hunt, United States marshal in 1864 and afterwards Governor of Colorado Territory, was a typical frontiersman of great force of character. He was full of humor and a great man of action. He had charge of the land department of the road. Colonel William H. Greenwood was head of the 35th parallel surveys in 1867 as chief engineer. He then came as engineer of the Rio Grande for a short time, and then took charge of the Mexican National surveys in Mexico, where he was murdered some two years later. William F. Colton, secretary to the General during the Kansas Pacific survey, remained in his employ and subsequently passed on to the Rio Grande Western, and especially was attached to the coal department of the road, or rather the Utah Fuel Company, with headquarters at Salt Lake City. Lyman K. Bass, a former partner in Chicago of President Cleveland and a most able lawyer, became our general counsel at an early date, and Hanson A. Risley did our legal work from the first. W. W. Borst, William Wagner and Charles B. Lamborn were with us in the early days. John A. McMurtrie was our chief engineer during all the active construction of the road, and R. F. Weitbrec was manager of construction. William S. Jackson was treasurer; J. W. Gilluly, cashier; Andrew Hughes was freight and passenger agent; G. W. Kramer, superintendent of express; George Ristine, assistant to the manager, and last I name our general manager, D. C. Dodge. I think I may say without question that D. C. Dodge, after a life devoted to the difficult business of railroad management, stood out preeminently as the greatest and best railroad manager that Colorado has produced. In June 1865, he came to Denver as the western agent of the Chicago & Northwestern Railroad Company.


In 1871, when the D.&R.G. opened business to Colorado Springs, he became the first general freight and ticket agent of the road. From 1885 to 1888 he spent most of his time in Mexico as second vice-president and general manager of the Mexican National Railroad, under General Palmer as president. In 1888 he resigned his position in Mexico and resumed the management of the Rio Grande Western system, and commenced the improving and standard gauging of the track between Grand Junction and Ogden, which broad-gauging was completed in June 1890. In June 1901, the R.G.W. was transferred to the D.& R.G., followed by the absorption of both roads into the Gould system and control. Whilst general manager of the D.& R.G. Railroad he brought that system up to a high state of efficiency. As vice-president and general manager of the Rio Grande Western he promoted the growth and development of the great coal industry in Utah, and was actively engaged in tapping the important copper and gold mines tributary to Salt Lake City and in enlarging the shops there when the Palmer management terminated. William A. Bell accompanied William Jackson Palmer as the physician on the survey for a southern railroad to the Pacific Ocean during 1867-1868. Soon after this expedition, Bell wrote New Tracks in North America (1869), with Palmer and other contributors. In addition to his talents in the healing arts and writing, Bell was a Fellow of the Royal Geographical and Geological Societies, and an expert photographer.

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Denver and Rio Grande Western observation car, Durango, Colorado, rail yards. May 1964. Photograph by Myron Wood, © Special Collections, Pikes Peak Library District.

Denver & Rio Grande Railway narrow gauge steam engine in Rockwood Canyon above Las Animas River, near Durango, Colorado, May 1964. Photograph by Myron Wood, © Special Collections, Pikes Peak Library District.

Connections West: William Jackson Palmer & His Railroad Routing Rivalries E. M. “Mel” McFarland On July 1, 1862, Congress authorized construction of the Transcontinental Railroad, finally connecting the plains with the Pacific Coast. The Union Pacific would build west from Omaha. The Central Pacific would work east from California. Meanwhile, the Kansas-based Leavenworth, Pawnee and Western (LPW) came under the joint leadership of New York banker Samuel Hallett and western explorer John C. Fremont, who envisioned jumping ahead of the Union Pacific. In the summer of 1864, the LPW was renamed the “Union Pacific, Eastern Division” (UPED). Plans were to build west and north to Fort Kearny, Nebraska, if they could reach that point before the Omaha Union Pacific. In 1866, Congress approved the new route of the UPED along the Smoky Hill Trail, and other westward railroad projects. The incorporators included J. Edgar Thomson, John C. Fremont and some twenty others. Palmer Enters the Stage The arrival on the scene of General William Jackson Palmer, a slight-of-build railroad surveyor, was a more significant event than other railroad men might have realized. His past decade had made Palmer a railroad developer to be reckoned with. Palmer, a young Civil War veteran, joined the UPED as part of a great injection of fresh energy provided by the surplus of veteran Civil War officers. He had served a surveyor’s apprenticeship with the Hempfield Railroad in western Pennsylvania in 1853. He became acquainted with J. Edgar Thomson, President of the Pennsylvania Central, and, in 1857, Palmer became Thomson’s personal secretary. Traveling with Thomson, Palmer learned railroad management. He was assigned to a company• 113 •

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sponsored evaluation program. All of the steam locomotives at the time primarily used wood as fuel. With an abundance of coal available, however, Palmer wondered if steam locomotives could use it. Palmer spent considerable time on the project. The development of coal as locomotive fuel in America centered on the results of his findings. When the Civil War started, the Assistant Secretary of War in charge of transportation was Thomas A. Scott of the Pennsylvania Railroad. He would become integral to Palmer’s railroad future. Palmer, though a Quaker, decided to join the war effort, and led a Pennsylvania unit. An energetic leader, he developed a close-knit regiment with dedicated men. At war’s end, Thomson and Scott took an interest in the Union Pacific, urging Palmer to join them. He traveled to St. Louis to interview with the Union Pacific, but in August 1865, he joined the UPED becoming its treasurer, a position which included acting as secretary-treasurer of the railroad’s construction company. The UPED was stalled in eastern Kansas with deep financial problems. Palmer’s primary job was traveling between Kansas City and Washington, D.C. to sort out the railroad’s funding and land grant issues. Palmer’s friendships, established with his men during the war, attracted many of them to follow him into railroading. Colonel William H. Greenwood became chief engineer of the UPED, and Captain Howard Schuyler would work directly for the colonel. Another railroad man who would become significant, although not a member of the regiment, Henry Randolph Holbrook, recently with the Missouri Pacific Railroad, became Greenwood’s assistant. Palmer’s most influential partnership for the Pikes Peak Region, however, was yet to come. In the Spring of 1867 the officers of the UPED decided to explore a route toward California. In grand style they announced a great expedition to find a route to the Pacific, to be led by Palmer. This announcement attracted an English physician, William A. Bell to the group. He was keenly interested in seeing the West and, later, in being part of the influx of English investors and developers. Learning the

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expedition needed a photographer, Bell sought out one who would teach him all that he needed to know. Palmer led three teams totaling forty-eight engineers and a staff of ten. The men set out from the end of track on the Kansas prairie. Palmer coordinated the specific areas each team had been assigned, his own group following the Purgatoire River. His team included Bell as photographer, a geologist, an entomologist, a botanist, three quartermasters, his secretary, and a newsman representing the Philadelphia Press. By August 7, 1867, Palmer had traveled as far as Trinidad, Colorado, a small settlement of two hundred people, roughly six hundred miles of exploration. There were conflicting notions of which route westward to Denver the UPED should take. At the time, Holbrook was surveying from River Bend, on the eastern plains, westward along a ridge to the mountains and north to Denver. Palmer had proposed a route along the Arkansas to Pueblo, and north to Denver. The directors ruled that out, asking for an easier, more direct line. Holbrook’s line made good use of the access to needed timber, but it too was ruled out for the more direct route along the Smoky Hill Trail, which cut west across the central plains of eastern Colorado. The Smoky Hill, of course, had been the most popular Gold Rush route in 1859 for the same reason of directness. Palmer continued to pull south in his interests. While he had been traveling through New Mexico to Santa Fe, he was a guest at Lucien D. Maxwell’s ranch house, where he would realize a future opportunity to develop lines across the huge Maxwell Land Grant. For 1867-1870, however, Palmer became chief surveyor and overall director of the UPED Denver construction. He directed Greenwood to start work on the survey to Sheridan, Wyoming, and to Denver. Palmer, however, was not happy with the whole idea of building to Denver because steep Rocky Mountain inclines still prevented a direct route from Denver toward the Pacific. An Act of Congress reorganized the UPED on March 3, 1869, as the Kansas Pacific Railroad. Palmer became its director.


Who Will Build What Along the Front Range? When the Kansas Pacific Railroad concluded its connection to Denver in 1870, it would be Denver’s first, albeit distant, link to the Transcontinental Railroad all the way back to the Midwest via Kansas City. The conclusion of the Kansas Pacific Railroad in Denver would also create the opportunity for most of the middling to higher level Kansas Pacific engineers, surveyors, and supervisors to fan out, looking for the best railroad chances up and down Colorado’s Front Range and into the Southwest. Obviously, one goal might be short lines between Denver and Cheyenne, where the Transcontinental passed. Another might be expansion into the mountains and canyons. Still another might be to move south into the opportunities across New Mexico. The railroad men brought out by the Kansas Pacific would, end up in competition with each other in the future. For example, in the summer of 1869, a Kansas Pacific survey team looked at the area south of Denver. It was H. P. Holbrook’s second visit to the area. Holbrook hired on a new transit man, Lewis Kingman, for this project. The team set out south from Denver looking for a route along the mountains. Thus the historical record became rife with railroad men’s names that would later be railroad town names (and still later familiar Route 66 town names) across the Southwest. Also in 1869, General Palmer and Dr. Bell made their first visit to Colorado City. They looked at the area and discussed their ideas. This trip helped inspire Palmer to seriously consider his own north and south railroad. The two were introduced to young Irving Howbert, El Paso County Clerk, an area resident for ten years. They shared some of their ideas with Howbert and invited him to help develop their project. Of course, Howbert later made money in Leadville mining, and gained prominence through banking, business, politics, writing a history of the Pikes Peak Region, and helping to build two railroads: the Colorado Midland Railway and the Colorado and Cripple Creek District Short Line. Meetings for Palmer were also life-changing. In 1869, Palmer also met William Proctor Mellen, an eastern lawyer looking for investment projects. Palmer’s enthusiasm for the west infected

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Mellen on a mutual train ride back to the East. Introduced to Mellen’s young daughter Mary Lincoln “Queen” Mellen, Palmer became smitten and courted her after they reached her Flushing, New York home. Then he returned to Colorado City to explore the country at the base of Pikes Peak, not just for a railroad route, but to develop a community fit for a Queen. Thus Palmer initiated a pattern that he would follow in railroad community development: Colorado City was unworthy—and more income would result from combining community and railroad development—so he would start his own towns rather than build in the pre-existing ones. His opportunity to become a town founder was close. By November 20, 1869, the Kansas Pacific’s tracks were within twenty miles of Colorado. Which Way Would Palmer Go? Palmer always explored his options with other railroad projects in connecting regions and directions toward a grand north-south scheme. He had been considering the Maxwell Land Grant for railroad development since visiting Lucien Maxwell in 1867 during the western survey. The largest tract of land held by a single owner in U.S. history, the Maxwell Grant was offered to a group of Denver leaders who purchased it in April 1870. This group included Colorado Senator Jerome P. Chaffee, George M. Chilcott, Charles F. Holly, David F. Moffat, and Wilson Waddingham. They formed the Maxwell Land Grant and Railway Company and held its first meeting on May 18, 1870, at Cimarron, New Mexico Territory. The company elected its first board of directors—John Pratt, Miguel Otero, John S. Watts, New Mexico Governor William A. Pile, and General Palmer—with Palmer as first president of the board. If he were to develop the land in Colorado and the Southwest, Palmer knew he needed an accurate survey. Maps dating back hundreds of years were hardly adequate. U.S. Army surveys dated back to the Pike Expedition of 1806—1807. Fremont and Kearney’s expeditions had done some mapping in the 1840s, but it was limited. So Palmer contracted William Raymond Morley, a location engineer who had worked for him on the Kansas Pacific. Morley hired Lewis Kingman, who was carrying a letter of introduction from his friend Holbrook, to assist with


his mapping of the land grant. Morely and Kingman created the first accurate map of the northern part of New Mexico that would provide invaluable information for the area’s development. One of the authorities Palmer sought out was “Mr. Wooten.” Mr. Wooten, also known as “Uncle Dick Wootton,” had become a familiar, entrepreneurial character in Colorado history starting in the 1830s. By the 1860s, he moved to Trinidad and settled on the trail up Raton Pass, a part of the Maxwell Grant. Watching wagons battling their way up to the trail, he figured out how to make the trip easier and how to own a toll road for himself. He arranged a long term lease on the pass from Lucien Maxwell that gave him control of the trail and the approach on the north side of the pass. He hired teams of men to build bridges and cut a new road in the most difficult areas. He opened his twentyseven-mile toll road over the pass in 1865. The improved road made the pass the preferred route, and made Wooten a player in later railroad planning. Palmer was torn, once he was free of the concluded Kansas Pacific at Denver. His favorite Colorado railroad idea was to construct a railroad on a north-south axis between the east-west lines. The dream railroad would run south from Denver into Mexico, and later possibly north to Canada. He used knowledge gained from his earlier visits and surveys to develop the proposed route of the north-and-south railroad. The prospects were looking good for the project, so Palmer turned down an offer to be the manager of the Maxwell Grant effort. Palmer Develops the Pikes Peak Region He then needed to build his own organization. Palmer held to the faith that he could conduct business with old friends, especially from his regiment, and relations would always be amicable. The Union Contract Company would oversee Palmer’s first Denver and Rio Grande Railroad (D&RG) projects. The directors included railroad developer William. S. Jackson, but also several regimental associates of Palmer’s, notably Major Henry McAllister, and Colonel W. H. Greenwood. The company would buy materials and operating equipment, replacing Palmer’s original North and South Construction Company.

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Another Palmer company, the Colorado Improvement Company, became the railroad’s land agency. In early 1871, Colonel Greenwood and his engineers were surveying the details of the route south from Denver. The work was ready in March for grading teams and the Orman Brothers Construction Company won the contract. On July 26, the first D&RG locomotive, “The Montezuma,” arrived from Philadelphia, while Palmer was in Mexico. Two days later the first rails were put in place. Greenwood had the honor of driving the first spike. Even more than the north-south axis, Palmer’s most persistent railroad dream was to develop narrow gauge railroads as a means of conquering Colorado’s steep mountain grades. Often called his “principle,” Palmer’s faith in narrow gauge extended to his whole north-south plan. It was to be a unique experiment to follow the Continental Divide and connect the center of the United States with the center of Mexico by the lighter and more agile narrow gauges. During 1871, preliminary, rough surveys were done on many lines. Many of the Kansas Pacific Railroad’s surveyors found work on the D&RG, including J. A. McMurtrie, H. R. Holbrook and W. R. Morley. One of the proposed D&RG routes given a preliminary look was west from Cañon City through “the big canyon” on the Arkansas west of Pueblo. Development of the D&RG line and the new town it would found away from Colorado City were integral. On July 31, 1871, the Colorado Springs Company drove the first stake at Fountain Colony, later known as Colorado Springs. Denver and Rio Grande construction crews reached the town on October 21, 1871, however it was five days before the first non-construction train arrived. Regular service started on January 1, 1872. William Jackson Palmer remained extremely active and central to the development and history of Colorado Springs until his 1909 death, and is still revered as its founder. In addition, in 1872, at the mouth of nearby Ute Pass, Palmer and his partner Dr. Bell planned a spa town around the many mineral springs. The Colorado Springs Company coordinated a development first called Villa La Fonte. The name


“Manitou” (Algonquin for “Great Spirit” and popularized by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow in his poem “Hiawatha”) was suggested by William Blackmore, also a heavy investor in the area, to romanticize the area’s Indian heritage. The first building in the mountain spa was located near where the center of town would be. The wagon road was widened, smoothed, and space was prepared at a wide spot in the canyon for building a fine structure. The first major building would be a hotel, the Manitou House. A plan for Colorado Springs and Manitou Railway was announced. It would connect Manitou with the D&RG main line. The organizers included B. F. Crowell, A. V. Hunter and Irving Howbert. It was backed, quietly, by the D&RG. Why Choose? Palmer continued to investigate the Maxwell Grant region for his goals of extending the D&RG south. He sent out his team to explore the mountains south of Trinidad. While exploring the Manco del Burro (Pass of the Lame Donkey), they discovered outcroppings of coal that would be useful to Palmer’s industrial ventures. Of the six mountain passes from Trinidad to Santa Fe—Manco del Burro, Raton, San Francisco, Trinchera, Emory Cap, and Long’s Canyon—the Manco del Burro was much too rugged for a railroad line. On the south side of Raton Mesa they found coal deposits extending well into New Mexico. In 1872, Morley, still mapping for the Maxwell Grant, traveled through Colorado Springs, meeting with Palmer. Morley had been dividing his time between Cimarron and supporting Palmer’s narrow gauge concept. He had spoken out, on occasion, in favor of the latter at the General’s request. Morley, however, had developed quite an attachment to the Cimarron area, and he was building a new reputation for himself there. He was most interested in obtaining any kind of rail line into the grant’s area. Although offered the full time position as locating engineer on the D&RG, Morley turned the job down to stay with the Maxwell Company. Palmer wanted to build to Cimarron and other Maxwell communities, but needed major monetary assistance from land

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grant owners. He had already received some substantial help when the D&RG started. Yet under increasing pressure from his Colorado projects, Palmer recognized the need to cut loose from Maxwell responsibility. He relinquished his Maxwell leadership role. The directors offered Morley the job as executive director on November 11, 1872, knowing that he had the interests of the grant at heart. Palmer continued to work on his plan to cross New Mexico into Mexico. His Empire Contract Company became the Mexican National Railroad in late 1872. Traveling first by ship, Palmer rode stage coaches cross-country to Guadalajara. The trip nearly cost him his life. At Cebolla, “bandits” relieved the party of their weapons and sent them on to Guadalajara defenseless. It took a month to reach Mexico City. There were only rough beginnings of railroads in Mexico. Palmer was looking at routes into and around Mexico and work on preliminary surveys. His greatest competitor was, however, on the horizon. The Rival Santa Fe On June 26, 1873, the Atchison, Topeka, and Santa Fe Railroad (referred to here as the Santa Fe) formed the Colorado and New Mexico Railroad to build from Granada, Colorado, to Albuquerque, New Mexico and on west. Albert Alonzo Robinson, chief engineer of the Santa Fe, was sent to do a preliminary survey of the route. He suggested a route over Cimarron Pass much the same as Palmer had suggested for the Kansas Pacific. In 1874, the Santa Fe finally started to build further into Colorado. The newest division point would be at Granada. The Santa Fe organized the Pueblo and Arkansas Valley Railroad to build their Colorado line to Pueblo. They found an experienced man who was already knowledgeable of Colorado, H. R. Holbrook, and made him chief engineer of the Colorado project. The primary goals were the coal fields near Trinidad and Cañon City, then on to New Mexico once a route was determined. Meanwhile, Palmer’s relationship with the town of Pueblo, Colorado, was mixed. As was his consistent strategy, Palmer had developed a “South Pueblo” as a D&RG town rather than deal with the existing town of Pueblo. So the residents were surprised


and thrilled when the Santa Fe Railroad decided to build into old Pueblo. Thus they welcomed the Santa Fe when it started service to Pueblo on March 7, 1876, with a huge celebration. The Santa Fe’s next plan was to build south from La Junta along the Purgatoire River to Trinidad. A rival railroad, the Atlantic & Pacific (A&P), had built west from Kansas toward California, following some of Palmer’s ideas. The railroad ran into trouble in Indian Territory but was still working toward New Mexico. The Santa Fe Railroad and the D&RG both watched the A&P’s development with interest. The projected routes over Raton Pass by both companies were aimed for an A&P connection. Climb Every Mountain While seeming to be ready to build south, the D&RG decided to build west over La Veta Pass into the San Luis Valley. Investors, as well as some of Palmer’s friends with interests in the San Luis Valley, had pressured him to build west first. Survey teams had scouted three routes over the mountains. Palmer contacted Ray Morley to assist in selecting the best way. Refusing job offers from the Santa Fe, Morley switched loyalties from Maxwell to Palmer and went north to work for the D&RG. Palmer discussed with him his intention to build from El Moro to Cimarron once the line to Alamosa was finished. The La Veta Pass survey grading crews were waiting to start on the pass when Morley joined the D&RG’s workmen. Much of the alignment over the pass was Morley’s handiwork. The grading was completed in March and the track layers were close behind. Morley became upset, however, by the decision to build over La Veta rather than Raton Pass. He felt the D&RG would benefit more from building through Cimarron than to the San Luis Valley. He also feared the D&RG would build the line south and miss Cimarron. Accepting tempting offers, Morley joined a Santa Fe survey team before the D&RG work was finished on the pass. Palmer had made it no secret that he planned to build over Raton Pass, too. It was, however, becoming clear that the D&RG had never filed a survey to do so. Ray Morley had developed a strong friendship with “Uncle Dick” Wooten over the years with his position on the Maxwell

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Grant. Through Morley’s connection, the Santa Fe offered to pay Wooten a respectable lifetime income for use of his pass. The Santa Fe sought a route to California as well as to Colorado’s California Gulch (near what would become Leadville), and had announced intent to survey several routes through Colorado including up the Arkansas, up Ute Pass, and to Denver. Morley and his survey team looked at various routes into the mountains for a possible path to the Pacific. After Raton Pass, the Santa Fe priority became a survey for the Cañon City and San Juan Railroad (CC&SJ) up the Arkansas River. H. R. Holbrook, Lewis Kingman, and Morley teamed up for this project. They covered the Gunnison River drainage, on to Utah, back to the Clear Creek Canyon area into Denver, south to Ute Pass, and from there into South Park. Holbrook filed the CC&SJ right of way up the Arkansas River Valley in June. In September 1877, Palmer, J. A. McMurtrie, and Dr. William Bell traveled to the Leadville area to check reports that a second boom and rush was beginning there. The rumors were right; the great Leadville Silver Rush was 1877-80. That made ample reason for the railroads to build up the Arkansas River. Palmer thought the Santa Fe had no firm plans to expand into Colorado any further. In October 1877, he ordered a survey crew to finalize his Raton Pass designs. The reports of D&RG activity at El Moro obligated the Santa Fe to make a move, however, readying the survey from La Junta along the Purgatoire River. Already familiar with Palmer’s plans for the pass, Morley was directed by the Santa Fe to work out the details of the survey. Railroad Espionage Morley was not surprised at finding D&RG surveyors already at work on Raton Pass. Knowing the D&RG men, who knew him well, would operate in secret, Morley disguised himself by roaming the hills with a group of Uncle Dick’s sheep herders. He was apparently not recognized by the D&RG men and was able to make the final detailed Raton Pass survey undetected. In early 1878, Palmer learned of telegrams between the Santa Fe president and Kingman and Morley, setting up signals to reach Trinidad in order to cross Raton Pass. Knowing that the


Santa Fe men would make a bold move, Palmer decided to move in and hold the pass, directing his crews to start construction immediately. John A. McMurtrie and James R. DeRemer headed to Trinidad to get started for Palmer. McMurtrie had been with Palmer since building the Kansas Pacific. DeRemer had been with D&RG since the early days of the company and had gained Palmer’s trust. The two boarded the train to El Moro at Pueblo. It is unknown if the timing was accidental or planned, but Santa Fe chief Robinson was at the Pueblo station also bound for El Moro. One might assume that the ticket clerks or the conductor would have noticed him, but it appears they did not. Cautious about tipping his hand, Robinson boarded the train, locating a seat far from the D&RG men. He did, however, want to watch them. When the train arrived at El Moro, the D&RG men, unaware of the situation, checked into lodgings for the night. Morley met Robinson at the El Moro station. The Santa Fe men, clearly aware of the situation, rushed through Trinidad to Wooten’s ranch house. At the same time, Kingman was converging on the pass from the South for the Santa Fe. Along the way he recruited laborers for work on the pass. Later in the night the D&RG men, alerted about the Santa Fe’s activity, headed for Wooten’s ranch. The early March sunrise found Kingman’s crew already scratching dirt and cutting trees. The D&RG construction crew was assembling its teams at El Moro while its DeRemer and McMurtrie moved to the pass. At Wooten’s ranch they found the Santa Fe crew who ordered them off. It is legend that Wooten himself was working with the Santa Fe men and backed up the Santa Fe’s order for the D&RG to get off his land. Wooten was in full control of the access over the pass, and he and Morley were confident of that for the Santa Fe. McMurtrie then pressed Palmer to abandon the pass work and pursue the Arkansas River route. If the Santa Fe was busy at Raton Pass, perhaps it was a good time to build west from Cañon City and hold the Royal Gorge (then called “Grand Canyon of the Arkansas,” among other names). Yet the Santa Fe also had firm contacts ready in Cañon City. Immediately after the incident at Wooten’s ranch, the Santa Fe had sent Kingman

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to work on the survey from Pueblo west into the mountains. A mid-April Santa Fe message told the Rio Grande gang to move quickly. Robinson suspected the D&RG was preparing for a move to Cañon City. He set out to investigate in El Moro, questioning the D&RG men. They seemed unsure where they were going, perhaps to Alamosa to push a finish there. He concluded that they were really heading for Cañon City. When he went to arrange for his own travel to Pueblo and was refused by D&RG men, he suspected he was right. Robinson hoped again to out flank the D&RG’s McMurtrie. Unfortunately, his men were scattered. Holbrook was working on the new main line to Trinidad from La Junta. Robinson had already wired Morley in Pueblo to travel to La Junta and there replace Holbrook as construction engineer on the La Junta to Trinidad section. Then Holbrook was to move on into New Mexico and get the Trinidad to Las Vegas section going. Now Robinson wanted a new plan. As the story goes, Morley received Robinson’s message as he arrived at Rocky Ford. Morley rushed back to Pueblo to find a way to get into the gorge. Holbrook and his best men received Robinson’s new orders to go to Cañon City to work with Morley for the Santa Fe to beat the D&RG. Kingman was already in the area, and ready to start too. Once in Pueblo, Morley attempted to get on the D&RG’s train to Cañon City, but the conductor reportedly recognized him and refused to move the train with him on it. Morley got off the train, and it left westbound. He retrieved his horse and rode alone through the night to Cañon City to gather a crew and try to repeat the Raton Pass play. Upon his arrival in Cañon City, well ahead of the unhurried D&RG train, he started looking for workers in Cañon City and San Juan. The word went out. Men with tools gathered quickly. The “Royal Gorge War” The mouth of the gorge was a short distance west of town. From all appearances it is nothing more than a raging river running through a steep-walled crevice. There was a shelf leading into the canyon on the north side of the river, reaching in about half a mile. On April 19, 1878, Morley took the Cañon City


men to the north side of the river at the gorge. They immediately started scratching out a grade. Morley was expecting Holbrook and his workers to arrive and help at anytime. When the D&RG men arrived, they demanded that Morley and his Santa Fe men leave; they refused. The D&RG crews did not back down either, setting up camp not far away. Although there was no way to build along the south side of the river on the east end of the canyon, the D&RG set up a camp there. They needed to walk to the north side of the river where there was plenty of room for grading well into the gorge. The D&RG men sent workers around the Santa Fe men into this area. The D&RG’s men also set up a blockade in the gorge on the Santa Fe’s path. The situation turned into a stand off. Holbrook and his Santa Fe men arrived and were quickly pressed into action. The Santa Fe obtained an injunction to force the D&RG men out of the canyon. The Santa Fe was using General Palmer’s narrow gauge principles against him. Building a unique grade, the Santa Fe temporarily laid out a narrow gauge line knowing from the standard-gauge limits of the survey that, once built, they could convert the CC&SJ to standard gauge. The Santa Fe was benefiting from the machinations of a railroad baron larger and more infamous than any of the Santa Fe or D&RG men. Jay Gould Enters the Stage The D&RG was forced to sell stock to raise money. Jay Gould—often recognized as the most aggressive of the railroad “robber barons” in American history—and the Santa Fe were buying. Gould had been amassing control of all Union Pacific lines and had no Santa Fe loyalties; he wanted to control the D&RG to help rebuild his faltering railroad empire and to retaliate against the Santa Fe for being his own rival. The Santa Fe’s reduced freight and passenger rates to Colorado were pulling business away from Gould’s Kansas Pacific. Gould became a power factor in Colorado in 1873 when he gained control of the Union Pacific, through the purchase of Thomas Scott’s share of the company. As owner of the Union Pacific, Kansas Pacific, and the Denver Pacific Railroad (which had

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been Governor John Evans’s line from Denver to Cheyenne), Gould was working on Evans to gain control of his South Park line. Gould thought a better approach might be through the D&RG and Palmer. The battle for the Arkansas River gorge continued for a while but Palmer was finally forced to lease his three-foot gauge railroad to the standard gauge Atchison, Topeka, and Santa Fe in October 1878. The Santa Fe and the D&RG continued to battle along the Arkansas River until December, but then only the AT&SF grade was built. The lease was specific: Palmer’s men could not interfere with the Santa Fe’s operation of the D&RG.

Jay Gould was among the elite “robber barrons” who amassed his fortune with financial interests in railroads and in Western Union Telegraph. From the Library of

Congress Prints and Photographs Division Washington, D.C.

Railroad War II Palmer and his close circle of associates formed a pact to maintain their interests in the future direction of their railroad. They would extend the D&RG west over the mountains to Leadville and the San Juans. The Santa Fe’s thirty-year lease would allow it to gain entry into the gold and silver fields opening up the west of the Denver area. Soon Palmer charged that the Santa Fe had broken the lease and demanded his railroad back. In January, the United States Supreme Court issued a decision on a case between the Missouri, Kansas, and Texas Railway and the Kansas Pacific Railroad that was nearly identical to the situation between the Santa Fe and the D&RG. The Santa Fe argued that they had not broken the lease. In late May and early June, Palmer and his associates organized a force to recapture the railroad and the gorge. They


wanted to keep the D&RG healthy, in particular the future of the line to Leadville. The lease limited the D&RG in its power, but some work continued west of Cañon City. Dr. Bell reported on June 8 that DeRemer held the canyon near Spike Buck. The situation became very tense. The Santa Fe was well aware of the D&RG’s activity. Even the court battle heated up. On June 10 the court ordered the Santa Fe to quit operating the D&RG. The D&RG force started to reclaim its railroad. On June 11, 1879, the D&RG was placed in the hands of a receiver friendly to Palmer, but on July 16 it was back under Santa Fe control. On August 15 it was again in the hands of a receiver. The Santa Fe and Rio Grande were again at a stand off. While all of this was going on, former Colorado Governor John Evans pushed his Denver, South Park and Pacific Railroad (DSP&P) along the South Platte River, down Trout Creek Pass toward the Arkansas River. His goal was Leadville, while the Santa Fe and D&RG fought each other. Evans, once the developer of Evanston, Illinois, and Northwestern University, focused on being a Denver-centered railroad man after the damage done to his political career by investigations of the Sand Creek Massacre in 1864. Evans also developed the Denver and New Orleans and the Denver Texas and Gulf Railroads. Meanwhile, Jay Gould had continued to buy D&RG stock. By late 1879, he held enough power to stop the conflict. In December, he started the process of easing the conflict in a series of Boston meetings. Gould had attempted to buy control of Evans’s DSP&P, but so far was unsuccessful until later, in January 1880, when he gained that leverage. While negotiating with the D&RG, Gould had not conquered Evans but was talking with the Santa Fe in secret. The majority of the Santa Fe officials, as well as those in the D&RG, were not privy to subjects being settled. At the same time Gould also held secret meetings with Evans and Palmer. The Peace Treaty The D&RG and the DSP&P railroads—Palmer and Evans— decided to share the new line from Buena Vista to Leadville. The D&RG would build the new line on top of the grading being

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built by the Santa Fe. The ink was not dry on the resolution of the D&RG-Santa Fe lease-ending agreement when the D&RG and DSP&P started to take action. Santa Fe crews had graded well north of Buena Vista, while the DSP&P was building down Trout Creek Pass. Buena Vista was first settled in 1864, but it was not officially incorporated until October, 1879. In January, D&RG officer W. W. Borst learned that Evans’s DSP&P was building a connection to the Santa Fe line at Buena Vista. By this time, however, leaders of the Santa Fe saw no need to dwell on the dispute. As part of the agreement most of the narrow gauge equipment acquired by the Santa Fe was purchased by either the D&RG, or the DSP&P. There was no other place to use it. The Santa Fe and Palmer’s D&RG had alternately won their small skirmishes, but, by March, Palmer’s men started to reoccupy his railroad. On March 3, 1880, the DSP&P completed its line to Buena Vista. The “Royal Gorge War” had nearly come to gunfire when the Santa Fe brought in Bat Masterson and Doc Holliday with a posse, but it was brought to an end in the “Treaty of Boston” canceling the lease, receivership, and all of the various related lawsuits on March 27. The Aftermath Some of Palmer’s friends who had fallen out with him did not return to his fold. Borst, who had been with Palmer since the Civil War, left the D&RG when the Santa Fe returned control. It appears that the two had differences of opinion on how things were handled during the lease. Palmer was very upset with some of Borst’s decisions, and Borst elected to remain with the Santa Fe. Holbrook became chief engineer of the Atlantic and Pacific Division of the Santa Fe in 1880. Kingman worked with him until late 1881. When Holbrook resigned to go into Mexico to work on the Mexican Central with Morley, Kingman succeeded him at the A&P. One of the most important names from the conflict at the Royal Gorge faded into relative obscurity. J. R. DeRemer returned to the anonymity of the engineering offices of the D&RG.


The Santa Fe became occupied with building to California. Locating teams led by Kingman, Holbrook, and Morley were all working on the extension of the Santa Fe. Kingman and Holbrook worked in Arizona, the center of construction work to California. One of the other projects was the rail line from Guaymus, Mexico, to the border. The Sonora Railroad had started in 1880, and Morley was sent to help do their survey. Later Holbrook returned to Colorado and settled in Pueblo, working on developing the Arkansas Valley. At least two key players died for Palmer’s railroad expansion. Palmer sent his friend William H. Greenwood to Mexico to direct the Mexican National Railroad survey. On August 18, 1880, “bandits” killed Greenwood only eighteen miles from Mexico City. He was buried there in the American Cemetery. Three years later, Mexican bandits also killed Morley. Obviously, the general population of Mexico did not all welcome American railroad developers, but, equally obvious, these zealous men were slow to recognize that resistance or take it seriously. In Colorado, rumors of the consolidation of the D&RG and the DSP&P were common during 1880. When Palmer, Evans, and Gould met in New York, a merger would not happen. Palmer was not about to give in to Gould, nor was Evans. Palmer’s next move was to build another major railroad, the Denver and Rio Grande Western, from Salt Lake City to Grand Junction, or wherever the western end of the D&RG would be. Of course, this railroad reached across the San Luis Valley to Durango, another town Palmer founded as a railway terminal town in 1880. Through all, Palmer held onto his trust of his close associates remarkably well, in spite of the political ugliness in many railroad rivalries. His close knit association with his comrades from during the Civil War was never undone. Even though the situation had been rough, Holbrook and even Borst remained on good terms with the General. Perhaps Morley was the only exception to Palmer’s continuing rapport. The insecurities and irrational decisions by the D&RG may have driven Morley to the Santa Fe camp. He was upset by the company’s practice of bypassing older, established towns, and starting rival towns

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nearby hoping to woo residents and businesses to the new town. For the D&RG, this practice was essential to financing the railroad. Mel McFarland is a Colorado Springs native and graduated from W. J. Palmer High School in 1962. He earned a B.S. and M.A. from the University of Southern Colorado. McFarland taught industrial education and fine arts in Fountain-Fort Carson School District, and upon retiring joined the staff of the Manitou & Pikes Peak Railway. He is the author of Midland Route: A Colorado Midland Guide and Data Book (1980) and The Cripple Creek Road: A Midland Terminal Guide and Data Book (1983), and co-authored Rocketing to the Rockies (Colorado Rail Annual No. 17) and The Phantom Canyon (1990).

William Jackson Palmer’s lavishly furnished business car. Durango, Colorado, August 1964. Photograph by Myron Wood, © Special Collections, Pikes Peak Library District.

Congress Geography and Map Division Washington, D.C.

Map of the Denver and Rio Grande Railway and connections, including proposed lines, 1873. Original map 61 x 28 cm. From the Library of

William Jackson Palmer. Courtesy of Starsmore Center for Local History at the Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum.

NOTE: In March 1874, Inquirer Printing and Publishing Company published The Westward March of Emigration in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. The fifty-three page pamphlet was not attributed to an author, however the copy located in Special Collections, Pikes Peak Library District, reveals that William J. Palmer was the true writer of this work. The annotated copy, identified in Palmer’s handwriting as “W. J. Palmer’s N.Y. office copy,” contains corrections and marginalia which are represented in this chapter with square brackets [ ] to indicate his additions. Palmer often refers to himself, but never by name. We are grateful to have better insight into Palmer’s thoughts knowing that he penned this incredible publication. This chapter is reprinted with only minor format and spelling revisions to the original version.

The Westward March of Emigration in the United States, Considered in its Bearing Upon the Near Future of Colorado & New Mexico William Jackson Palmer [by Wm. J. Palmer] The United States has about forty-two millions of inhabitants. Its annual production exceeds ten thousand millions of dollars (by some authorities six thousand millions). Its foreign exports exceed 600 million dollars, gold value. All classes, it is safe to say, are more prosperous in the United States than in any country of the world. The population increases annually about 1,500,000, due— 1st. To the natural growth caused by an increase of births, an evidence alike of the salubrity of the climate and the general comfort and prosperity of the people. 2d. To an immigration which now amounts to about 400,000 annually. In the 50 years from 1820 to 1870, it has been 8,518,334, of whom 2,375,095 were farmers. The character of this immigration may be inferred from the fact (see the Report of Secretary of Board of Immigration issued in December last,) that these colonists bring with them to the United States an average sum of $800 each. They are in fact, for the most part, enterprising and intelligent people, who, from religious or political persecution, or a desire simply to acquire land or otherwise better their fortunes, have sought the shores of the new world. One effect of this large yearly increase in population has been to induce a national movement from the Eastern States to the West, which has come to have the certainty and uniformity of a great social law. This part of the “new world” is about 3,000 miles in width from the Atlantic to the Pacific oceans. Having been discovered and peopled by Europeans, it was, of course, settled up first along the Atlantic shores, and the navigable streams communicating therewith. The settlements extended thence westward about 300 miles to the Ohio river and the chain of great • 137 •

138 • WESTWARD MARCH OF EMIGRATION lakes—where water communication again came in to promote and distribute the westward movement. When, at last, railroads were introduced, access was afforded to every part of the interior of the new States, and the growth and production of the West were wonderfully stimulated. The westward march of population was now fairly inaugurated on its modern scale. The emigration from Europe assumed larger proportions and increased yearly with the improvements in ocean travel, and the opening up of railroad communication with fresh parts of the virgin Mississippi Valley. This great basin, drained by the Mississippi river and its tributaries, is about 1,700 miles in width, and extends nearly 1,000 miles from North to South. Its eastern border is the low range known best as the Allegheny Mountains, and its western rim, the Sierra Madre, or “Rocky Mountains,” the back-bone of the continent, whose drainage is shed eastward to the Atlantic and westward to the Pacific ocean. So rapidly has this westward movement gone on, that the “Mississippi Valley” already contains the majority of the people of the United States, and it has even been proposed to move the capitol of the nation, from Washington (which was sufficiently central for the 4,000,000 people who effected a separation from Great Britain in 1784) to St. Louis, a city 1,000 miles west of New York, but containing over 400,000 inhabitants, and occupying a much more central position to the existing 42,000,000 of people. (The population of the States in the Mississippi Valley, according to the census of 1870, 18,000,000; add for growth in 3½ years, 3,000,000. Present estimate, 21,000,000.) In size, St. Louis is the third city in the United States, or was by the last census. The growth of the great West is measured by the rapid increase in population of its large cities: Chicago, from 4,170 in 1836, to 400,000 in 1873. [1836 the year the writer was born WJP] St. Louis, from 12,000 in 1836, to 400,000 in 1873. Cincinnati, from 33,000 in 1836, to 250,000 in 1873. Pittsburgh (and suburbs), from 16,000 in 1836, to 300,000 in 1873. The most rapid growth, however, set in after the close of the war of the rebellion, 1865. St. Louis, which had 180,000 population in 1865, has more than doubled since; and the growth of Chicago has been perhaps even more astonishing. The energetic building of railways which then began, and the adoption of special and organized efforts by the States and railway companies to induce colonization to the lines of those roads, have caused

PALMER • 139 this rapid opening up and development of the West, which is rightly considered one of the great social phenomena of the 19th century. These lines of railway were rarely built to accommodate existing population or traffic. They were built ahead of both, in order to colonize the country. Their construction was necessary to make it inhabitable, and the lines found at once a lucrative business in carrying in the immigrants and their household goods, tools and plant generally, lumber for their houses, and the first supplies even of food itself, to start them in their new homes. The railway companies well knew that this business would support their lines until the colonists could get to work on the virgin soil and raise a surplus for shipment. When the Kansas Pacific railway had reached Topeka, in 1866, the line of Concord coaches from the end of its track westward to Denver and the intermediate country, carried sometimes six passengers daily, and often none at all. In two years, with the extension of the rail, the daily trains were running (from Topeka westward) with 400 to 500 passengers each, and from the inability of the company to anticipate such an increase in time to supply the rolling stock, it was more usual than otherwise to see the aisles of the cars and even the platforms of a long train crowded. Thus was Kansas settled, other railway lines having been rapidly added to join in the work of colonization. In 1865 the construction of railways began in Kansas. In 1873 there were 2,500 miles in operation. The population meanwhile had increased from about 100,000 to 400,000, the bulk of whom had gone there in four years. In Texas, since 1871, the population has increased from 800,000 to 1,100,000; there having been added to it 100,000 yearly for the last three years. When the writer of this paper began his connection with railways, twenty years ago, it was necessary to go west by stage-coach a part of the way to reach Pittsburgh (at the eastern edge of the Mississippi Valley, about 400 miles from New York), and the construction of railways was then just beginning West of Pennsylvania. He has had occasion since to keep en rapport with their extension through the West. In 16 years thereafter, he was able to travel by rail across the entire continent, 3,300 miles. In 1857 the financial panic interrupted all railway building, including a line then under construction, the Pittsburgh, Fort Wayne and Chicago railroad, now one of the leading and most remunerative trunk lines of the United States, deriving a revenue in 1873 on 500 miles, of $9,780,310, and of which over four and a half millions were net. It found itself 84 miles short of reaching Chicago, a promising

140 • WESTWARD MARCH OF EMIGRATION town which then numbered about 70,000 inhabitants. The enterprise was, however, taken hold of by J. Edgar Thomson (then, as now, standing at the head of the railroad men of the United States), who raised the money by an appeal to capitalists, in which he showed, amongst other things, that the line would pay, because the clearing of the forests along its line, while opening the country to the farmers, would give transportation to the railroad, since all the lumber would be required at Chicago, a growing place in a prairie country; which would also consume the manufactured products of Pittsburgh. This was sixteen years ago. Long since, Chicago became the “New York of the West,” far outstripping Boston and Baltimore in population: and the Fort Wayne railroad, besides possessing great local significance, has become a great national highway for the commerce between the West, the entire Northwest, and the East. Even the Pennsylvania railroad, perhaps the most important line in the United States, was started by the merchants of Philadelphia (about the beginning of this great hegira to the West), not so much as an investment expected of itself to pay, as an effort to secure trade as merchants, and as a matter of city pride. Subscriptions were made and frequently charged off to profit and loss. A reputation for public spirit demanded they should subscribe, and the merchants paid over their money to this unpromising enterprise in much the same spirit that they would have done toward a public library or a city park. It is gratifying to know that an original subscriber has received back in dividends, in 20 years, since 1853 (a year before the completion to Pittsburgh) for each $100.00 invested, the equivalent of $250 cash, an average of 12½ per cent, per annum, while the company has besides a surplus of 9 millions; and that this road, undertaken as a daring adventure on money considered rather as sacrificed to public spirit, is now transporting yearly nearly six million passengers and ten million tons, and that it derived an annual revenue in 1873 from the 358 miles of main line alone, of $22,308,481, or net $9,428,273. (Counting the stock dividends at their market value when paid.) The above are only a few of a thousand incidents which might be cited to illustrate the wonderful extent and rapidity of this peculiar American movement, epitomized by the words of Horace Greeley, “Go west, young man, go west.” Of what classes are those who thus emigrate? Partially foreigners, but chiefly young Americans—pushed out by the large annual influx from Europe. The young American has inherited a genius for colonization. He has seen and learned by tradition of the growth of comfort, wealth and refinement, of the increased value of

PALMER • 141 land, and the rapid rise of cities and acquisition of capital around him in his more easterly home. He starts out full of courage and hope, with no other capital than these qualities and his strong arm, to acquire the cheap land, and build himself a home in the West. He leaves behind friends and kindred, resolved to achieve fortune and consequence, and then to return East to marry and carry his wife to the new land. He is enterprising and full of faith. He knows that his adopted State or Territory will soon become populous, and contain large cities and all the comforts and luxuries he has left in the East. He hastens to seize the rich soil, the forest of timber, the coal field, the iron, copper or lead mine, the fine water-power or the promising town-site, which have remained since creation untouched in that country of hope. As he acquires fortune, and his boys grow up, they too become filled with the inevitable longing. The land around them has become in its turn valuable; the social and business chances are diminished by competition; they know the story of their father’s career, and the most enterprising imitate it and start out to advance still farther the line of the western frontier. All this is but a truism to the American, but to the European reader it seems a necessary preliminary to impress upon the mind the character and magnitude of this national westward movement, which is calculated upon by every thinking man in the United States with the certainty of an unquestioned natural law. A few more illustrations may be interesting: The State of Illinois has now nearly three millions of people. It is one of the richest States of the Union. It contains 7,000 miles of railways, and it is a common remark that the resources of eight miles of country on each side of a line in that State will warrant the construction of a new railway. But in 1856-7, when the writer first visited Illinois, and the more active construction of these lines had begun, one might ride by rail across the unbroken prairie for a hundred miles without seeing a house or fence. The lines were built in advance of population—not to supply existing wants, but to settle the country by making it accessible and enabling its future products to reach a market. How well they have succeeded in making this state the “granary” of America is too well known to require expression. The lines themselves—the machines which have absolutely created this prosperity—have abundantly shared in it; and, with few exceptions, have paid a high interest upon their cost. West of the line of the Mississippi river the same rapid progress has continued, building up first, Missouri, Iowa and Minnesota; then the more westward tier of States—Texas, Kansas and Nebraska— pausing only during the war, to be renewed with much more startling

142 • WESTWARD MARCH OF EMIGRATION activity upon its conclusion. Here again, with the extension of the railways westward, one city after another arose, along the banks of the Missouri, to challenge, with one or two exceptions, even their older tier of sisters on the Mississippi. Omaha, Council Bluffs, St. Joseph, Atchison, Leavenworth, Lawrence and Kansas City—all within a stretch of less than 200 miles—contain populations of from about 20,000 to near 50,000 each. Practically few of these had their birth earlier than the close of the war in 1865. At that time the writer was obliged to stage across the western part of the State of Missouri to reach Kansas City, then a place of less than 8,000 people. Now Kansas City has between 40,000 and 50,000 inhabitants; and between 1865 and the government census of 1870, its population had quadrupled. Nine railway lines (from every quarter) terminate there, and the ambitious little city even asserts its claims as a future rival of Chicago. The land where these railways intersect at Kansas City was then, in 1865, a “muddy bottom,” which could have been bought for from $50 to $100 per acre. In four years thereafter (1869) the railways themselves, requiring a small tract for a joint depot, were compelled to change their plans because they could not obtain it for less than $9,000 per acre. It is now (1874) covered with brick and other houses. This striking instance of the rapid increase in population and the value of land in the West, and especially at certain points of concentration, is not exceptional. It is the natural and certain concomitant of the great continuous tide of emigration, and has long since ceased to create surprise in the West. It is regularly counted upon, and the largest fortunes are made from correct judgment. II Proceeding West, between the line of the Missouri river and the base of the Rocky Mountains, extends westward a vast unwooded, gently rolling plain, 600 miles in width, which gradually rises from an elevation of say 560 feet above the sea (at Kansas City) to 5,300 feet (at Denver). This gradual swell of the continent, caused by the upheaval of the great Rocky Mountain range, is at the average rate of from 8 to 10 feet per mile, and there presently results from this cause—in connection with the increased distance from the Atlantic, and the existence of high mountain ranges which cut off and condense the moisture which might have found its way from the Pacific—entirely new climatic conditions.

PALMER • 143 At an average distance of say 200 miles West of Kansas City, very near the half-way line of the American continent, the gradually increasing aridity, due to the above causes, has resulted in our reaching what may be called the western limit of natural arable culture, on say, roughly, the 99th meridian from Greenwich. West of this line, to the vicinity of the Pacific coast, the rain-fall, as a rule, is insufficient to produce crops without the assistance of artificial irrigation. This limit is tolerably uniform for over 1000 miles from South to North—from Southern Texas to British America. For the belt of about 400 miles in width between this line and the foot of the Rocky Mountains, there are so few streams (and still fewer permanent ones) that irrigation is almost entirely impossible. Artesian wells have been sunk to a depth of 1,500 feet, but the strata have continued soft and permeable, and no water has been reached. This great plain has generally a good soil, rich in valuable mineral ingredients, and lacks only water to make it productive. But the indispensable water is lacking. It is covered with thin grass, and is roamed over by millions of buffalo and antelope (a species of chamois), and a few elk, but except on the immediate banks or in the beds of some of the little streams, trees do not grow; there is no shelter from the high winds; no fuel exists except the bois de vache; and, unless in certain narrow valleys, this entire belt of 400 miles in width may be considered as unlikely to be inhabited in our day, except by a scattered population of cattle and sheep raisers. After crossing the “plains,” however, and reaching in Colorado and New Mexico the foot-hills of the great range known as the Rocky Mountains, the situation is more completely and perhaps beneficially changed than even in the rich immediate basin of the Mississippi which lies to the East of the uninhabitable belt which has been described. It is as though one had crossed the sea and reached the shores of a new country, full of novel attractions and advantages—some even unknown in the one from which he had set sail—water, timber, coal, shelter; picturesque scenery, natural parks, resembling the finished grounds of a gentleman’s country seat; home-like-dells, coves and valleys; a most uniform and healthy climate, genial alike in winter and summer; numerous mineral springs, hot and cold; productive soil—everything apparently to invite rapid and permanent settlement. Numerous streams of water pouring down upon the plains (fed by the melting of snow from the higher mountain peaks), admit of being distributed over the adjoining slopes, converting them into a fertile agricultural district, capable of raising food for a large population. But more than this—everywhere in the mountain ranges, which one after another in parallel order, from north to south, ride this

144 • WESTWARD MARCH OF EMIGRATION magnificent plateau that crowns the American continent, are found rich veins and deposits of silver, gold, lead, copper, iron, salt, and nearly every other known mineral, the value of each being greatly enhanced by the remarkable abundance and diffusion of the best coal. From the eastern foot-hills of the first of these ranges to the Pacific coast is about eleven hundred miles. This includes (on the central and southern parallels, which we are more especially considering), the territories and States of Colorado and New Mexico, Utah, Arizona, Nevada and California. In connection with the territories North of this parallel, which need not now be described, this section produces practically all of the gold and silver of the United States, already about $80,000,000 yearly. The Rocky Mountains, in the words of President Grant in his first message, constitute the “strong-box” of the United States, from which it will obtain the means to pay the national debt. We must now mention a remarkable break in the gradual westward march of colonization, which began in 1849, soon after the conclusion of the Mexican war. The whole of California, Nevada, Arizona, New Mexico, with Southern Colorado and Southern Utah, belonged in 1846 to Mexico. This area constitutes, with Texas, also a former Mexican territory, about one-third of the present limits of the United States, exclusive of Alaska. California was then a distant border province of Mexico, containing about 60,000 inhabitants, who produced nothing but a few cattle and sheep, with hides and wool, and a little fruit. No precious minerals had been discovered, and whatever wheat was used was imported from Chile. The well-known discovery of gold in 1847, however, started an American colonization, which has increased the population of California to near 800,000, and its products from a few thousand dollars to over one hundred million dollars yearly. California was accessible by water around Cape Horn, and by the Isthmus of Panama route, both for first reaching and subsequently supplying it. Everything was at first imported, even meat. Nothing went out but gold. The country was considered dry, and agriculturally so unreliable, that it occurred to few to deem it valuable, except for washing gold. Men went to California to make their fortunes and return home to enjoy them. Now California exports $20,000,000 worth of wheat yearly (as much or more than of gold and silver), $10,000,000 yearly of wool; it supplies fruit and wine to all Eastern cities, and besides the constant immigration, is visited by from 15,000 to 20,000 tourists yearly from America and Europe, who think nothing of crossing

PALMER • 145 the American continent, 3,300 miles by rail, to spend some weeks or months there, for the benefit of their health or the enjoyment of the scenery. California, however, was on the Pacific coast; it was accessible by water, and although many of the early emigrants crossed the plains to reach it, the great majority went by sea, and all the supplies were of course carried by water. The absence of navigable rivers West of the Missouri, and the existence of wild tribes of Indians, prevented other parts of the western half of the continent from being settled to any extent until the time had come to push out railroads, bridge the dreary expanse, the “Buffalo Plain,” which has been described, and bring the Rocky Mountains within reach from the East. The only exception to this statement is the early Mormon occupation of Utah, where the chief object was to get as far away as possible for the undisturbed practice of their peculiar institutions. The effect upon the Utah railroads of this exceptional colonization will be referred to hereafter. Two great railways, the Union Pacific and Kansas Pacific, started from the banks of the Missouri river in the summer of 1865, to cross the plains. The first, supplemented by the Central Pacific which was to advance from San Francisco, eastward, had the bold purpose of spanning the remainder of the continent. The project was ridiculed; the Rocky Mountains were declared to be impassable; it was denied that there would be any business if the line was built; even the most enthusiastic counted upon little, but the through business with California and China; and no less an authority than General Sherman, the head of the army, who had campaigned in the country to be traversed and was supposed to know it, declared in the hearing of the writer in August, 1865, that the project was chimerical, and that he would not [be able to] “buy a ticket for his youngest grandchild.” Notwithstanding, in four years from its commencement the entire line of nearly 2,000 miles in length was completed in the summer of 1869, and the General could (and I believe did) ride through by rail to the Pacific coast in seven days from New York (3,300 miles). The gross earnings of this Pacific railroad line from Omaha to San Francisco last year, were $24,137,192, and the net, $13,504,838, sufficient to pay from 16 to 18 percent, upon its cash cost; but what is most interesting is the fact that although its construction has reversed to a considerable extent the course of the world’s trade with the Indies, so that teas and other Asiatic merchandise now come from the West instead of the

146 • WESTWARD MARCH OF EMIGRATION East, and England sends her mails to Australia by way of New York and California, yet the bulk of this vast revenue is derived from local transportation originating between the two termini of Omaha and San Francisco. Immediately prior to the construction of this highway, a single coach line, an occasional emigrant wagon train for California, and the supply of the interior government military posts, constituted the entire movement. Nearly the whole of the enormous transportation represented by the above figures was simply created by the construction of the railroad. It did not exist before, and could not have existed until the railway was built. What has been the effect of the construction of this railway upon California? To raise its population in four years from 500,000 to near 800,000. That outlying Mexican colony has become one of the proudest and most promising States of the American Union! Its taxable wealth is appraised at 1,200 millions of dollars. Nevada, adjoining California on the East, then entirely uninhabited except by starving Digger Indians, produces now about $35,000,000 of silver and gold yearly—nearly as much as the whole of Mexico. Its water is so limited, however, that there is scarcely any agricultural production. Utah, still further Eastward, has, since the completion of the Pacific railroad, discovered silver mines which already produce five million dollars annually—and this territory having besides, the advantage of the water which flows from the West slope of the Rocky Mountains proper, produces every species of vegetable crop, with the finest fruits, and already exports some wheat (which raised by irrigation is of a superior quality) to St. Louis. About a year later, the Kansas Pacific railway, on a line averaging 150 miles South of the Union Pacific, succeeded in spanning the Buffalo Plain, and reaching the foot of the mountains in Colorado. The effect is seen in the increase of population of Colorado, in three years from 39,864 to 100,000. The Denver Pacific Railway, a branch from the Union Pacific, of 106 miles, at the same time gave Colorado a second railroad connection with the East. Six other trunk lines have advanced a greater or less distance across Nebraska, Kansas, the Indian Territory or Texas, with the view of reaching Colorado and New Mexico—two of the lines hoping to extend through New Mexico to the Pacific. These are the Texas Pacific; Atlantic and Pacific; Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe;

PALMER • 147 Leavenworth and Denver; St. Joseph and Denver, and Burlington and Missouri extension. These lines are pushed out by the momentum of the 70,000 miles of line at their back, constituting the railway system of the United States. They are a strong evidence of the American faith that “Westward the Star of Empire takes its course,” and that the great wave of colonization in that direction will not stop. It must be interrupted however, as above shown, by the “400 mile arid belt,” which has been described, and then what will happen? Will it roll back and fill up more densely with population the country East of the 99th meridian? Not if human nature continues to be what it is and has been. The same desire to push out and seize upon the virgin resources of the land, the same longing to acquire an independent home, and to carve out a fortune unrestricted by the competition of capital—the same yearning to have “elbow room,” socially and industrially—the continued rapid increase of population in the East and “Old West” from births and foreign immigration, must continue to produce the same result that they always have done in the United States. Let us ask what the colonists from the Eastern States would have done on reaching the western border of Ohio, after that State had been occupied, had they found to the westward, instead of the rich soil of Indiana and Illinois, an uninhabitable belt of the same width separating them from the Mississippi river? Would they not have broken over this barrier and precipitated themselves upon the shore of Missouri, Iowa, etc., with exceptional force? Would not these States in all probability have been even more densely and rapidly populated and developed than they have been, by reason of the necessity of accommodating the four and a quarter millions of people who now occupy Indiana and Illinois? If it had been impossible to have a Chicago in Illinois, what a mighty city we should have anticipated of St. Louis in Missouri! The natural resources and capacity to support the population of Colorado, New Mexico, etc., will appear more particularly later on; but if we assume for the present, that they offer on the whole an area as attractive as that over which the westward emigration has already passed, can we resist the conviction that the great march which has been interrupted at the 99th meridian must leap across this uninhabitable belt, and strike first with particular elan against the foothills of the Rocky Mountains in Colorado and New Mexico?

148 • WESTWARD MARCH OF EMIGRATION III In what prominent respects does this new land present distinguishing features, favorable or unfavorable as they would affect growth, from those found in the Mississippi basin and East thereof? First. Unfavorable in comparison. In Colorado and New Mexico the rain fall is so much less, that except for small grains, potatoes, flax, hay, etc., in the higher parks and valleys, where the natural moisture is greater, arable culture is impossible without irrigation. The amount of arable land outside of these elevations is therefore limited by the amount of irrigating water. In fact, it is not estimated to exceed at the outside 6,000,000 acres, to which add the area estimated to be cultivable without irrigation for certain products, say 4,000,000 acres, and we have 10,000,000 acres as the maximum total area, estimated to be capable of producing vegetable food for man and animal in the two territories (exclusive of grass). As the total area of Colorado and New Mexico is, however, 148,000,000 acres, it will be seen that certainly not over seven percent, of the whole area is thus cultivable. Consequently immigrants cannot, as heretofore in the West, pour in and drop down hap-hazard all over the country, and proceed at once to cultivate the soil, each independently of the other. The agricultural colonists must go where there is running water, and then join together and get out their irrigating ditches. But irrigation is a new thing, and a bug-bear to eastern farmers. They find it requires a considerable first outlay, and they rarely have the necessary means to spare. They have been unaccustomed to it and fear it. We shall presently show how these difficulties may be overcome, and that they are even accompanied by some very valuable compensations; but let us here remark that in the above is summed up what we consider to be all the relative disadvantages of Colorado and New Mexico. On the other hand, what are the relative advantages? 1st: Health. The entire colonization of the Mississippi Valley, from Pittsburgh to middle Kansas, a width of 1,000 miles, has been carried on with the almost universal accompaniment of fevers—due to the breaking up of the new soil, clearing of the forests, exposure to rain, and frequently to the necessity of drinking inferior water. Charles Dickens’ description of “Eden” in his Martin Chuzzlewit, when his hero is brought to the West, was frequently not much exaggerated. It was lamentably near the truth in too many cases. The terrible “fever and ague,” oftener than otherwise, struck down whole families on their arrival in the new home. Reflect on what a terrible burden this

PALMER • 149 wholesale and depressing sickness—the seeds of which often remain permanently in the system—has been upon the first labors of the western pioneer. He was not only prevented from working when it was most necessary (at the start in life), but his little substance had to be taxed to pay for medicines and doctor’s services for his family. What a striking contrast is presented in this respect by Colorado and New Mexico. The elevation of the country, dryness of the air and proximity of the mountains produce here the healthiest climate in the United States, and probably of the world. Malarial diseases are almost unknown. One can lie down to sleep with impunity on the bare ground with nothing but his blanket. Bivouacking is a habit of the people. The newly arrived emigrant, when poor, often makes himself a “dug-out” or a cave in the ground, and lives there comfortably until he can build a house. It has been the custom for many years in the United States for physicians to prescribe for invalids a “trip across the plains” to the Rocky Mountains, and now one of the highest medical authorities of the United States, Dr. Jos. Pancoast, of Philadelphia, gives the following testimony: “That in regard to the great questions which concern invalids, heat, cold, dryness and humidity, and freeness of the air from every noxious quality, Colorado presents peculiar attractions that can scarcely fail to make it one of the great sanitaria of the North American continent. “Its weather, which is more than ordinarily clear and serene, and its scenery unexampled almost for interest and beauty, invite the invalid to out-door exercise, and its mineral springs, of varied qualities, grateful to the taste, will be found very beneficial in wellapportioned cases. “Colorado lies in the northern part of the temperate zone, which is deemed in all climates the most conducive to health and longevity. It is protected by its mountain ranges against the cold winds of the West, and by its continental slopes from the paludal fevers of the Mississippi Valley. If greater warmth is required in the winter, the railroad, which extends southward, places it within easy reach of the invalid. “The great elevation and consequent rarefaction of the atmosphere in Colorado, with its thermometric moderation in all seasons, gives to this region an especial advantage as a general sanitarium.” Since the railways have made Colorado accessible—in fact, it has become a great “Summer Resort” and “Winter Resort” for the wellto-do people of the East. American and English gentlemen of means and leisure have begun to build country seats there, and the fame of the country for its healthfulness and beauty is universal in the United

150 • WESTWARD MARCH OF EMIGRATION States. The purity of the atmosphere is unsurpassed—possessing a large degree of electricity consequent, upon altitude, entirely free from humidity, wonderfully clear and exhilarating—malarious or poisonous exhalations rarely burden this pure air. Decomposition takes place so slowly that the noxious gases engendered pass away imperceptibly. At Colorado Springs the number of clear and fair days number 320 in the year. What an advantage is this to the emigrant: to have for his new home, instead of an unhealthy swamp (a sort of alluvial grave), a land already sought by people of wealth and leisure for its healthgiving qualities. It is difficult to overestimate the importance of this consideration. “The work of a man in full health is worth from 50 to 100 percent, more than that of a man in poor condition.” 2d. Much greater variety in the elements of natural wealth. Heretofore in the United States, and especially in the more recent States of the great Mississippi Valley, the resources opened to immigrants have been in an overwhelming proportion merely agricultural. The Raising of Indian corn and wheat has monopolized for the greater part the labor of the immigrant. For a while this was accompanied by great prosperity. As long as the distances were not too great from the seaboard, the surplus would bear railway carriage to the cities and manufacturing districts of the East, and to Europe and the West Indies. Wheat having become the standard bread-food of the civilized world, was tolerably sure of a foreign market, from the failure of harvests in one or another of the European districts, and the surplus Indian corn or maize could be put into packed hogs, whisky, high wines, lard, etc., and in that concentrated form bear long transportation. The South, also, prior to the abolition of slavery, having devoted itself quite exclusively to the raising of cotton, tobacco, rice and sugar, afforded a good market for the breadstuffs and meat of the States North of the Ohio. West of the Mississippi, a like prosperity at first was seen. The immigration was so rapid to Iowa, Kansas and Nebraska, that the newly arrived colonists themselves were sufficient to afford a good market to those who had previously come and got their farms under cultivation. Each year’s immigration was equal in numbers to the population of a great city, and like it required to be fed, being, at least temporarily, non-producing. It was manifest that where nearly every new-comer proceeded to farming, the first prosperity could not continue very long. There was too much raw material being produced. The farmers of these last mentioned States, finding after the first falling off in the proportion of new arrivals that all their neighbors

PALMER • 151 were likewise producers of agricultural products, and that they were separated from the manufacturing States of the East and the Atlantic seaboard by a belt of 1,000 miles (also filled with farmers), began to look out for a western market, which they found in the gold and silver miners, stock raisers and traders, who had already found their way to Colorado, New Mexico, and Montana. This new market, by reason of the larger influx of miners, smelters, cattle, horse and wool growers, tourists, invalids, and other “non-producers” of grain, in proportion to the number of farmers, still continues, but is every day lessening in importance and must soon stop altogether. Hence a check has come to the prosperity of the farmers West of the Mississippi river especially in the rich States of Iowa, Minnesota, Kansas and Nebraska (containing together nearly three millions of people), where although there is some coal in thin seams and of not very good quality there appears to be little or no iron ore, and other mines are not found. Extensive manufacturing and mining, therefore, is not possible. These farmers have in some seasons recently been obliged to burn their corn for fuel—and many of them are now turning their attention to the Rocky Mountains, where the larger variety of natural resources favors a greater and more permanent prosperity. These States may be expected to constitute one of the best recruiting grounds for the emigration to the Rocky Mountain plateau, from which their average center is distant less than 700 miles. In Colorado and New Mexico, although the amount of cultivable land is much restricted, it is doubtful whether this circumstance is on the whole unfavorable. Man requires other things than food, and the agricultural resources exist here in much better proportion to the other elements of natural wealth. The working of the mines of gold, silver, lead and copper, so abundant in the adjoining mountains, and the great profusion of good coal, iron, fireclay, water power, timber, wool and hides, tending to create a large manufacturing community, all go to afford a reliable and permanent home market to the farmers. The very fact of the long distance from all outside agricultural competition must cause its arable lands to be the more rapidly and densely settled; and these farmers may expect to become much more wealthy than their eastern brethren. It is safe to say however, that there is sufficient irrigable and other arable land distributed through these two territories, if devoted solely to that purpose, to raise vegetable food for ten millions of people, and for present purposes, we may rest with that conclusion. The emigration of farmers, therefore, will not be so large, but the emigration of other classes may be expected to be larger than it has

152 • WESTWARD MARCH OF EMIGRATION been to the States farther East. Because of the great abundance and diffusion of the precious and other minerals, including an unusual amount of coal and iron, the largest population of Colorado and New Mexico will probably always be a mining one. This furnishes the basis. Manufacturers will be especially invited: 1st. By the large demand for tools, machinery, tramways, cars, wire ropes, etc., occasioned by the working of so many mines. 2d. By the smelting or reduction of the precious and other metals. There are already thirty works for this purpose in Colorado (also six forges). 3d. To work up the native wool and hides, raised on unirrigated lands (and which are now exported eastward in considerable quantities), the first into clothing, the second into leather and shoes, saddles, etc. 4th. By the great diffusion of good coal and rich iron ore, assisted by the long distances (500 and 1,000 miles), which separate these from the nearest coal and iron deposits to the Eastward. This distance, from all possible competition, operates as a natural tariff, which no legislation can affect, in favor of the Colorado and New Mexican manufacturer. 5th. Beside the articles above specified, this last consideration will promote also the manufacture of sugar from beets (which thrive here exceedingly well, and contain a very large percentage of saccharine matter: this manufacture has already been introduced into California, where there are 1½ millions of pounds produced annually at two works): the manufacture of paper, furniture, pottery, household ware, textile fabrics from flax (which grows wild in the parks), agricultural implements, tools for all classes, etc. Graziers This class will likewise be exceptionally large from the great area of the two territories, and the fact that nearly the whole of it is covered with nutritious grasses, which, from the dryness of the winters and the general mildness of the climate, form a good feed both summer and winter. Cattle graze out all the year, and are consequently (in connection with the fact that this land does not require to be irrigated, and belongs to the government, which permits its use by the graziers without cost), raised with extraordinary cheapness. The profits on the raising of “live stock” in Colorado and New Mexico by those who understand the business, exceed an average of 50 percent, per annum.

PALMER • 153 A good home market is afforded for the beef, mutton, horses, mules and wool, in the mines, and among the manufacturing, commercial, and other classes; and as the surplus will bear shipment even to the far East (an exportation already considerable as regards cattle, wool, hides and dressed beef), it is difficult to see how this business, which may be carried on upon over seventy million acres in Colorado and Now Mexico, can be over done. Beside the producers of the above articles, this class will include a very large number of butter and cheese makers, by reason of the superiority of the park grasses, water, climate, and exemption from flies, and other annoying insects. In fact, for dairying, this country will have the same prominence as little Switzerland on the old continent. A market for all the surplus of this choice butter, cheese, dressed beef, and mutton will be afforded in Chicago, St. Louis, and the other large cities of the Mississippi Valley—while for butter and cheese, Texas, California, and in time the mines of Mexico, will likewise constitute good markets. Lard and high wines are also to be added. Wine, Brandy and Subtropical Fruits There are few parts of the United States which have proven successful in the attempt to produce wine, while the habit of drinking this beverage has greatly increased within the past few years among the Americans, and is apparently on the constant increase from year to year. Ohio, after many efforts, and partial successes, has failed, except in a restricted belt along the shore of Lake Erie. Missouri produces a limited quantity, while California has perhaps shown the only decided success. A large amount of California wine and fruits is now brought annually by the Pacific railroads across the entire continent. The lower 300 miles of the Main Line of the Denver & Rio Grande Railway, along the Rio Grande Valley, will be chiefly devoted to fruit growing and wine making. For this, it is probably not surpassed in the United States, if equaled. Being nearly 1,000 miles nearer the center of population than California, its grapes, which are equally good, will command all the large markets in the United States. The fruit transportation from California over the Pacific railroads is already a large one, to Denver, Omaha, Chicago and other western towns, and it extends even to New York, Boston and Philadelphia; but the Atlantic cities are pretty much shut out by the time required. The saving of several days, which will be effected when the vineyards of Bernalillo and the Rio Grande valley are reached by rail, must open a market

154 • WESTWARD MARCH OF EMIGRATION of great extent to these fruits. The wine and brandy will of course bear transportation to any distance, and this will be assured by the superior character of the grape, the freedom from liability to disease and advantage of climate. The local consumption will also be larger than usual for the same amount of population, because of the disproportioned number of miners and tourists in the Rocky Mountains. Mexico, on the southward, is also a large consumer of wine, and with railway communication this would chiefly go down from El Paso to her towns and mining districts, since the grape does not appear to be adapted to the climate much south of El Paso, except where water is limited, as at Parras. Besides the relative advantages which have been specified, some others will be briefly alluded to. The combination of latitude and altitude in Colorado and New Mexico, accompanied by the remoteness from ocean vapors, and the proximity of grand mountains, unite in forming a country, the charm of whose climate and scenery is in everyone’s mouth. Unlike Switzerland, the country is locally extremely accessible— cattle graze, and towns flourish at an elevation of 10,000 feet, the forests of pine timber only give out at 11,500 feet (instead of at 6,000 feet, as in Switzerland) and mining is carried on all winter (on Mt. Lincoln) at over 14,000 feet above the sea—as high as the “Jungfrau.” The eastern base of the Rocky Mountains ranges from 3,700 to 7,000 feet above the sea, sufficient, in this latitude, to ensure a delightful moderation. By changing his latitude or altitude, one can find almost any climate that suits him best. Denver has about the latitude of northern Virginia or Lisbon, in Portugal; Colorado Springs, that of Washington city; El Paso, that of Savannah, in Georgia, and the Madeira Islands. At intervals, averaging less than 50 miles, occur mineral springs— hot and cold—which are already becoming resorts for health and pleasure, by people from the Mississippi valley and the far East. The universally recognized attractiveness, then, of this sunny land, constitutes a farther advantage not possessed by any of the Western States, which, as we have seen, filled up so rapidly with population, between the Allegheny Mountains and the 99th meridian. This advantage operates not only directly on the fancy of the would-be emigrant, but shows him an additional sound business reason for preferring this favored country. He sees that the annual swarming of wealthy tourists to the Spas and Parks of Colorado and New Mexico, seeking pleasure and health, means the free expenditure of large sums of money, a good market, of

PALMER • 155 itself, for many of the articles of luxury and necessity which he may raise. He is aware that already about 100,000 prosperous Americans go to Europe annually for recreation, spending a sum estimated at $100,000,000 yearly, and he observes, how the completion of the Pacific Railroad has opened in California a new pleasure ground for from 15,000 to 20,000 of the same class yearly. But it is not even necessary to speculate; the facts are before him. Colorado is now visited by at least 6,000 tourists yearly, and as many of them remain for months, and some throughout the year (to avoid the forbidding winters of the East) the amount of money thus expended is already considerable. Even from New York, Philadelphia and Boston, Colorado is but two-thirds of the distance to California; while from St. Louis, Chicago, Kansas City, and the center of this populous hive of the Mississippi valley, it is but an average journey of two days, and is the nearest resort to which these people can repair from the excessive summer heat and malarious atmosphere of their vast alluvial basin. The tide of tourist travel to the Rocky Mountains is therefore increasing each year, in a high ratio, and no one who is familiar with the traveling habits of the Americans, with the manner in which the “White Mountains,” “Saratoga,” and hundreds of sea-side resorts along the Atlantic Coast, are thronged each summer, and Florida, Havana, etc., in winter, by people from every part of the interior, and who observes the growing tendency of Americans to learn more about their own country, can doubt but that this sort of travel will, before long, be as large and remunerative to Colorado and New Mexico, as it now is to Europe. There will be a chain of hotels throughout the two territories, at the various Spas and points of special scenic interest, and the curious travelers will make the round of these, as they now do to such an extent in the comparatively tame “White Mountains” of New England. The fact that Colorado is a country of the finest natural roads, requiring little or no expense to make or maintain them, is another advantage of no mean importance. In some countries the burden of constructing and keeping up the indispensable turnpike roads is half as great as the cost of Narrow Gauge Railways in Colorado. Diligences and wagon trains start off from stations on the railway lines for journeys of several hundred miles, where scarcely a dollar’s expenditure has been found necessary to make the road other than nature left it. Fourth. Organized Migration. The recent plan of emigrating in colonies which, was first generally introduced in the United States by its adoption for Colorado, is a relative advantage of very considerable

156 • WESTWARD MARCH OF EMIGRATION importance. Heretofore the western immigrants had straggled out individually and dropped down without society, schools, churches, friends, amusements, roads, or any of the ameliorations of life. They left the cohering process to be carried on afterwards. Although stimulated by ambition, it was, after all, a hard lot, a long struggle for fortune, with few enjoyments by the way. How different is the case under the system of “organized immigration.” But the contrast between the old and new way is so well expressed by a writer in the Chicago Interior of July 18th, 1872, that we may be pardoned for quoting it entire. Organized Migration Colorado at once became the field of a more fortunate and happier development than up to this time has been vouchsafed any other portion of the United States. Capital, influence and organization combined to make her settlement systematic and rapid. There probably never has been a country before, whose settlement has been under so happy and promising auspices as that of this Territory to-day. Capital has already laid firm and strong the foundations of a prosperous social structure. Railroads have been built at the cost of millions of dollars, and more are projected, or in course of construction. Smelting works, furnaces and ore mills have been erected by eastern owners, until the wild hills of the Rocky Mountains, in places, look like the coal and iron regions of Pennsylvania, or the great manufacturing districts of New England. Her population, too, has been gained, not by the old and fortuitous system of pioneer settlement, but by organized and systematic colonization. Her people are not the drift, but the pick of the east. They come not as solitary adventurers, but as matured communities. They come not to struggle through generations of hardship and privation, but to improve on the experience of the life they have left. I know of nothing in the history of human progress which shows a greater advance, than the contrast between the old and the new plan of emigration. The old emigrant gave up almost everything—the new one, we might almost say, gains almost everything. Our fathers, when they sought a new

PALMER • 157 home, abandoned country, law, order, comfort, education. We carry with us our schools, lyceums, churches, political and civil organization, and may even start with advantages which we did not possess in the old home. Colorado is a brilliant example of the modern system of organized colonization, and this settlement of Colorado Springs, from which I write, is a most excellent and successful illustration. Nine months ago the place was a beautiful rolling mesa, which had never known the habitation of man. Today it is an embryonic city, with every condition of a fortunate future which could be secured by intelligence, liberality and sagacity. There are churches, a school-house and school, a lyceum, a full municipal organization, justices of the peace, constables, and a special charter, hotels, railroad offices, one lawyer, three physicians, a newspaper, livery stables, stores, insurance and real estate offices, and some 600 or 800 inhabitants (now over 2,500). No street is narrower than 100 feet, and the main avenues are 140. Every house that goes up is built in regular order, and by good mechanics, shapely and in place. The municipal charter forbids the sale of liquor, and secures police regulations which could not be enforced in many parts of Illinois. I can safely say, that in the way of social culture, salutary restraints and moral influences, the place is not excelled by any village in the States. In the old times, a settler would have had to wait many years, perhaps a life-time, to have gathered around him for himself and children the comforts and conveniences which are here at Colorado Springs. Now we go West, and find civilization readymade to order, waiting to receive us.—Temperance Vindicator, Harrisburg, Pa. It will be observed that in a country where irrigation is practiced, there is everything to recommend and induce the system of migrating in colonies—the dependence upon a common canal, the union of resource’s to build this canal, the necessity of acquiring in block the area of land to be covered artificially by water, and so on. Besides other advantages, the colony, through those raising it, is able to obtain for the members, and their families, lower rates of

158 • WESTWARD MARCH OF EMIGRATION transportation from the railways, by about one-third, also for their household goods and first supplies. It can likewise deal, for its agricultural implements and cattle, on better terms; can herd its animals in common, and use the organization for a variety of useful purposes. It is better able likewise to wisely regulate, at the start, the composition of its parts, avoiding an excess of any particular industrial class. The colonial organization is of the simplest character, rather understood than written down, and ceases in a very short time after the arrival of the colonists—giving way naturally to the regular organizations provided by State and Territorial law. But will not the greater distance from the East tend to restrict the emigration to Colorado and New Mexico? No. Because this emigration comes chiefly from the Mississippi Valley—the “Old West.” From the center of population in this basin (of over 20,000,000 souls) to Colorado is but little, if any longer than from New York or Philadelphia to that central point. Even for those who come from the extreme East, the distance is practically lessened one-third by the abatement of rates of transportation for colonies which has been referred to. Colorado Springs is nearer the heart of the United States than is St. Louis. IV It will be correctly inferred from the preceding summary of the most striking differences between the attractions of the “Old West” and the “New West” as affecting emigration, that only in one respect— the very small proportion of land capable of raising vegetable food (this being for the most part limited by the amount of water available for irrigation)—is there found any inferiority in Colorado and New Mexico; while in numerous other important elements of wealth there exists undoubted superiority. Considering even the agricultural resources as a whole, we must include the raising of cattle, sheep, horses, mules, wool and hides, and here we find in the climate, character of the grasses, and immense area adapted to grazing free of cost (being public lands), such great advantages, that even agriculturally, it is necessary to award these two territories a high rank. Some idea of the importance of wool alone may be gathered from the fact that from California, a State which, as we have seen, had the advantage of early accessibility and settlement there was shipped last year, over the Pacific Railroad, and to the Atlantic cities (3,300 miles) no less than 20,000,000 pounds of wool.

PALMER • 159 As regards cattle, the example of Texas, which enjoyed the same advantage of early accessibility, is to the point. This State possesses over 3,500,000 head of cattle and exports over 1,000,000 head yearly. But a very much larger amount of wool can be raised on the 231,000 square miles of Colorado and New Mexico, than on the 188,000 square miles of California (the quality being a matter of breeding); and the quality of the beef raised, by reason of the dryness of the climate, especially in winter, is much superior to that of Texas. In the “Old West” and Eastern States, the stock grower is obliged to work hard for six months of the year, to raise food to keep his cattle through the severe, wet winters. In Colorado and New Mexico, and some of the adjoining Territories, the animals take care of themselves, winter and summer, grow while their owner sleeps, and come off the range, even in the Spring, in good condition for market. This last circumstance is of additional importance from the fact that—since it is possible in so few parts of the Union—the market is somewhat free of competition at that season of the year, and the price of cattle for beef is higher than the average. On the whole, although the grass appears thin and stunted, its nutritious qualities are so great that it may be truthfully said, there is no better range in the Union than that of Colorado and New Mexico. In Colorado alone, its area exceeds 30,000,000 acres, and there is probably more than that much in New Mexico. Already, there is exported from Colorado and New Mexico about 5,000,000 pounds of wool yearly, chiefly to Philadelphia, an average distance of 2,500 miles; and although the cattle business is new, from 10,000 to 20,000 head of choice beef, live and dressed, are already exported. The rule is to import Texan and other cattle, fatten and improve them on the nutritious grasses of Colorado, and export the choicest beeves. The importation must probably continue in excess of the exports, until these Territories are stocked. Irrigation While the first effect of the necessity of irrigating land in order to cultivate it, is unquestionably to check the ingress of the farming class, unless special agencies, which will be hereafter described are adopted, yet in fact this may be found, in the long run, a positive advantage. Irrigation is simply scientific farming. The tiller of the soil is not left at the mercy of fortuitous rains. His capital and labor are not risked upon an adventure. He can plan with all the certainty and confidence of a mechanic. He is a chemist whose laboratory is a certain area of land; everything but the water is at hand—the bright sun, the potash

160 • WESTWARD MARCH OF EMIGRATION and other valuable mineral ingredients (not washed out of the soil by centuries of rain); his climate secures him always from an excess of moisture, and what nature fails to yield—greater or less, according to the season—the farmer supplies from his irrigating canal, and with it he introduces, without other labor, the most valuable fertilizing ingredients with which the water, in its course through the mountains, has become charged. After the first richness is taken off the soil in the older States, it may turn out that the farmers will look with envy to this systematic cultivation of Colorado and New Mexico. Even as regards first outlay, it costs less than clearing the land of trees, underbrush and stumps in the more easterly States, or draining it in some of the lower western ones, and when once done, it saves: 1st. The cost of manuring, the water being always charged with fertilizing matter, and keeping up the soil. 2d. All loss of crop by drought or flood, or irregular rainfall, or rust, or injury from being wet in harvesting. It is farther a positive advantage, in that First. It enables the farmer to regulate the work to his own will, instead of being compelled to labor at irregular and uncertain intervals. Second. It greatly increases the yield. Let us quote a recognized agricultural authority of the highest character—the late Horace Greeley. Horace Greeley On Irrigation To many the cost of irrigation would seem so much added to the expense of cultivation without irrigation; but this is a mistake. Here is land entirely free from stump or stick or stone, which may easily and surely be plowed and seeded in March or April, and which will produce great crops of nearly every grain, grass, or vegetable, and with a moderate outlay of labor to subdue or till it. The farmer need not lose three days per annum by rains in the growing season, and need not fear storms or showers when he seeks to harvest his grass or grain. Nothing like ague or any malarious disease exhausts his vitality or paralyzes his strength. I saw men breaking up for the first time tracts which had received no water, with but a single span of horses as team, whereas in the Prairie States breaking up involves a much larger outlay of power.

PALMER • 161 The following reflections from the Greeley Tribune very pertinently present the irrigation question: Those Eastern farmers who expect to come to Colorado and get 160 acres of land, well-watered, for any sum, will be disappointed. The conditions are altogether different here from what they are there, and it is useless to look for similarity. Irrigation is certainly expensive, if one is to farm on a large scale, and do good farming. But a small amount of land will produce the same results that large amounts produce in the States, with less labor, though not with less attention. It is the water, not the land, that has the value. Land may be had, and good land, too, almost for the asking. We can begin to see and understand, now, how it is that land in the vicinity of Ogden and other towns in Utah, when well improved, is worth $1,000 an acre; and why it is that five-acre lots, two and three miles from Salt Lake City, without much improvement, are worth $300 an acre; and why common farms are worth from $100 to $200 an acre. It can be said definitely that there are two reasons why irrigated land must be dear: because there is so little that can be watered, in comparison with the vast country; and because it is so uniformly productive in grain, vegetables and fruit. No American bottom, nor Mississippi nor Connecticut Valley, nor Mohawk Flat, can equal irrigated land in yield, considering the labor bestowed. But enough of theory. Now for the facts as already developed in Colorado. The annexed table will show the comparative results of farming: the first, the average in Colorado, according to the recent message of its Governor—the second, the average production of the United States, according to the last report of the Bureau of Agriculture: Average crop of Colorado per acre. Average crop of the United States per acre. Wheat .............. 28 bush. Barley ...................... 40 “ Corn ........................ 35 “ Oats ......................... 55 “ Potatoes ................ 200 “

Wheat .............. 12 bush. Barley ...................... 24 “ Corn ..........................25 “ Oats .......................... 25 “ Potatoes ................... 93 “

162 • WESTWARD MARCH OF EMIGRATION In the State of Pennsylvania, one of the most fertile of the Atlantic States, the average wheat crop is but twelve bushels per acre; and even in Missouri, one of the most fertile States of the Mississippi Valley, the average does not exceed fifteen bushels. So that it appears the effect of irrigation, combined with the character of the soil in Colorado, has been to double the crop. Instead of twenty-eight bushels, however, which is the average, it is not unusual to raise forty bushels, while even sixty and seventy bushels to the acre have been produced. New Mexico is perhaps equally fertile, and enjoys the same conditions as Colorado, with a warmer climate. Although it produces as excellent wheat, the vine and Indian corn are more especially the staples of New Mexico. The mild climate of New Mexico permits, in the case of some products, several crops to be raised yearly, especially of Alfalfa (Lucerne). What is the quality of this wheat of Colorado? It is acknowledged to be of the best raised in the United States. Being produced in a dry climate by irrigation, the grain comes to a full, perfect head, is very heavy, and makes a flour which is already exported by rail to distances in the East, reaching even 2,500 miles. During the past season, about 2,000 barrels of Colorado flour have been shipped to Boston, 1,000 barrels to Chicago, and as much more in all to Philadelphia, Leavenworth and other cities eastward. The price of the flour in Philadelphia, is now $11 per barrel (196 Lbs.), delivered at the residence. This is not a large trade, but it is in its extreme infancy; and the superior quality of the flour will always ensure it a considerable eastern market, from that large class in the United States which is always ready to pay a high price for the best of anything. The demand will extend to other cities throughout the Mississippi Valley and the East. The United States government has just begun to contract for Colorado flour to supply its principal military post in the Union, Fort Leavenworth on the Missouri river, 620 miles by rail eastward from Denver. The following extract is taken from the Denver Rocky Mountain News of February 3, 1874: The commissary of this military department has recently awarded to N. O. Vosburg & Bro., of this city, a contract for one hundred and sixty-five thousand pounds of Colorado flour. Major Elderkin, commissary of subsistence, U.S.A., arrived in town last night to inspect the first installment of this

PALMER • 163 purchase. About 50,000 pounds of this flour will be shipped to Fort Leavenworth for army purposes. The remainder will be distributed among the different posts of this department. But it is not upon an Eastern market that Colorado and New Mexico will depend for a market for their wheat. After devoting a wise proportion of the irrigable land to raising corn, lard, whiskey, high wines, (these last articles being the usualforms into which corn is concentrated to bear exportation in the United States), oats, barley, hay, beets for sugar, vegetables, wine, brandy, beer, fruit, tobacco, cotton, flax, and other textile staples—to nurserygardens, etc.—it is not likely, in the writer’s opinion, considering the very large proportion of miners, manufacturers, graziers and traders—which will constitute the home market, that there will be a much larger surplus of wheat for exportation than will be required by the mining Territories immediately adjoining. Of course the production of wine, brandy, wool and hides cannot be overdone, since the United States still imports yearly over one hundred millions of dollars of those articles. Neither can too much gold and silver be produced, or (as a matter of fact in the United States), cattle, sheep, horses, textiles, sugar, dressed packed and canned meats, butter, cheese, fruit, beer, and tobacco. These will nearly all bear transportation for any distance to a market. We may conclude, therefore, that as compared with the “Old West” and the Eastern States, there are compensations attending the restricted amount of arable land in Colorado and New Mexico, and the necessity of irrigation, which may even throw the balance of advantage with the last named Territories. And certainly by reason of greater productiveness, we may safely multiply the number of irrigable acres by two, in making this comparison. V But how, as regards attractions to immigrants, do Colorado and New Mexico compare with California, which has so rapidly risen to a production of $100,000,000 yearly, and a population of nearly 800,000? California has many of the peculiar advantages of Colorado and New Mexico in climate, adaptability to cattle and wool, wine and sub-tropical fruits, irrigation (to some extent), scenery, Spas and precious mines. It probably has not a much larger proportion of arable land—remembering that one-third of California (whose total area is 188,000 sq. miles), lies east of the high range of the Sierra Nevada and Cordilleras which cut it off from the moisture of the Pacific, and make of it a sandy desert which does not even produce grass.

164 • WESTWARD MARCH OF EMIGRATION As regards wheat, California does not average over 20 bushels per acre. Colorado exceeds this by 40 percent. California has a decided advantage in adjoining the sea, and possessing two available harbors, San Francisco and San Diego. This, by making it accessible before the trans-continental railways were begun, gave it the start. It has now, however, the disadvantage of being over 1,009 miles in a straight line (1,500 miles by rail) more remote than Colorado and New Mexico from 41,000,000 out of the 42,000,000 of the inhabitants of the United States—from the great wealthy hive which dwells east of the Rocky Mountains. For all the wines, wool, horses, cattle, fruits, tourist-travel and colonization, this diminished distance is a decided advantage relatively for Colorado and New Mexico. The climate is not so admirable in California, because, although the winters are milder they are wet, whereas, like Mexico, the rainfall of Colorado and New Mexico, although much smaller, generally occurs in summer. In California one misses the change of seasons—the charming progression of spring, summer, autumn and winter. It has but two seasons—the dry and wet. The summers are not unfrequently accompanied by severe droughts, and the winters by destructive floods. As regards scenery, it will be sufficient to say that attractive and famous throughout the world as California is in this respect, it does not excel the territories under consideration. As regards health, although California is much frequented with this object, it misses the advantage presented by a grand elevated plateau lifted a vertical mile above the sea level. Its air is not so bracing. In respect of precious mines, California yields twenty million dollars yearly, as against five million for the much more recently opened Colorado. But as the yield of California still consists so largely of placer or washed gold, it is constantly diminishing, or at least not increasing (since the new quartz mines do not appear to more than replace the production of exhausted placers). The yield of Colorado, on the other hand, is chiefly from regular quartz lodes of gold and silver, principally the latter. As new veins are constantly being discovered in the Rocky Mountains, with the opening of railroad communication, the bullion production of Colorado is yearly increasing in a high ratio, and may be reasonably expected before many years to surpass that of California, and, by reason of the remarkable abundance of lodes, even the yield of Nevada. It is, however, in the important resource of manufactures that the greatest advantage exists for Colorado and New Mexico, as compared

PALMER • 165 with California and the entire Pacific slope. California possesses, as far as yet discovered, but one small coal district, that of “Monte Diablo,” and the quality of that coal is very inferior. Most of the coal used in California is brought from Bellingham Bay, on the coast of British America, 700 miles distant, and even that is an ashy lignite, unfitted for most purposes of the arts. One sees in the streets of San Francisco depots of “Rocky Mountain coal,” which has been carried by the Pacific railroad over 1,000 miles from the interior; and most of the fuel used for the ocean steamers is brought from Maryland and Pennsylvania on the Atlantic side, an enormous journey around “the Horn,” or via .the Isthmus of Panama. Iron ore also has, I believe, not been discovered, and even if it should, it would be comparatively valueless without coal. California and the other Pacific States can therefore never excel in great staple manufactures, which bring so largely of population and wealth to a country. But on the other hand, those States should open up a vast market of consumers to the manufactures of Colorado and New Mexico, to which they will be so near in comparison with the other manufacturing districts of the United States. But it is for metallurgical purposes that the absence of good coal west of the Rocky Mountains will be more especially felt. Those States are great producers of silver and gold, lead, copper, and other metals, which must be reduced from the native ores. Throughout an area of over one million square miles, metallurgical operations will be required on the grandest scale. The demand for an adequate fuel for reduction is therefore already large and imperative, and, as this vast mineral territory is still further developed, it will become in time enormous. At present charcoal from wood is chiefly used, but the sparse forests are becoming rapidly thinned out, and the wagon haul will soon be too long to permit extension. Already, therefore, we see the Union Pacific railroad engaged in carrying three hundred tons of coke weekly to the silver works of Utah and Nevada. This coke comes chiefly from Connelsville, Pa., a rail transportation which reaches even twenty-five hundred miles. But the coking coals of Trinidad and Cucharas in Southern Colorado, soon to be obtained by the extension of the Denver and Rio Grande railway are of excellent quality and less than half that distance. To Utah and Nevada the saving in transportation will simply be 1,300 miles! The Hon. W. M. McCoy, one of the largest silver smelters in Nevada, writes within a few months, concerning Colorado coke, as follows:

166 • WESTWARD MARCH OF EMIGRATION The amount of coke necessary for smelting purposes in Nevada, will be very great, and the fact that the transportation will be shortened 1,600 miles (?) will certainly enable you to supply us .at much less cost to the consumer than Pittsburgh. A railroad is now being constructed from Palisade on the Central Pacific railroad to Eureka, Nevada, which will probably be completed by the first of September next. This will bring us in communication with central Nevada, which will consume an immense amount of coke after the small quantity of timber (now being rapidly consumed) shall have been exhausted. The estimate is that my town (Eureka), will alone consume seventy-five tons per day, after the present season. We are now hauling charcoal from thirty to forty miles and paying thirty cents per bushel for it. With a railroad completed to our town, it will cost us less for coke from Colorado than the article (charcoal) we now use. What amount Utah will consume I am unable to say. It will certainly be very large. I can say in general terms: if you can supply us with a good article of coke the consumption will be very great. But if a large market is thus opened to these coals, at such a distance westward as Utah and Nevada, what an extensive production will be required for the near reduction works of Colorado and New Mexico (where there are already between thirty and forty such establishments), and for the immediately adjoining mining districts of Arizona and Chihuahua. So far as yet discovered, the only metallurgical coals in the entire western half of the American continent are these coking coals of Southern Colorado, and the two valuable anthracite beds near Santa Fe, in New Mexico. The demand upon them must be enormous. The New Mexico anthracite will go also southward by rail through Mexico, which produces $40,000,000 of bullion yearly, but has found no good coal, and is obliged to reduce its silver by the feet of mules in the wasteful patio process. It will also go westward by the Texas Pacific railway route to California and for the supply of the rapidly growing steam marine of the Pacific, which it will reach at the harbor of San Diego in less than 1,000 miles. From Alaska to Chile, along that coast a distance of 6,000 miles, there is an absence of good coal. Except in an older development and a seacoast, therefore, we can see no advantage possessed by California over Colorado and New

PALMER • 167 Mexico, while it is evident that in some of the most important elements of natural wealth it is far inferior to them. To a country such as we have been describing, where in time nearly every article known to commerce, including the metals, can be produced within its borders, excepting tea and tropical groceries, drugs and other products of the tropics (while even these will be brought by rail from Mexico, much more quickly and almost as cheaply as they could reach the Atlantic cities of the United States), the relative importance of foreign commerce is yearly diminishing. To an unusual extent it will be able to “live within itself.” VI We have now cited our reasons for believing that in the various elements which go to attract population, Colorado and New Mexico are, to put it modestly, not behind the country East of the ninetyninth meridian, where we have seen one State after another grow in a few years, under the impetus of rapid railroad construction, from an uninhabited wild, to a population of from 400,000 to 3,000,000; and new made cities with dazzling rapidity acquire a population of 50,000 to 400,000. Also, that they are not in these respects behind California, which increased in population between 1849 and 1865 from say 60,000 to 500,000, and since that time by the building of the Pacific railroad to near 800,000. How then, can we resist the conviction, that a similar rapid growth in population and wealth is at hand for Colorado and New Mexico, especially as the general filling up (not densely but so as to permit the sting of competition to be felt) of the country East of the limit of natural arable culture in the United States, leaves the increasing westward stream of emigration on this general parallel, no nearer or more desirable field to occupy? There will come with this rush of immigrants the usual rapid building up of towns and cities, the increase in the price of land, the making of sudden fortunes, which are so familiar to the American who has had time to watch the growth of the “Old West.” This process may indeed be even more active than in the Mississippi Valley, because of the necessity of much greater concentration on certain topographical lines in Colorado and New Mexico. In this great material work, railways must play a more important part, if possible, than they have done in the Mississippi Valley and Eastern States; for all this vast district (230,925 square miles in Colorado and New Mexico), one-seventh larger than France, is without a navigable stream, and canals for navigation are impossible; whereas, every State east of the Rocky Mountains has been reached

168 • WESTWARD MARCH OF EMIGRATION and supplied more or less by water navigation, and the railroads in every such State have been from the beginning, and still are, feeling the effects of water competition. It is perhaps not an exaggeration to estimate that without the rivers, canals, lakes, bays, sounds and coast lines which the eastern half of the United States possesses, the existing domestic commerce of those States could not be carried on without at least trebling the number of miles of railroad. This water system, moreover, includes the largest rivers of the world. But in Colorado and New Mexico the entire commerce, whatever the reader may infer its amount will be from a careful consideration of the preceding statements, must be carried by rail. There is no water to help! The general character of this railroad system will be shown further on. Meanwhile, let us again refer to the East and West Trunk lines above enumerated, which have pushed and are pushing out through Nebraska, Kansas, the Indian Territory and Texas, toward Colorado and New Mexico. Two of these eight lines, the “Texas Pacific” and “Atlantic and Pacific,” have been organized to extend through New Mexico to the Pacific; but even these have counted upon and estimated their local business as the most important consideration. The remaining six have sought only (after crossing the first 200 to 250 miles of productive belt and reaching the arid line) the trade of Colorado and New Mexico, with that of the adjoining Territories. After reaching the 99th meridian, or thereabouts these railway lines are all more or less in the condition of a ship which has started for a foreign shore and must reach it before any of the cargo can acquire a value. On the remaining belt of 300 or 400 miles of country, the railways in their course leave scarcely more trace than a vessel does upon the waves. The Eastern foothills of the Rocky Mountains contain their ports, which must be reached to obtain water, timber, a sheltered and inhabitable country, mineral wealth—in a word, to reach business. This vast arid plain roamed over by wild Indians, which had to be crossed without any local results, was of course for a long time a nightmare to western railroad progress, and has been the principal cause, in connection with the absence of navigable waters, why the development of the immense wealth of the western half of the continent has been even thus long delayed. An adventurous population, chiefly of miners and stock growers, at last began to seize upon these remote treasures, and finally, in the summer of 1870, two railway lines reached Denver from the

PALMER • 169 Missouri river—one from Omaha (making use of the Union Pacific for 517 miles, thence called the “Denver Pacific”), and the other the Kansas Pacific railway, 637 miles long from Kansas City, with a branch of 20 miles to Leavenworth. The last named line, in spite of the absence of local business for nearly 400 miles, has since its completion yielded an average of over $2,500 per mile, net. Its gross earnings are nearly four million dollars yearly, of which between one-third and one-half arises from Colorado traffic. The remainder is derived to a slight extent from New Mexico, but chiefly from the colonization and supply of Eastern Kansas, which for 200 miles is very rich and sufficiently watered. As Eastern Kansas is getting to be pretty well filled up, Colorado and New Mexico may be expected in a few years to give the Kansas Pacific railway the bulk of its revenue. About seventeen million dollars cash were expended in the construction of this road. About two millions and a quarter more were expended in building the Denver Pacific railway, which completed the remaining link of 106 miles in the other route referred to between Denver and the Missouri river at Omaha. The Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe railroad is completed about 500 miles to a point near the western border of Kansas on the Arkansas River. Having been caught by the recent panic in the United States, it is very much in the condition of the ship above referred to, which has not yet landed. On being extended westward to Pueblo, 140 miles, it would find a desirable haven. From ten to twelve million dollars have been expended on this line. The other lines have advanced a distance varying from 80 to 300 miles, and will be pushed on as Colorado and New Mexico grow, and as the necessary capital can be raised. The most southerly of these lines, the Texas Pacific, has perhaps the greatest importance in its bearing upon the future of Colorado and New Mexico. In the construction of these last named roads, in all about $20,000,000 have been expended, so that, exclusive of the Union Pacific and North Pacific railroads, we find that $50,000,000, cash, have already been expended in the construction and equipment of 2,070 miles of operated railway, completed to or partially on their way across the Plains to Colorado and New Mexico, from the line of the Missouri River. To complete the said several unfinished lines, merely to the eastern base of the Rocky Mountains, will require the construction of nearly 3,000 more miles, and the further expenditure of from $60,000,000 to $75,000,000 cash.

170 • WESTWARD MARCH OF EMIGRATION Nothing but the appreciation of the great future in store for Colorado and New Mexico, based upon a full recognition of the facts which have been rehearsed in this paper, has led to the expenditure, made and contemplated, of the bulk of this large sum of $120,000,000. Nobody could appreciate more thoroughly than railway men the truth that the great westward tide of emigration can not stop, and that hence it must soon pour into the Rocky Mountains, and in so doing must choose for the greater part the latitude South of the 41st parallel, occupied by Colorado and New Mexico, a little more than one-half the width of the United States in a North and South direction. Accomplished Results. But it is no longer necessary to speculate upon what ought to take place. Although the first railroad crossed the desert and reached Colorado but a little over three years ago, it is possible to point already to demonstrated results, which go far to confirm all our theories about the inevitable and rapid growth of this section. The expected emigration at once set in. At the beginning of 1871 the population of Colorado did not exceed 40,000. Before the close of 1873 it had reached 100,000. The population of its capital, Denver, had increased in the same time from 5,000 to between 15,000 and 20,000. That town has become the point of arrival and departure for the trains of six railways. Along the 156 completed miles of one of these lines, the Denver and Rio Grande railway, extending from Denver toward New Mexico, the five counties traversed by it have trebled or quadrupled their wealth and population, and the taxable appraisement of the whole territory, which (as it does not include the mines and cattle) is perhaps less than half of the real wealth, has increased from $16,015,521, in 1870, to $35,669,030, in 1873. The town of Colorado Springs, of which the site was only selected just before the Denver and Rio Grande railway was completed to it, in the autumn of 1871, has become in two years a thriving place of over 2,000 souls, and promises to double in another year. At the commencement of the Denver and Rio Grande railway, in 1871, Pueblo contained only 500 people ; it now counts over 4,000. The farming population, miners and other classes, have increased proportionately in Colorado. The effect of the completion of 118 miles of main line of this road has been in an average of less than two years to add 20,000 people to the population along and supplied by it. The effect has extended for 100 miles South of the present terminus of this railway, so that we find the town of Trinidad, on the border

PALMER • 171 of New Mexico, which before had but a few hundred people, now numbering over 1,200—while 140 miles Southwest of Pueblo, on the Rio Grande (where the writer forded the river in the autumn of 1871, without seeing a soul or a house) there is now a town population on the opposite banks of that stream (Del Norte and Loma) of nearly 2,000. It must be remembered that all of these places, which are simply indices to the rapid colonization which is going on throughout Colorado, are continuing to increase very rapidly. In the mountains adjoining on the westward the mines of gold and silver have more than doubled their yield. The reduction works have been more than doubled in number. The coal mines of Colorado are already sending to market nearly 500 tons daily, some of which goes from Canyon City, as far as 250 miles, to Cheyenne, on the Union Pacific, and North and East over 300 and 350 miles to Kit Carson and Las Animas, on the Kansas Pacific railway. The last named road uses Colorado coal on 300 miles of its line eastward from Denver. The soda, iron and sulphur springs, cold and hot, at Manitou and Idaho, have been improved by building bath-houses, half a dozen hotels, and laying out good roads, paths, villa sites, etc., and have become already noted and favorite summer resorts attracting yearly about 6,000 pleasure tourists and invalids from all parts of the United States. Colorado Springs is becoming even a winter resort for invalids, and is destined to become as famous in that way as for a place of escape and recuperation from the summer heats of the East. The Governor of Colorado, in his recent message, says: That between 1870 and 1873 there have been constructed in Colorado and placed in operation 624 miles of railroad, costing on an average $18,000 per mile, say $9,792,000, and that in spite of their operating in so new a country not yet settled up, have brought in a gross revenue of $2,205,000. (The cost of operating railways in Colorado does not exceed 50 percent.) Further, he says that 544 miles additional will probably be completed in 1874. Also, that, since 1871 the public wealth of Colorado has increased from twenty million to seventy million dollars; that the counties traversed by the railroads have tripled and quadrupled in

172 • WESTWARD MARCH OF EMIGRATION value; that Colorado alone contains more iron and coal than the States of Missouri and Pennsylvania together (This is a matter of estimate merely. The quantity seems to be practically inexhaustible in both Colorado and the States with which it is compared)—these two States being generally considered the richest of the Union in coal and iron; that the cultivation in 1873 of an average of 200,000 acres has produced ... $5,000,000 Gold and silver mining ............................... 5,000,000 Coal mining .................................................. 1,000,000 Stock raising ................................................. 2,000,000 (Besides these, the production of wool, lumber, and dairying is estimated at nearly $2,000,000 additional.) That there are in Colorado from two to six million acres of irrigable lands; 30,000,000 acres of the best range for grazing, and that an area of 30,000 square miles contains numerous mines of gold, silver, copper, lead, marble, gypsum, petroleum, and other minerals and mineral springs, independently of its coal and iron lands. So much for -the Governor’s official statement. We already see that bullion, matt, wool, hides, choice cattle, dressed beef, and flour, are being exported to the East. Some manufactures have started of wool, lumber, paper, pottery, etc., but the scarcity of capital has prevented the great staple of iron from being taken hold of. This will happen when the lines of railway are further advanced. Reduction works have been established beyond expectation, and a stimulus has been given to “prospecting,” which has resulted in opening within three years four new and highly promising mining districts of gold and silver—the “Boulder,” “South Park,” “San Juan,” and “Hardscrabble”—which include hundreds of veins before unknown. It should be pointed out how with the cheapening of transportation and of supplies of breadstuffs, forage, etc., there is a tendency toward the increase of mining productions in even a higher ratio than that of the economy realized, since there are a much larger number of comparatively poor veins than very rich ones. If, for instance, it will now only pay to work silver mines which yield seventy-five dollars per ton of ore, any lessening of the cost of production brings at once under development a large number of veins now known which are

PALMER • 173 worth less than seventy-five dollars, and which were not worked at all before. In New Mexico there has been no visible progress, because railroad communication has not yet reached within 110 miles of its northern border. A like prosperity, however, awaits it when railroads are provided, since all the conditions of salubrity, attractive scenery, mineral, manufacturing and agricultural resources are found in that territory. The principal industry of the Rio Grande Valley will be the raising of wine, corn and fruits. 100,000,000 gallons of wine, the best of the United States, can be raised yearly in this valley. The saving of 1,000 miles of land transportation will give the fruits and wine of New Mexico a great advantage over those of California. Already the grapes and pears of California have difficulty in reaching east of Chicago and Cincinnati in an edible condition, although they are constantly sold in New York and Philadelphia. But two or three days saving in time, beside the avoidance of the additional haul, will enable the Rio Grande grapes (which are quite equal to those of California) to reach the most easterly markets in sound condition. By the United States Census of 1870, New Mexico contained 110,000 inhabitants. VII Before proceeding to outline the railway system of 2,500 to 5,000 miles which will be required in the opinion of the writer during the coming ten years for the proper development of Colorado and New Mexico, let us state some considerations of a general character affecting the question of railroads in that country. 1st. Railways are constructed in the West of the United States more economically than in any part of the world. This arises partially from the fact that the land and “right of way” are obtained without cost, or at very low rates. Some railways have probably been entirely built in the West for no more than the lands alone have cost for a railway in Europe. Again, here the legislative, organization and legal expenses are inappreciable. Although iron and labor, it is true, are cheaper in Europe, yet timber for sleepers, bridges, trestles, all buildings, cars and telegraph poles, are cheaper in the United States, and by the substitution of timber much iron is saved. The sleepers are placed closer together, thus permitting a lighter rail; wooden truss and pile bridges and trestle work are used, which with proper caution answer sufficiently for the first ten years of the traffic. So also though labor is higher in the United States, yet this is more than offsetted in various ways:

174 • WESTWARD MARCH OF EMIGRATION (a) By the employment of labor-saving implements and machines to a much greater extent—scrapers, excavators, steam-Irishmen. (b) By the use of heavier grades and sharper curves to avoid tunnels and heavy cuttings, trestles to avoid immediate high earth embankments, etc., etc. (c) By saving the labor (as well as material) which in Europe are expended in permanent and expensive depots and structures. Generally the Americans have conformed themselves to a more economical system of construction. As the rate of interest was so high, it was better to expend as little capital per mile as would comport with safety and first efficiency—preferring to adapt the “rolling stock” thereto, as for instance by the contrivance of bogie trucks, permitting engine and cars to turn sharp curves—second, to enlarge and improve the works out of the results created by the operation of the line. Then by running at a lower rate of speed for the earlier years, the first economy becomes admissible, and for all practical purposes the transporting machine is as efficient and safe as the foreign one. The constant yearly growth of traffic enables it to gradually substitute iron and stone for wood, to reduce the grades, substitute tunnels, replace trestles by permanent earthworks or bridges, erect substantial depots, add side tracks, etc. Single track lines with turnouts are generally used in the United States. This produces an additional economy. The early necessity for a second track in the United States is often avoided by locating the second line through a different district enroute while it reaches the same distinct through points or centers. Thus it develops and obtains a new local business. For instance, there are four single track-lines connecting the Pacific railroad at Omaha with Chicago, about 500 miles, each traversing an entirely different and perhaps equally rich local section. They have each rendered the lands along their respective routes accessible, and have settled them, while they now carry their local produce to market. As the business increases on each single track line, the turnouts or sidings are gradually extended from year to year, and finally develop into a second track, third track, and as in the case of the New York Central, a fourth track (now building). The Americans build railways more cheaply than any other people, but in the western half of the continent the character of the topography and geological structure often permits even a greater economy than is usual in the United States. The surface is more apt to be plain, the cuttings rarely strike rock, and when they do it is generally of a soft tertiary or cretaceous formation.

PALMER • 175 Added to this is the fact that the “Narrow Gauge” system—the only one fitted to the peculiar conditions of the Rocky Mountains— has been adopted for Colorado and New Mexico, permitting a further economy of 33 percent, in cost of construction. 2d. The railways of Colorado and New Mexico will be very profitable. We have seen that they can be built very cheaply. They will likewise enjoy a business large in amount and remunerative in character. Americans travel, it is thought, four times as much as Europeans, but, however this may be, the American of the Far West certainly travels twice as much as the eastern American, and is altogether more luxurious in his wants. He is an immense consumer. He surveys the rich natural heritage spread out before him, and convinced that he cannot fail to become rich, he proceeds to BANK upon it. He discounts the future. Especially is this the case with the gold and silver miner. He is a great traveler. The gambling element of human character comes in to keep him constantly on the look-out for new and richer mines. There is indeed no occupation which, for the numbers engaged, induces more transportation than mining. Besides the machinery, tools, rope, powder, chemicals, tramways, building materials, everything for the feeding, clothing and shelter of the miners themselves, and accompanying population, their actual existence and luxury, as well as the food of the large number of animals, is required to be carried to them from more favored agricultural districts, while ore, matt or bullion has to be returned. The 42,000 to 50,000 men, women and children of Nevada, a State almost exclusively devoted to mining, not only supported the Central Pacific railroad prior to its effecting a junction with the Union Pacific railroad from the East, but to-day contribute no insignificant proportion of the immense annual revenue of this line, $14,000,000 (from 1,219 miles operated). Producing as Nevada does, thirty-five million dollars yearly of the precious metals, manifestly a large share of the results can profitably go into transportation. It is even found that mines of the precious metals that do not give any profit or do not pay expenses, are often worked because of the constant chances of great fortunes. They require, therefore, more transportation than their actual net results really warrant. In the western half of the continent all wages and incomes are high. In farming, any industrious man can produce from the land surplus products enough to own a farm clear in a few years. Sometimes in a year or two he accomplishes in this way what is the

176 • WESTWARD MARCH OF EMIGRATION work of a lifetime in other countries. It follows that in any other trade he can save sufficient of his surplus to acquire property in a short time. He becomes a capitalist. He has either bought, or Uncle Sam has given him a farm for a song. He then travels both for pleasure and profit, making up for the loss of time by greater rapidity while at work. There is half a continent to redeem, and only one short life time for man. He must always be in a hurry. He is afraid of stagnation if he stops. He sells out in some cases to later coiners when prices rise, and goes off to hunt up a new location. His eastern friends come out to see him. He returns when he has prospered to look them up. The social and national life is much more active in the West (and especially since the war), organization and companies for a common purpose more easy and numerous, and these still further stimulate the national activity. Further, in Colorado and New Mexico and the adjoining Territories, as already set forth, their occurs locally the greatest variety of distribution—rich mines of gold and silver in rocky ranges, elsewhere fertile valleys and numerous rich but scattered basins; here, stretches of unwooded prairie, and there, mountains at intervals covered with dense forests of timber; here, districts badly off for fuel, and there, beds of very fine coal, practically inexhaustible; deep valleys adapted especially to corn, melons, or vineyards, and elevated parks, where wheat, barley and other small grains alone thrive; .so-called deserts filled with rich mineral mountains, but otherwise valueless, and slopes and valleys like those of California, which can raise all the breadstuff’s required, besides semi-tropical fruits. Now these are precisely the conditions which are most favorable to the business of transportation and which render it most remunerative. The advantageous distribution of the natural resources is an important element. A railroad thrives in the proportion that one part of its line lacks that which another has a greater facility for supplying. Finally, there is the constant and increasing movement of emigration from East to West, to secure the richer natural prizes and to enjoy the larger life, greater independence and freedom from competition to be found there. This colonization has to be distributed over the vast area of these two territories. 3d. As heretofore shown, competition is impossible from rivers, canals, or any navigable water The railroads must carry everything and everybody. 4th. At the beginning, the scale on which everything is conducted in this part of the West warrants high rates for transportation.

PALMER • 177 Substituting wagon transportation at 20 to 30 cents per ton per mile, and Diligences at from 15 to 25 cents per mile, the railroads at first, while population is sparse, are accustomed to charge an average of eight to ten cents per mile. As the population increases, these rates are gradually and wisely diminished, producing an increase of traffic which can be carried at but little additional gross expense, and at a great reduction per ton and per passenger. 5th. Owing to certain characteristics in the dryness of the climate and the favorable character of the ground over which the railroad is laid, all the roads of this section of the continent are operated with exceptional economy. The adoption of the Narrow Gauge adds to this a further economy, estimated at from 25 to 33 percent, due to the saving of dead weight. Finally, there is an illustration of the successful pecuniary results which, from some at least of the above causes, may be expected to accrue from the operation of railways in Colorado and New Mexico, in the case of the Utah Central railroad, which passes through a similar country along the western slope of the Rocky Mountains from Ogden southward. This line simply had the advantage of a previously existing population of 120,000 Mormons, who had gone there to get out of the way, before railroads began West of the Mississippi river. From it may be gathered an idea of what may be realized in the richer Territories of Colorado and New Mexico, when a somewhat larger population has been introduced. The Utah Central railroad, earns yearly a net revenue sufficient to pay seven percent, upon its mortgage bonds of $32,000 per mile, and fifteen percent, upon its capital stock of $32,000 per mile. In other words its net earnings exceed $7,000 per mile yearly. The Railway System Of Colorado And New Mexico. It is not the purpose of the present pamphlet to set forth in detail the several railway lines which are likely to constitute this system. Suffice it to say that the now-apparent lines amount in length to 2,500 miles, and consist: First. Of a North and South line following mainly the eastern base of the Sierra Madre or “Rocky Mountains,” through Colorado and New Mexico, from Denver to Chihuahua, eventually to be extended southward along the same plateau, to the Mexican tropics. Second. Certain connecting lines which lead off from points along the North and South line, and follow up intersecting valleys, or through feasible passes, to the gold and silver mines and parks, forests of timber, deposits of coal and iron, or rich agricultural sections in the

178 • WESTWARD MARCH OF EMIGRATION adjoining mountains. When the physical geography of the country under consideration is known, it will be seen that thus a complete system for the development of these two large Territories, rich in the possession of rather an extraordinary variety of the elements of natural wealth, is formed. The several lines composing this system, although independent in respect of developing, each a different important district, all bear upon and assist each other. The area of the Territories thus traversed is 230,925 square miles, about four-fold the area of England and Wales, as follows: Area of Colorado, 106, 475 square miles. Area of New Mexico, 124,450 square miles. Before the first 2,500 miles of line are completed, the necessity for an additional 2,500 miles will have probably manifested itself. Improvement Companies. It is manifest that even the first disadvantage to an agricultural immigration of being obliged to prepare the land for irrigation, may often be counteracted by the formation of improvement, or development companies, which will have capital enough to construct the irrigating ditches, lay out the farms and towns, build the dwellings in some cases, and sell the tracts and lots to the colonists on small annual payments distributed over several years, so that a portion of his actual current profits from the ground, or from his business, will enable him to discharge those annuities. It must be manifest likewise, that by such a system the colonization of the country can be greatly stimulated, the railroad earnings enormously increased, and the work of twenty years be concentrated into ten. In Colorado and New Mexico—from the very necessity of irrigation, the necessary greater concentration of growth upon certain topographical lines, the absence of navigable water causing the growth to be exclusively on railroad lines, and the existence in many cases of large tracts (Spanish Grants) which are independent of the national laws of small sub-divisions which prevail elsewhere in the United States, there seems to be everything to favor the formation of such improvement companies, acting in harmony with the railway, and having for their object the more rapid colonization of the lands along its line. The acquisition of tracts of proper size becomes more possible, and the points where the colonists would find their best location, also where the greatest rise in values will occur, can be more readily

PALMER • 179 anticipated than perhaps anywhere in the United States. Nothing indeed would appear to be more legitimate and business-like than this co-operation of the improvement company with the railway company. Their joint operation may be made of the greatest advantage to the colonists, whose prosperity is the surest guarantee of profit to the companies whose capital is thus invested. VIII What future is in store for Colorado and New Mexico, if the program thus sketched be carried out? Knowing what splendid results a similar but more desultory and less systematic process of development has created in the seven most western States of the Mississippi Valley (with which we have shown how favorably Colorado and New Mexico compare); and appreciating properly the fact that the great westward march of emigration having acquired the fixed and permanent character of a natural law must continue, and therefore finds its nearest and most attractive lodgment in these best territories of the Rocky Mountains; that in fact there is nothing sounder than this law for capital to calculate upon as a basis for immediate future results in the United States, we are not left without a reliable guide to our prognostications. In the ten years between the government census of 1860 and that of 1870, of which four were occupied by the great war of the rebellion, so that practically the growth may be considered as having been mainly in five years, the seven States lying nearest to Colorado on the eastward have increased in population ay follows: square miles from Kansas with 83,000 Missouri with 67,380 Iowa with 55,045 Minnesota with 83,500 Wisconsin with 53,924 Illinois with 55,405 Nebraska with 70,000 7 states with 468,254 square miles increased from a population of

1860. 107,206 to 1,182,012 to 674,913 to 172,023 to 775,881 to 1,711,951 to 28,841 to

1870. 373,299 2,721,295 l, 194,320 446,056 1,064,985 2,539,891 122,993

4,652,827 to

7,462,839

The railroad mileage of these States increased in the same time from 5,167 miles to 19,853 miles. It very nearly quadrupled. Is it too much then to expect that Colorado and New Mexico, whose joint area is 230,925 square miles, will in ten years attain a population

180 • WESTWARD MARCH OF EMIGRATION of at least one million? By that time we may also reasonably expect that the production of these territories will have reached, under the impetus given by so rapid a construction of railways, accompanied more or less by the operations of improvement companies, the following amounts: 1. From the mining of gold, silver, lead, copper, salt, gypsum, lime, cement, marble, iron ore, coal, etc. $100,000,000 per annum. (Nevada with 110,000 square miles of area yields $35,000,000 of silver and gold alone; and the State of Pennsylvania, which has an area of only 46,000 square miles, and is without the precious ores, produces from its mines $80,000,000 yearly, of which $50,000,000 are from coal alone.) 2. From the raising of live cattle, sheep, horses, mules, hogs, wool and hides, dressed, packed and canned beef, etc. 3. From all the products of arable culture, including wine, fruits, and also from dairying. From manufactures, $50,000,000 Total per annum $300,000,000 And that there will be spent by that time by the 100,000 yearly tourists who will frequent Colorado and New Mexico for health and pleasure, not less per annum than $25,000,000. We have already pointed out how the character of the resources and their distribution in these territories are such as to require an unusual amount of transportation, so that in the prosperity which the above figures indicate, the railway system must abundantly share. We estimate that the average net railway earnings by that time will be not less than $5,000 per mile per annum, for all the lines. If the above figures be thought exaggerated, let it be remembered— 1st. That the entire annual production of the thirty-five States (including the impoverished South), which occupy the eastern half of the American continent, and contain forty-one of the forty- two million total population of the United States, is stated at 10,000,000,000 dollars (by other authorities at six thousand millions), or an average of $250 yearly to each man, woman and child. Even at this rate, the production of 1,000,000 people in Colorado and New Mexico ought to be $250,000,000 yearly. But being a newly-opened country, the population will consist, to a much greater extent than the average, of able-bodied men, and consequently of large producers. 2d. But experience shows that mining and manufacturing States produce much more largely (as might have been expected from the large amount of machinery used and the higher value of skilled labor) in proportion to their numbers than the average. For instance,

PALMER • 181 Pennsylvania, with 3,500,000 inhabitants, produces $2,000,000,000 yearly, or an average of near $600 to each. This ratio would give double the annual yield to Colorado and New Mexico that we have actually calculated. (Pennsylvania has about 6,000 miles of railway.) Where the precious mines are worked, the highest average is reached. Thus Nevada, with 45,000 inhabitants, produces yearly of silver and gold alone $85,000,000, an average of nearly $800 each. 3d. If area forms the basis of comparison, we find that the thirty-five States referred to (which contain 41,000,000 inhabitants and produce $10,000,000,000 yearly) have an area of 1,600,000 square miles. At this rate the 231,000 square miles which compose Colorado and New Mexico, should have a population of 6,000,000, a railway system of 10,000 miles, and an annual production of $1,500,000,000. This presupposes an equal period for the same sort of development, say of an average of twenty -five years. By reducing it in an equal ratio for the basis of ten years we obtain A population of 2,400,000 An annual production of. $600,000,000 And a railway mileage of 4,000 miles. The discount of 50 percent, in estimating for Colorado and New Mexico which we have allowed upon these figures (except the railway mileage, which cannot properly be reduced because there is no navigable water, as in every one of those thirty-five States) will doubtless be considered a guarantee of entire safety. 4th. The State of Illinois, as will be seen from the preceding table, having already a population of 1,711,951 in 1860, increased it in ten years to 2,539,891—constructing in that time 3,571 miles of railway, which increased its railway mileage to 6,361 miles in 1870. The area of Illinois is 55,405 square miles, less than one-fourth that of Colorado and New Mexico. 5th. We can take four States of the “Old West” which contain the same area as Colorado and New Mexico—Illinois, Iowa, Missouri and Wisconsin (whose united area is 231,754 square miles)—and find the following facts from the United States census of 1860 and 1870: That in 1870 they had in operation 14,583 miles of railroad; that of this, there had been built since 1860 (ten years) 10,323 miles; That their population in 1870 was, 6,520,491 That the population of the same in 1860 was 4,344,751 Gain 2,165,740

182 • WESTWARD MARCH OF EMIGRATION Finally, as the total annual gain of population in the United States by immigration and otherwise is now 1,500,000 yearly, the increase in the railroad mileage 6,500 miles, and as the total area of the United States is 3,000,000,000 of square miles (including the deserts) it would seem a modest estimate, under all the circumstances which have been set forth, to accord Colorado and New Mexico, which have onethirteenth of the total area, at least one-thirteenth of the said yearly increase. This rate, however, would give Colorado and New Mexico an average increase in population of 115,000 yearly, and an increase in the railroad mileage of 500 miles per annum. That the above estimates of the future population and production of Colorado and New Mexico will be realized, I cannot, therefore, doubt. That the annual surplus of products will find an advantageous market at home and abroad, will be evident from all that has been stated in this report. In conclusion, there is one point connected with the westward movement of population in the United States, which although not yet mentioned, is of great importance. The wonderful growth which we have herein recorded of the States of the “Old West” has been based upon and had the momentum of a population slightly exceeding twenty millions. But for the coming twenty years, the domestic movement will be that which will result from the same causes operating upon over forty millions of people as a basis. The annual emigration from abroad will probably likewise continue to increase. Without doubt, therefore, of the 100 millions of inhabitants which the United States are expected to contain in the year 1900, no small share will be found in the western half of the continent, of which we are disposed to consider Colorado and New Mexico the choicest sections. COLORADO SPRINGS, March, 1874.

PALMER • 183

The Denver and Rio Grande Railway. Wood engraving from The Illustrated London News, May 24, 1884. Pictured are: Manitou, Colorado, with Pikes Peak (top left); Phantom Curve, San Juan Division (top right); Gorge and tunnel (middle left); Pueblo de Taos, New Mexico (middle right); and Garden of the Gods Gateway (bottom). From Special Collections, Pikes Peak Library District.

Colorado Springs population. W.H.H. Raper & Co. reported, “The present population of the town, August 20th, 1879, is from 5,000 to 5,500, not including the many persons - probably numbering fully a thousand - who are always temporarily stopping here for health or pleasure.” Colorado Springs’ population slowly increased during the early 20th century, then sharply began to climb in the 1950s. Birdseye view of Colorado Springs, 1882, from the Library of Congress

Geography and Map Division Washington, D.C. 1

General William Jackson Palmer & His Vision for Colorado Springs Matt Mayberry The aim was intensely practical—to create a habitable and successful town in the broadest sense of the word.2

William Jackson Palmer, 1896

In 1896, on the 25th anniversary of the establishment of Colorado Springs, city founder William Jackson Palmer wrote these words to describe his original intent for a resort town at the base of Pikes Peak. In hindsight, successful is perhaps an understatement. The community grew steadily at times during its initial decades but then saw rapid and sustained population growth during the second half of the 20th century. Anyone who has lived in Colorado Springs long can attest to this growth. Academy Boulevard, which only thirty years ago marked the farthest eastern extent of the community, is now at the geographic center of town. Many miles to the east of that, a sea of rooftops covers a landscape once home to grazing cattle and antelope. Suburban houses are accompanied by strip malls, big box stores and chain restaurants. These growth trends were even documented in the 2001 book, Fast Food Nation, in which investigative journalist Eric Schlosser used Colorado Springs as a bellwether to represent the impact of consumer culture in contemporary America. This type of growth is nothing new in Colorado Springs, and worries over the values reflected in suburban development started long before Mr. Schlosser arrived with notebook in hand. To members of every generation growth seemed to threaten the very traits that make the city “habitable and successful.” Every generation discussed and worried over how the wonderful amenities offered in our community could be protected and • 185 •

186 • PALMER & HIS VISION

expanded. The purpose of this paper is to provide historical perspective on Colorado Springs in comparison to other typical western communities and to examine Palmer’s role in formulating the guiding principles that helped to make the community unique. From its birth, Colorado Springs was quite unlike the typical western town and the best way to understand what it was is to first understand what is was not. Most communities in the American West grew up around particular economic activities, such as mining, lumber production, agriculture, railroad, and cattle trails. Some cities found it difficult to escape these founding identities long after their economies matured and diversified. Before and during the 2008 Democratic National Convention, one often heard Denver boosters decrying the city’s reputation as a “cow town.” An excellent description of these western boomtowns can be found in a delightful memoir by an itinerant miner named Frank Crampton. During the late 19 th and early 20th centuries, Crampton traveled from mining camp to mining camp seeking work and adventure. One of his first destinations was the fledgling Cripple Creek Mining District. Throughout his life’s journey he noticed similarities between all of these settlements. The following passage provides insight in the overwhelming role of commerce in boomtowns. There were a few towns, all cut from the same pattern, and each was near a group of mines. They had narrow streets with a few stores, eating places run by [people] who knew how to cook, sometimes a bank not often an opera house, but always saloons and gambling places. A few homes were built on narrow streets away from the main drag; their number was small and often the owners took in boarders, mostly hard rock stiffs that worked in the nearby mines. And there was always the “line” or “stockade” with its dance halls, parlor houses, and cribs.3

MAYBERRY • 187

Colorado City is the best local example of a western boomtown. It was founded in 1859, during the first year of the Pikes Peak Gold Rush. Bold businessmen saw an opportunity in situating a town at the base of Pikes Peak. It was on the route used by most gold seekers that connected the Santa Fe Trail with the Cherry Creek diggings. It was located at the lower end of Ute Pass, which provided the quickest access to Tarryall, Fairplay, and the other mining camps springing up in the central Rockies. In describing the location of Colorado City, one early resident reported, “this is the finest site and has the best prospects for a large town.”4 Colorado City was all business. The trail up Ute Pass was improved so as to be more attractive and useful to miners, who hopefully would spend some of their money in the town. Within months of the town’s founding stores and grist mills opened to serve residents and travelers alike. Roads and buildings were strictly utilitarian in design. They served a purpose but were far from fancy. The boomtown process was a common model for western town building, but it was not the only one. Another major trend in community development in the American West was the colony experience. A colony was an association of individuals that banded together for the purpose of migrating west in order to pursue common aims once they arrived at their destination.5 Hundreds of these utopian settlements sprang up across the West as a result of the massive upheaval and social displacement following the Civil War. They were communal in nature and shunned the economic individualism that distinguished boomtowns. Instead of focusing solely on generating wealth, colonies were idealistic. They were founded to express a specific political or economic ideology or to promote ethnic, religious or social harmony. Palmer was keenly aware of this trend and paid particular attention to several examples. In February 1870, members of the German Colonization Company passed through Palmer’s railroad camp on the way to settle in the Wet Mountains of southern Colorado.6 This group consisted of two hundred seventy German artisans and laborers from Chicago under


the leadership of Carl Wulsten. Each member invested $250 with a goal of establishing a farming community based on a communist vision. Participants worked for the common benefit rather than individual profit. According to the plan, after five years whatever members remained would divide up the profits of the group’s labor. Palmer also followed the efforts of Nathan Meeker in the establishment of Union Colony at Greeley. This colony also focused on agriculture, but rather than concentrating on the political philosophy of Karl Marx, the organizers of Union Colony sought to establish a utopia founded on religious ideals. Members were selected from a pool of candidates and only those that were literate, temperate and had the highest moral standards were accepted. The colony relied on cooperative irrigation canals and advanced this dry-land farming technique as a valid method of western agricultural practice. Though most of these utopian experiments were undertaken with commendable fervor, few of their residents came with the necessary skills and knowledge to be successful in what could be an unforgiving terrain. For this reason many colonies were short lived. For instance, the German Colonization Company failed within the first year due to poor leadership and lack of farming experience. By the end, the commune had dwindled to less than thirty people and crop failures required that the holdouts send urgent pleas for rations to the governor.7 How then do these two distinct forms of western city building relate to the establishment of Colorado Springs? One has only to glance at our city’s history to see that we have very little in common with the traditional western boomtown and that laissez faire model of city building. Boomtowns were built where the money was, but Colorado Springs came into being because it is where the money wanted to be. From its very roots, Colorado Springs had more in common with other colonies. Palmer borrowed several of the more common notions developed by the colony movement including the construction of cooperative irrigation canals and strict temperance policies. He adopted the name “Fountain Colony” as the marketing and membership arm of his town building

MAYBERRY • 189

venture. He even stole away two of the Union Colony’s key employees when he hired General Robert Cameron to become the town manager and Edwin S. Nettleton to be its chief engineer.8 Colorado Springs was always separated from other colonies because it did not have that driving ideology or high concept. General Palmer’s goal was simply to create a pleasant, healthful and attractive city at the base of Pikes Peak to which people would want to move. If Colorado Springs was neither a boomtown nor part of the colony movement, then what was it? To understand that, you have to understand the town’s founder. Today, when we think of General Palmer, in our mind’s eye we invariably see him in a serious, formal, stately pose. There are any number of portraits, photographs, and even an outdoor sculpture that serve to reinforce this image. This unfortunately does his memory a disservice. A collection of letters, candid photos and other documents, which were acquired by the Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum from a Palmer descendant in England, paints a very different picture of General Palmer. They show a lively, caring, humorous man—a person that can be silly at times. For instance, one image from this collection captures Palmer in the middle of a hunt. He is kneeling on the ground, taking careful aim with his rifle. When one follows his line of sight, it is only then that you realize he is targeting an old, moldering, stuffed bobcat that is perched precariously atop a pile of rock. It is a funny image Not known to be a hunter, Palmer and one that is a far cry from that takes aim at a stuffed animal. Courtesy of Starsmore Center for Local stiff, temperance - rule - creating History at the Colorado Springs Pioneers Quaker of popular imagination. Museum. We know that Palmer’s original idea for Colorado Springs was developed on July 28, 1869, while he worked for the Kansas Pacific Railroad. He was employed as an advance man for the railroad, and in this role he purchased land and made decisions


about the best route for the tracks that were then pushing west across the plains. During a wagon trip from Pueblo to Denver, he stopped to bathe in Fountain Creek and eat breakfast in the Garden of the Gods. He wrote a letter to his fiancée, Queen, describing the experience. “Near here are the finest springs of soda and the most enticing scenery. I am sure there will be a famous resort here soon after the railroad reaches Denver.”9 Over the next year as ideas for his own railroad developed, Palmer and his colleagues began purchasing land along the proposed route of the Denver and Rio Grande. The town site at the base of Pikes Peak ultimately grew to encompass ten thousand acres, nearly all of which was purchased from the government for $1.25 per acre.10 Lots would then be sold for $100 or more with a third of the profits going to the Colorado Springs Company and two-thirds used for city improvements. As a result of this reinvestment in the community, Palmer noted that “many of the first disadvantages of immigration might be counteracted with capital enough to construct irrigating ditches . . . plant trees and aid in the building of hotels and even of dwellings.”11 In other words, Palmer planned to create a readymade civilization for the new members of his colony. Within months of the town’s founding on July 31, 1871, many of its distinguishing features were already taking shape. On what had very recently been a short grass prairie devoid of trees, Palmer’s men planted thousands of cottonwood saplings hauled from the Arkansas River valley to make the city green and lush. Irrigation was a key for Colorado Springs just as it was for the members of Union Colony, but the El Paso Canal was intended to water trees and grass as much or more than crops. Wide streets were platted to express the hope and optimism of the burgeoning city. Permanent structures began to replace tents. For instance, the Colorado Springs Hotel, the city’s first, opened on January 1, 1872, at the southeast corner of Pikes Peak Avenue and Cascade Avenue. All of these elements were designed to make people feel comfortable and welcome. By the end of 1871, six months after the town’s founding, approximately six hundred people called Colorado Springs home.12

MAYBERRY • 191

Once Palmer had seen to the town’s founding, he all but stepped away from its day-to-day operation. Despite his obvious love and concern for the colony, he literally distanced himself from it and its citizens by building a home miles away with its own school, dairy and greenhouse. Consumed by a passion for his railroads and making frequent trips to England to visit his ailing wife and daughters, Palmer was often far away from Colorado Springs. Palmer did not serve in any elected position or on any boards or commissions. In his later years he turned his attention, energy and active mind to a program of acquiring and improving land that he later donated back to the people of Colorado Springs. This effort not only created park land and roadways for the community, but it also employed hundreds of its men. Palmer biographer John Fisher notes that for years Palmer’s monthly payroll for this work was as much as $15,000.13 This is equivalent to $382,000 today.14 Palmer was intensely dedicated to preserving open space and beautiful views. On the 25th anniversary of the founding of Colorado Springs, he ruminated on what could have been done differently and all of his critiques had to do with safeguarding scenic beauty. He regretted not buying all of the neighboring canyon lands along the foothills, when it could have been done for a “comparative trifle.” If he had to do it over again, Palmer said, “with such a sunny, airy climate, the street should have been narrower, and the land so saved put into more open spaces, apart from the thoroughfares.” Why did these things not happen? He wrote that it did not seem to make sense at the time, what with all of the open country that extended as far as the eye could see and in every direction. The notion of setting apart any of this void to save feeling crowded in the future, appeared about as irrelevant as though it had been suggested to parcel off a segment of Heaven to make sure of never being deprived of the enjoyment of the stars.15 Despite these regrets, Palmer gave over two thousand acres of land to the City of Colorado Springs during the course of


his life. Of this amount, more than fifteen hundred acres were donated in 1907 alone. His gifts included parks, roadways, and trails.16 This includes the three formal downtown parks: Acacia, Alamo Square, and Antlers Park. He not only donated Palmer Park, but improved two roads—Palmer Park Boulevard and Paseo Drive—that led to this natural area. He gave land for notable institutions, such as Colorado College, the Deaf and Blind School, and Cragmoor Sanitarium (now the site of the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs). He also donated land to any church that wished to build a congregation in Colorado Springs. Finally, he gave the community a sense of style. This is quickly confirmed by spending a few minutes studying historic photographs of the first Antlers Hotel and the D&RG Depot. These and other Palmer structures located downtown have a distinctly European architectural flair that was unheard of in other equally young boomtowns. It is obvious that citizens took great pride in the legacy Palmer gave them. In the very first report of the Colorado Springs Parks

Dozens of Colorado Springs citizens invested in the Antlers Hotel, which “was open to all who may desire to secure stock.” William J. Palmer invested $25,000 in the “first-class hotel,” which opened on June 1, 1883. A fire destroyed the hotel on October 1, 1898, with damage estimated at half a million dollars. Courtesy of Starsmore Center for Local History at the Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum.

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Commission, published in 1908, the commissioners boasted that the city had more park land—and in many cases vastly more— than other such notable cities as Kansas City, St. Louis, Seattle or Omaha. On top of that, all of it came to the community freeof-charge.17

Frederick Sterner, architect of the Antlers Hotel, also designed the Victorianstyle Denver & Rio Grande Depot. The ornate, solid building was an icon of prosperity for newcomers arriving in Colorado Springs. Courtesy of Starsmore Center for Local History at the Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum.

Palmer died in March 1909. At the time, the Civic League, a local women’s organization, was examining ways to maintain and improve the community’s quality of life. They commissioned a study to determine what could and should be done to protect the unique character of Colorado Springs. In 1912, Charles Mulford Robinson, then a leading voice in the nation’s City Beautiful movement, published his findings. Many of the suggestions may sound remarkably familiar to today’s residents. He recommended that the railroad tracks running through downtown be diverted east of the city to reduce smoke pollution, a plan very similar to our Powers Boulevard beltway.18 Since this suggestion would naturally result in the abandonment of the Santa Fe rail bed, he encouraged city


administrators to construct a new park along Shooks Run.19 This finally happened in the 1980s. Finally, he proposed the construction of a park at what he considered the gateway of the community at the confluence of Fountain and Monument Creek.20 This site is now home to America the Beautiful Park, which was dedicated in 2005. A century after his death, there is renewed fear that the values William Jackson Palmer instilled in the community are evaporating. If he magically reappeared today to tour the city, would he recognize it? It seems unlikely that change and growth alone would baffle him. He lived long enough to see Colorado Springs evolve from a tidy resort town to a bustling city of twenty thousand people. He would certainly be bewildered by, among other things, our suburban sprawl and the hectic pace that accompanies it. He would, however, find comforting signs of commitment to his vision of maintaining a healthful, attractive and livable city. Chief among these is the Trails, Open Space and Parks (TOPS) ordinance, which funds the acquisition and preservation of critical open space. This is a natural extension of his efforts to provide opportunities for citizens to get outdoors and enjoy the beauty of their surroundings. While Colorado Springs faces numerous challenges related to the economy, environment, transportation, and infrastructure, there is still no better guiding principle for us than what Palmer urged in 1896. We must strive to create a habitable and successful city, in the broadest sense of the word. Matt Mayberry is the Director of the Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum. In 2006, he curated the exhibit Pike’s World: Exploration and Empire in the Greater Southwest, which was one of three major exhibits mounted by the Museum to commemorate the Pike Bicentennial. He holds an M.A. in history from the University of Colorado and is a former elected member of the governing council of the American Association for State and Local History. His publications include “Reforging the Golden Spike: The U.S. Gold Mining Industry During World War II” published in Colorado History magazine in 2005.

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Notes

1.�� Data sources for chart: Colorado Springs City Directories, City of Colorado Springs Budget Books, U.S. Census Bureau. 2. William �� Jackson Palmer, “Founding of Colorado Springs,” Colorado Springs Gazette, August 10, 1896, 10. This article is the text of a speech given by General Palmer at a commemoration ceremony for the 25th anniversary of the town’s founding. The special section of the paper is called the Carnival Edition. 3.�� Frank Crampton, Deep Enough: A Working Stiff in the Western Mining Camps, (Norman, Okla.: University of Oklahoma Press, 1993), xiii. 4.�� A. Cutler, “Letter to E. S. Lowman, dated April 20, 1859,” Colorado Gold Rush: Contemporary Letters and Reports, 1858-1859, Leroy Hafen, ed., (Glendale, Calif.: Arthur H. Clark Company, 1941), 339. 5.�� James Willard, The Union Colony at Greeley, Colorado, 1869-1871 (Boulder: University of Colorado, 1918), xiv. 6.�� Palmer, Colorado Springs Gazette, 10. 7.�� Robert S. Fogarty, All Things New: American Communes and Utopian Settlements, 1860-1914 (New York: Lexington Books, 2003), 56 8.�� Palmer, Colorado Springs Gazette, 10. 9.�� Ibid. 10.�� John S. Fisher, A Builder of the West: The Life of General William Jackson Palmer (Caldwell, Idaho: Caxton Printers, 1939), 181-182. 11.�� Palmer, Colorado Springs Gazette, 10. 12. H. S. Rogers, “A Brief Historical Sketch of the Founding and Building of the County Seat of El Paso County, Colorado,” Annual Reports and Financial Statements, 1901-1902, I. S. Harris, ed., (City of Colorado Springs, Colo., 1902), 218. 13.�� Fisher, A Builder of the West, 305. 14.�� Measuring Worth, “Six ways to compute the relative value of a U.S. dollar, 1774 to present,” http://www.measuringworth.com/ calculators/uscompare/result.php, accessed January 10, 2009. 15.�� Palmer, Colorado Springs Gazette, 10. 16.�� Colorado Springs Parks Commission, Report of the Parks Commission, (Colorado Springs, CO), 7. 17.�� Parks Commission, Report, 38. 18.�� Charles Mulford Robinson, Colorado Springs, The City Beautiful: A General Plan for the Improvement of Colorado Springs, (City of Colorado Springs Department of Public Works and Property, 1912), 10. 19.�� Ibid., 52. �� 20.�� Ibid., 46-47.

Letter to the Citizens of Colorado Springs of the Twenty First Century William Jackson Palmer Glen Eyrie, August 1, 1901 There is little to add to the story of the inception and early days of Colorado Springs embodied in the foregoing address delivered on the 25th anniversary of its birth. In the half decade which has elapsed since, the place has grown more in population and wealth, I think, than in any previous five years. And no cloud can now be seen hanging over to check its increasing prosperity. The population of the town is now say 25,000 - or perhaps over 30,000 including Colorado City, Manitou and all of the community at this foot of Pike’s Peak. There are also between 30,000 and 40,000 people living in the Cripple Creek gold district at an elevation of from 9500 to 10,500 feet above sea level. This mining camp, 40 miles from Colorado Springs on the S.E. slope of Pike’s Peak, I visited on the new “Short Line” Railroad on July 29th and found that about 2000 tons of gold ore are being mined daily, yielding some $2,000,000 of gold per month, and that last year this little district produced 1/18th of all of the gold mined in the world. Query - how long will these mines continue to produce gold and to what depth? Although there were two open spaces laid out and planted at the original plotting of the town on Tejon St. and the Experimental Garden in front of where the Antlers Hotel now is, the real development of the parks of Colorado Springs may be said to have begun with the present year. The Antlers Park was graded and grassed and partially planted during the present spring. Also the College Park and the Mesa Road Park at the crossing of Monument Creek on the way from the town to Glen Eyrie. The writer has also just bought Austin Bluffs, • 196 •

some 4 miles northeast of the Antlers Hotel and has advised the Mayor of his intention to give the surface, some 700 acres, to the city as a park. Before the year is over, I hope to put into effect my original plan of setting aside the ground for a frontal park along the immediate Monument Valley, from near the Antlers Hotel northward to the upper confines of the town some two miles or more. When undisturbed, shrubbery and wild flowers grow naturally in these creek bottoms without irrigation making it easier to carry out the purpose of affording an open and verdurous space removed from the dust and noise of the streets and roads, yet readily accessible from all parts of the town - where the citizen can come to walk (not ride or drive as that means dust) and his children to play - and all be refreshed by a little taste of country, without going too far afield. There is now good reason to believe that the Garden of the Gods will before long also be devoted to Park purposes for this section of the County. Large chlorination and other mills have to my regret, come in recently at Colorado City and along Bear Creek for the reduction of the ores of Cripple Creek - and these belch out considerable smoke with odors of sulphur and arsenic. This chiefly if not exclusively I believe from the roasting of the ores which is done by gas from the burning of coal on the spot. The power and light are transmitted by wire strung on poles for some 6 miles from the electric power house at the Curtis Coal mines of the Colorado Springs Co. on the outcrop west of Austin Bluffs. It is hoped that this nuisance may be ended soon, either by the further discovery and utilization of underground gas near the works which can be used for roasting, or by the further progress of electric invention, enabling coal to be dispensed with. Wm. J. Palmer Colorado Springs Century Chest Collection, Ms 0349, Folder 2, Special Collections, Tutt Library, Colorado College, Colorado Springs, Colorado.

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In the wintertime, Monument Creek in Monument Valley Park. The steeple of St. Mary’s Catholic Church and the towers of the second Antlers Hotel are visible in background, 1954. Photograph by Myron Wood, © Special Collections, Pikes Peak Library District.

William Jackson Palmer Park Builder Judith Rice-Jones Colorado Springs today enjoys an extensive park system, donated in large part by our city’s founder, William Jackson Palmer. His appreciation for the landscape and his commitment to preserving our unique topography and view corridors, set aside as “pleasure grounds” for the enjoyment of the citizens, benefit us all. What was the source of Palmer’s vision for his extensive park system? How did he manage to develop these amenities while also building a railroad empire? There are many observations about the region expressed by early visitors to Colorado Springs. Although the commentators were viewing a majestic landscape nestled near the mountains, their recorded impressions were descriptive of a hostile environment: A barren soil, parched and dried for eight months of the year, presents neither moisture nor nutrition sufficient to nourish timber. Zebulon Pike, 1806 Picture yourself a level, elevated plateau of greenish brown without a single tree or plant larger than a Spanish bayonet two feet high, sloping down a quarter of a mile to the railroad track and you have a pretty good idea of the town site. Rose Kingsley, 1871

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200 • PARK BUILDER

I shall never forget my sudden sense of hopeless disappointment at the moment when I first looked on the town. It was a gray day in November. . . . There stretched before me, to the east, a bleak, bare, unrelieved, desolate plain. There rose behind me, to the west, a dark range of mountains, snow-topped, rocky-walled, stern, cruel, relentless. Between lay the town—small, straight, new, treeless. Helen Hunt Jackson, 1873 [T]wo miles farther on, from the top of the foothill ridges, I saw the bleak-looking scattered houses of the ambitious watering place of Colorado Springs, the goal of my journey of 150 miles. . . . To me no place could be more unattractive than Colorado Springs, from its utter treelessness. Isabella Bird, 18731 Palmer, on the other hand, in 1871, wrote, “My theory for this place is that it should be made the most attractive place in the West for homes—a place for schools, colleges, literature, science, first-class newspapers and everything the above imply.”2 What was it that made this man see the region’s potential attractiveness when others had seen it only as barren, bleak, and unattractive? If we focus on Palmer’s activities as a young man, we may learn about the source of his optimistic viewpoint. Developmental psychologists tell us that our values and ideas are formed primarily in late adolescence and early adulthood. This was a pivotal period in the life of Palmer. As a young man, in 1855–56, Palmer went to England and Wales to study the operation of the railroads, particularly how they used coal as fuel. In the United States, people were beginning to note the negative results of deforestation for railroads, which burned wood for fuel. Palmer partially funded his European tour by writing articles about what he saw and experienced for a miners’ journal published in Pottsville, Pennsylvania. In reading his letters, journals and notes, one cannot but be impressed with the breadth of Palmer’s interests and the

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acuity of his observations. He wrote on any material at hand-on railroad schedules, for example. He constantly recorded his observations and appeared interested in everything around him. While in England, Palmer saw much of the countryside and its famous English gardens and landscape. He knew the names of all the birds and recorded the names of plants that he observed. He noted that the rhododendrons that he saw were a hybrid of those from England and those from China. In the fall of 1855, he went to France and visited the Exposition Universelle. Witnessing firsthand the beginnings of Baron Georges-Eugene Haussmann’s renovations of the city of Paris, Palmer declared, “Paris is an Eden.” Of his experience at the Forest of Fontainebleau, he said, I never enjoyed myself so much as I did in that gallop through Fontainebleau. . . . scenery of every description—hill, vale, gorge, rock, ridge, water, in short, everything to make a perfect spot . . . Here an ascent, from which we gained a view of leagues around the surrounding country—there a gorge, where rugged boulders piled up in wild confusion one upon another marked some pre-adamite convulsion of nature. It was grand—and reminded me of our noble forest at home in the Alleghenies. I never enjoyed myself so much since I have been in Europe, as I did in that gallop through the Forest of Fontainebleau, with its firs, its rocks, and its glorious recollections. Recalling his visit to Versailles, he wrote, “this is the finest park I ever saw.”3 This was a young man with heart and spirit. We know that Palmer was a frequent visitor to New York City’s Central Park. As a railroad man and later the fiancé and then husband of a young woman from Flushing, Palmer traveled regularly to New York City for both business and personal reasons. He was in New York during the years in which Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux were building Central Park.4 The list of aesthetic characteristics of Olmsted’s landscape design surely influenced Palmer’s plan for the


Monument Valley Park, including: man-made works of art; elements of the English romantic style; provision of a strong contrast with the city; dramatic land forms; balance between turf, trees, and water; the use of vistas as an aesthetic organizing element; series of planned sequential experiences; the separation of traffic; formal plantings; and architecture integrated into the landscape, characterized by variety, and built to provide for recreation.5 Those elements would be the organizing structure of Palmer’s park. An added influence was that many of the cities he passed through by train were in the process of developing great, interconnected park systems. Among the finest is one designed by H. W. S. Cleveland in Omaha, Nebraska, that is comprised of miles of interconnected parks and boulevards.6 Professor of Architecture Galen Cranz divided the history of parks in the United States into four periods. The latter half of the 19th century was the great American park building period. Many of the United States’ most cherished and revered parks were built during this era.7 To the benefit of the citizens of Colorado Springs, William Jackson Palmer’s travels in Europe as a young man enabled him to absorb the experience of a country where landscape design had been an art for centuries. In addition, his travels to France at the period when Haussmann was executing his grand design for Paris introduced Palmer to the possibilities of good urban design. He observed, also, the origin and development of some of his own country’s most revered parks, both in New York City and in the developing West. What did Palmer need to achieve his vision? Remember those observations of the region and city made by its early visitors, who commented on its barren, treeless landscape. First he needed water. By 1872, the El Paso Canal had been designed, dug and was in operation. This was an exceptional engineering feat for the time. The canal spanned from 33rd Street in Old Colorado City, over the bluffs, and crossed Monument Creek at Roswell via sluices to Monument Valley Park. Two large storage areas located at what today are Boddington Field and Boulder Park provided reservoirs. The canal ended in Prospect Lake, from which Evergreen Cemetery was watered.

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So we had water. Palmer was also a great nature aficionado. He knew the names of every tree and plant and soon after the city’s founding, began having trees planted in the city. Together with J. Sterling Morton, Palmer co-founded the International Society of Arboriculture.8 Morton served as the first editor of the journal, Arboriculture, until his death in 1902 at which point Palmer became the editor. In Palmer’s obituary, published in Arboriculture, the writer credits him with both funding the journal and helping find authors to write articles for it.9 Emulating the development of interconnected-boulevardpark systems that he had seen in his travels, Palmer, too, organized a similar system of interconnected parks that included Dorchester Park, Antlers Park, Monument Valley Park, Palmer Park, and the Cheyenne Cañon. A parkway or a park thoroughfare connected them all. Trees were planted along those streets and many were watered via the El Paso Canal. Palmer’s donation of parks was reported on the front page of the New York Times on May 1, 1907. The article, entitled, “Gives Big Park System,” mentioned that General William J. Palmer had offered to the citizens of the city of Colorado Springs, [A] park system embracing 1,500 acres, also the Boulevard Paseo and high drive roadways connecting them, and $45,000 annually for maintenance. Palmer Park embraces 800 acres, including Austin’s Bluff. Palmer has already expended $750,000 on beautifying Monument Park in city limits. A conservative estimate places the value of the gift at $1,500,000.10 Of all the parklands he donated, Palmer’s greatest gift was that of Monument Valley Park. The 1880 Colorado Springs Sanborn fire insurance map reveals the degree to which Monument Creek was a winding, braided creek. It also includes the location of Willow Creek Park established in the south end of today’s present park. Undoubtedly in his frequent trips to New York, Palmer met Charles Walford Leavitt, a well-known landscape engineer.11 Palmer engaged him to design the linear park and in 1903, Leavitt presented Palmer with a grand design for the park.12


Leavitt’s map represents the earliest view of what was actually on the ground. One saw the park from the train station opposite the old Antlers Hotel. The most formal part of the design is found in the southern end of the park, north of Bijou Street. As one progresses northward, the park becomes less formal and more naturalistic. The map also records the location of one of the park’s mineral springs, discovered by Dr. H. T. F. Gathchell, the city’s first physician. In 1904, the April 28 Colorado Springs Gazette reported that the water was tested by Dr. William E. Strieby, a chemistry professor at Colorado College, who pronounced it every bit as healthy as that found in Manitou Springs. Before the park building began, Monument Creek had been a braided stream. To create his park, Palmer began by purchasing lots to improve the view along the train tracks coming into the city. As all of the land had been platted and many lots sold, the addition of these lots resulted in an uneven border for the east side of the park. Relying on information from contemporary Colorado Springs Gazette articles, one can calculate that, based on today’s dollars, Palmer spent close to forty million dollars developing the Monument Valley Park. That represents the largest civic improvement in the history of Colorado Springs. During the early years of the park development, Palmer was the largest employer in the city based on the number of men he employed to work on the park.13 Moving northward one finds similarities with New York City’s Central Park. There are the same sorts of contours that broaden and narrow and lead one on to discover what might come next. In the northern part, we find the reservoir for the El Paso Canal, which also fed a cascade, that descended adjacent to the geologic column, one of the most distinctive elements of the park. It represents the post-Darwinian fascination with the geologic age of the earth. Palmer and Edmund C. van Diest, the engineer and superintendent of park construction, collaborated with George Finlay, a geology professor at Colorado College, to insure the accuracy of the layers in the column. Material for the column was mined in Glen Eyrie. In 1956, Colorado Springs Utilities closed the El Paso Canal which also meant an end to the water cascade by the geologic column.

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Water was an important aesthetic element; there were four ponds in the park. There were four pedestrian bridges and three automobile bridges, which crossed the creek. All were constructed in a rustic style. Similarly, the furniture style was rustic and most often built with local materials, similar to features in Central Park at the same period. Leavitt’s design also incorporates landscaping for Colorado College. We know that Palmer donated many linden trees to the College, a few of which remain today.

The geologic column is located at the base of Fontanero Street, near the north end of Monument Valley Park. It was conceived by William J. Palmer to reflect one billion years of geologic change. Stewarts Commercial Photographers, © Special Collections, Pikes Peak Library District.

The design of the park created opportunities for view corridors to the mountains and Pikes Peak. On Leavitt’s 1903 plan a number of overlooks are marked with a note that there are detailed drawings displaying the view from those sites. Alas, these drawings are not with the plans that reside in the Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum. Palmer wanted access to the park to be as easy as possible. Many entrances, especially


those on the east, were improved with distinctive stone walls and drainages often ending in a seating area designed to take advantage of the view corridors. Along with his preeminence as a landscape architect, Leavitt may also have been chosen for his appreciation of the value of native plants, for he wrote, “Our gardens and parks should symbolize local conditions of land and light and atmosphere and color, trees and shrubs and flowers and rocks, and they should also contrive to gain some of the human flavor and whatever background the district may possess from the passage of years.”14 Palmer was always interested in nature close at hand and had advocated native plants and natural features as the appropriate elements for park land. In 1907 Palmer gave a portion of the park, near the present intersection of Uintah Street and Glen Avenue, to Anne Van Briggle for constructing a pottery. Palmer had been an early investor in Artus Van Briggle’s pottery enterprise and was a friend of both Anne and Artus, who had died in 1904. It is notable that, unlike many of today’s philanthropists, Palmer never asked for anything to be named for him. His one condition for the donation was that an independent entity, much like the present day Pikes Peak Library District, be created to administer the park system. Palmer felt that citizens had a broader vision of what was appropriate for their city than politicians, who often thought in the short term. The Parks Commission remained an independent body until a charter amendment in April 1947 brought it under city control with the creation of the Department of Parks and Recreation. Additionally, Palmer’s deed identified cars as nasty, noxious things and prohibited them in the park. And, of course, liquor was prohibited in all of the parks. Supporting Palmer’s skepticism about politicians, in the 1970s, the city attempted to sell off the north end of Monument Valley Park. The League of Women Voters and the Springs Area Beautiful Association successfully sued the city to halt the sale. The February 19, 1974, judgment from that decision requires the city to uphold certain conditions of Palmer’s deed which specified that if any portion of any of his parks were used for

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other than park purposes, all of his parklands would revert to his heirs.15 From 1921 to 1934, the Colorado Springs Parks superintendent was Leipzig-trained Gustav A. Hennenhofer. The John A. Thatcher family of Pueblo, Colorado originally contracted with Hennenhofer to design the landscaping for their family home, “Rosemont,” today a historic-home-museum. He also became director of Pueblo’s parks. In Colorado Springs, Hennenhofer added to Palmer’s extensive botanical garden a rock garden that featured many native alpine plants. In The WPA Guide to 1930s Colorado, visitors were encouraged to visit the gardens in the 160-acre Monument Valley Park which the Guide called “the botanic garden for all of Colorado.”16

Mud and debris piled up in the lake in Monument Valley Park, after the Memorial Day Flood, May 1935. Stewarts Commercial Photographers, © Special Collections, Pikes Peak Library District.

Following the monumental Memorial Day flood of 1935, money was not readily available for the restoration of the park. New Deal programs provided funding for the re-channeling and rip-rapping of the Monument Creek as well as for the


restoration of many of the stone walls. Following that 1935 flood, the use of almost fifty percent of the parkland was lost as it is now deep within the rip-rapped channel. This untended wild area is generally not accessible to park users due to the steepness of the channel and the lack of pedestrian access. Following Palmer’s March 1909 funeral, urban designer and author of the City Beautiful movement, Charles Mulford Robinson, described him and the extraordinary fulfillment of his 1871 vision for the city as follows: General Palmer was a man of remarkable imagination, a poet who wrote in landscapes instead of words and song. His inspirations of the aesthetic found expression in the creation of civic beauty spots, such as parks and in the erection of a beautiful building at Colorado College and in many other ways.17 Today, Monument Valley Park shows the effects of deferred maintenance as well as some unfortunate additions such as the utility poles that interrupt the view to Pikes Peak at the back of the formal garden area. At an overlook located at the terminus of the Columbia Street entrance, one finds a utility pole and line blocking both the walkway and intruding into the view corridor to the mountains. At yet another park exit and entrance, there are two utility poles to dodge. Many different styles of fences have been added to the site over the years. Many of the open spaces have been lost. The geologic column has particularly suffered with rampant underbrush, trash, erosion of the stone stairs, social trails, and neglect. There is more to a community than infrastructure and public safety. The following quotation from the 2005 annual “CC State of the Rockies Report” emphasizes the value of cultural amenities such as the parks. Recognizing what makes a community unique culturally and then celebrating that distinction may be the most overlooked tenet of strategies to pursue economic development and vibrant communities.18

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Almost anywhere that one goes today, one finds communities restoring waterways as important community amenities. This is an opportunity we have today with Monument Creek as it flows through the park and downtown Colorado Springs. Charles Birnbaum, considered the father of cultural landscape preservation alerts us to pay more attention to the community amenities that we have: I am more worried than ever that people view “open space” as an incomplete sentence—meaning open for what comes next. We need to make it the highest national priority to preserve and interpret those places that are part of America’s ongoing relationship with the land.19 In earlier years, Colorado Springs celebrated Palmer Day with parades and picnics. William Jackson Palmer merits an annual community-wide celebration. The Friends of Monument Valley Park have attempted to revitalize the event with the aim of helping us remember the vision and generosity of our founder. The Historic Preservation Alliance and the Friends of Monument Valley Park recently received a grant of $25,000 from the Colorado Historical Society for the nomination of the park to the National Register of Historic Places. The Park was officially listed on its 100th anniversary in 2007. We hope that this recognition will help us honor and commemorate General William Jackson Palmer’s love of nature and his deep sense of community. It will remind us of the debt we owe him for the many amenities he added to our community, amenities which must be protected and preserved for future generations.


Judith Rice-Jones, M.A., M.L.I.S, came to Colorado Springs originally as a Colorado College student. She is currently the Social Sciences and Art Librarian at the University of Colorado, Colorado Springs. Rice-Jones is the scribe and archivist for the Historic Preservation Alliance, and a founding and current member of the Friends of Monument Valley Park board. She formerly was a member and chair of City of Colorado Springs Parks and Recreation Department Advisory Board. In the summer of 2008, Rice-Jones completed a course in historic landscape preservation taught at University of Virginia and Monticello. She now recognizes many similarities between Thomas Jefferson and William Jackson Palmer.

Notes

1. Zebulon Montgomery Pike, Exploratory Travels Through the Western Territories of North America (Denver: W. H. Lawrence & Co, 1889) 230; Rose Kingsley in South by West, edited by Charles Kingsley, London: Isbister & Co., 1873), 48; Helen Hunt Jackson, “Bits of Travel at Home,” (Boston, Roberts Brothers, 1878), 224; Isabella L. Bird, A Lady’s Life in the Rocky Mountains, (New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1879-80), 178. 2. Palmer, cited in John S. Fisher, A Builder of the West: The Life of General William Jackson Palmer, (Caldwell, Idaho: Caxton Printers, 1939), 200. 3. References to France are quoted from Palmer’s journals and letters in the collection of the Colorado Historical Society library. 4. Frederick Law Olmsted, 1822-1903, is considered the originator of American landscape architecture; Calvert Vaux, 1824-1895, an English-born architect and landscape designer, collaborated with Olmsted in designing New York’s Central Park and worked off and on with the Park’s Commission from 1858 until 1877. 5. Bruce Kelly, Art of the Olmsted Landscape (New York : New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission: Arts Publisher, 1981), 6. Horace William Shaler Cleveland, 1814-1900, was a notable American landscape architect often considered second only to Frederick Law Olmsted. 7. Claire Cooper Marcus and Carolyn Francis, eds., People Places: Design Guidelines for Urban Open Spaces (N.Y.: John Wiley and Sons, 1997), 85-86; Galen Cranz is a Professor of Architecture at the University of California at Berkeley.

RICE-JONES • 211 8. J. Sterling Morton, a Nebraska journalist and later Secretary of Nebraska Territory, then U.S. Secretary of Agriculture from 1893 to 1896, actively promoted planting of trees and was a co-founder of the tree-planting holiday, Arbor Day. 9. Arboriculture, (Connersville, Ind.: International Society of Arboriculture) April, 1909 Vol. 8 No. 2, “Gen. Palmer’s Interest in Arboriculture,” 36 – 37. 10. New York Times, May 7, 1907. 11. Charles Wellford Leavitt, 1871-1928, was an internationally recognized American landscape architect, urban planner, and civil engineer. 12. Charles W. Leavitt, Jr., “Landscape Engineer: Preliminary drawings of Monument Valley Park, Colorado Springs, Colorado.” Park designed at the request of General William Jackson Palmer, who funded the creation of the park, Starsmore Center for Local History, Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum, Colorado Springs, Colo. 13. Colorado Springs Gazette See articles from 1902-1907 on the development of the park. 14. C. W. Leavitt, “Architectural Record,” May 1920. 15. Records, League of Women Voters, Pikes Peak Region, MSS 0052, box 44, folder 6, Special Collections, Pikes Peak Library District. 16. Workers of the Writers’ Program of the Work Projects Administration in the State of Colorado, with a New Introduction by Thomas J. Noel, The WPA Guide to 1930s Colorado (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 1987), 121; “At the Bijou Street entrance are the Botanical Gardens, most extensive in the State, presenting Colorado scenes in miniature.” A planting list dated April 6, 1906 details the extensive number and variety of plants demonstrated in the park. List courtesy of author, located in Vertical File - Parks Colorado Springs - Monument Valley Park, Special Collections, Pikes Peak Library District. 17. Colorado Springs Gazette March 18, 1909. Charles Mulford Robinson, 1869–1917, a journalist and a writer became famous as a pioneering urban planning theorist. For his plan for Colorado Springs, see: Charles Mulford Robinson, A General Plan for the Improvement of Colorado Springs, Report Submitted to the Department of Public Works and Property, May, 1912, Special Collections, Pikes Peak Library District. 18. CC State of the Rockies Report, 2004 Cited by http://www. coppercolo.org/businesses.htm. 19. Charles Birnbaum, FASLA, LAND Online 2003: No. 18, American Society of Landscape Architects http://archives.asla.org/ members/land/pdf/landonline091503.pdf.

Glen Eyrie Castle is part of the Christian conference and retreat center operated by The Navigators. In addition to providing meeting and retreat amenities, they offer bed and breakfast lodging, public teas, holiday events, wedding facilities, and Castle and garden tours. Photo by Norman A. Sauppe.

The Gardens of Glen Eyrie Donald McGilchrist The rocks here are so towering and grand that, except for the relief of their brilliant hues, and the tender leafing and flowering things around them, they would be overawing. There are single shafts like obelisks or minarets, slender, pointed, one or two hundred feet high; huge slabs laid tier upon tier like giant sarcophagi; fretted and turreted masses like abbeys fallen into ruin: and all these are red or pink or painted in mosaic tints of green-and-brown and black-and-yellow. This is called Glen Eyrie; in it there is a beautiful home, and the voices of little children are often heard high up on the rock walls, where they seem as contented and as safe as the goats which are their comrades. Helen Hunt Jackson, 18751 The colorful Glen Eyrie property, once home to William Jackson Palmer and his family, now embraces three parcels that together cover one thousand fifty-five acres: the main valley and frontage on 30th Street (723 acres), the Mesa Reservoir (12 acres), and the Eagle Lake Reservoir and Camp at the head of Queen’s Canyon (320 acres). When General Palmer died in 1909, his contiguous property totaled thirty-eight hundred acres and included land to the south along the valley of Camp Creek and a northern parcel covering most of what is now Mountain Shadows neighborhood and surrounding ranches. Purchases in the 1920s by a subsequent owner, Alexander Cochran, extended the estate to a maximum of around seventyfour hundred acres.2 This included not only North Glen Eyrie,3 now devastated by the approach road to what was the Castle Concrete quarry, but also Blair Athol4 that was roughly on the site of the Flying W Ranch. Both these northern spots were favorite picnic places for the Palmers. Picnicking was an • 213 •

214 • THE GARDENS OF GLEN EYRIE

elaborate ritual in the late Victorian era―and Palmer liked to do things properly. This essay will focus on the heart of the property that is now owned by The Navigators―the central valley that contains the Castle. I will describe the works that Palmer carried out to beautify the grounds of his home.

Palmer’s Carriage House at Glen Eyrie contained space for 10 carriages and 16 horse stalls, with quarters for 10 grooms on the upper floor. Extended 1900, from the original stables. From Special Collections, Pikes Peak Library District.

This central valley, the Glen proper, is a highly compacted zone. Geologically, there are fourteen strata that occur between the mouth of Queen’s Canyon and the mesa, covering more than one billion years. Furthermore, the Rampart Range fault runs through the Glen from south to north. As regards vegetation, the picture is similarly compact. Five ecosystems can be distinguished: grassland, riparian, mountain shrub land, piñon/juniper woodland, and ponderosa/Douglas fir forest.5 The earliest reference to the vegetation of the estate is probably an article in an 1872 issue of Out West, which describes

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“Queen’s Canyon . . . a rich growth of trees and shrubs, the lofty pines festooned with Virginia creeper and wild clematis, and the lowlier shrubs covered with flowers or fruit.”6 Then, in 1873, we have a charming letter to the New York Times by Grace Greenwood, reporting from Glen Eyrie. She found it “a strange, wild, half-savage place, and yet beautiful exceedingly—green and fresh, when all without is bare and brown—with abundant foliage and hosts of wild flowers.” She added that “children are everywhere: on the hillside, by the brookside, under the bridge, in the cañon, about the barn and all over the house.”7 Glen Eyrie is Scots for the Valley of the Eagle’s Nest. Though a golden eagle has not used this site for perhaps two decades, the inaccessible nest still looks down on the Glen from high on the north Dakota Hogback. It is easy to forget how forbidding the terrain was for early visitors. The rocks of the Garden of the Gods, for example, were described as a “supernatural catastrophe” by Helen Hunt Jackson8 and as “ghastly peaks” by Isabella Bird,9 though the latter did concede that the Glen was “wild and romantic.” Another feature was the abundance of wildlife in the vicinity. For example, Captain Randolph Marcy reported two herds of several hundred elk each on the mesa in 1858―and in 1861 Melancthon Beach estimated a winter herd of more than three hundred head.10 Today, bighorn sheep, mule deer and wild turkeys add to the interest of the grounds. General Palmer married Mary Lincoln “Queen” Mellen in 1870 and the first house (twenty-two rooms) that they built in the Glen was finished early in 1872.11 The Palmers moved in accompanied by Queen’s father, William P. Mellen, his third wife Ellen and six children who soon learned to name the wildflowers carpeting the Glen.12 Anyone who would intend to cultivate and beautify the Glen, as did Palmer, faces the challenge of flash floods.13 The soil also was largely unproductive for cultivation though well suited to native vegetation and wildlife habitat. Much of it is clay loam with slow permeability and high potential for erosion.14 However, Palmer spared no expense in developing his estate, even though he was periodically short of money until he sold


the Denver & Rio Grande Western Railroad in 1901.15 Palmer was a visionary. As he once wrote to his bride Queen, “there is a music in the inception of large material enterprises.” What he called “this glorious country of bright days and beautiful skies” energized him.16 Furthermore, Palmer was surrounded by enthusiasts. For example, General Robert A. Cameron’s remarks at the driving of the first stake for Colorado Springs in 1871 included this purple passage— This favored spot, sheltered by the Divide from the storms of the north, is soon to blossom into gardens of beauty, and homes where elegance reigns; here will rise groves and orchards, and over these hills the luxuriant vine will climb and yield its fruit in its season, to delight the hearts of those who watch its growth beneath the fostering touch of civilization.17 The Gardens of Glen Eyrie will always be associated with landscape architect John Blair who emigrated with his wife Jane from Scotland to Ontario, Canada, in 1851.18 By 1853, he had settled in Rockford, Illinois, where a contemporary account reads: Rockford . . . contains some of the most tastefully arranged ground to be found in the West . . . one is struck with a perfect taste displayed in all the combination of variety, with unity and simplicity, which is everywhere seen in nature and so rarely seen in the workings of man; I found, on conversing with Mr. Blair the gardener, that there was a mastermind back of all this. This gentleman was born in Scotland and took his first lessons in landscape gardening from the forest, the mountains and the lakes of the land . . . his taste was formed by a familiarity with those wild and picturesque scenes.19 Blair’s informal and natural style was quite an innovation. It was romantic rather than classical, sylvan rather than striking.20 It attracted many admirers. It was even held to be a source of moral uplift!21 The above contemporary article continued:

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What a blessing to any State is the presence of such a man, surrounding our homes with scenes of beauty, which silently educate us into the love of the true, the beautiful and the good, and even exert a powerful influence in winning the poor, the dissipated and the depraved to a higher and purer life. In 1865, the Blair family moved seventy-five miles southeast to Chicago where he managed some very large projects. This was near the end of the Civil War, in which many wounded soldiers were dying from infection or the lack of clean bandages. Thus, two redoubtable women, Mary Livermore and Anna Dickinson, had determined to organize Sanitary Fairs throughout the North to raise money for the medical needs of the Union army. They charged Blair with creating a Horticultural Attraction along an extended length of Michigan Avenue in downtown Chicago.22 On this strip, Blair constructed an extraordinary ornamental landscape, packed with elegant islands, fountains, statues, terraces, grottoes and bowers, capped with a large hill. This installation was so successful, as the centerpiece of the largest Sanitary Fair ever held, that Blair was appointed Superintendent of Parks for Chicago and soon laid out half a dozen important parks for the expanding city. In 1871, after the destructive Great Fire in Chicago, 51year-old Blair decided to move further west to participate in the beginnings of Colorado Springs. He traveled with his friend Henry Austin, who intended to start sheep farming and from whom we derive the street and park name Austin Bluffs.23 They arrived in the infant settlement in December. Blair’s first commission from General Palmer was to lay out what is now Manitou Springs. The local newspaper reported in June 1872 that Blair, working with Colonel Edwin. S. Nettleton, the resident engineer of the Colorado Springs Company, was engaged [I]n laying out a small town close to the Soda Springs at Manitou . . . after which Mr. Blair will put on a large force to supplement the natural beauties . . . roads and paths will be constructed, bridges built and rustic seats placed in appropriate spots.24


Blair also worked on the north and south parks in Colorado Springs, now known as Acacia Park and Alamo Square. He laid out Evergreen Cemetery, designed the gardens of Briarhurst Manor, in Manitou Springs, and built the winding road through the Garden of the Gods to Manitou Springs.25 He constructed the stone bridge carrying the old road from Colorado City to Denver, which is still prominent just to the east of 30th Street opposite the entrance to Glen Eyrie. It is probably the oldest surviving road bridge in Colorado.26 During most of this early period, Blair’s family lived in a cabin on the western edge of the mesa, overlooking Glen Eyrie. Traces of the foundation still exist, although the cabin was moved onto the Glen in 1938 and is now known as Echo Rock Cabin. The foregoing assignments from General Palmer meant that it was not until later in the 1870s that Blair was able to apply his creativity to developing the gardens of Glen Eyrie. Even in his specialized and temporary work on Michigan Avenue in Chicago, Blair had delighted in crafting ponds and rustic bridges. Within a few years, Glen Eyrie featured a willow pond where the Castle car park is now, a duck pond south of the carriage house, a lakelet where the sports green is, a lily pond near Bighorn Lodge and two fish ponds near the gate. At least five arched stone bridges were thrown across Camp Creek and these were supplemented by rustic walkways such as the one which traversed the pond between the school house and the Castle.27 Most of Blair’s foundational work as Palmer’s landscape architect was finished by 1884, and his last visit to the Glen was in 1900.28 He went on to design Beacon Hill Park for the citizens of Victoria, British Columbia, Canada, and began to supervise construction of Stanley Park in Vancouver, British Columbia. He died in 1906. General Palmer frequently traveled to his other properties and to Europe. Ill health had caused Queen to settle in England in 1886. Palmer visited her and their daughters at least once every year. His saddest journey back to the Glen came in April 1895, after her death. He brought with him their three daughters Elsie (age 22), Dorothy (age 14) and Marjory (age 13).29 They

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returned to Colorado Springs in style: a night at Niagara Falls, a night in Chicago, a night in Denver, then a presidential progress along the tracks of his railroad in Palmer’s rail car Nomad. For the rest of 1895, the three girls kept a diary of what they saw around them at the Glen: flowers, birds, weather and visitors. In fact, they mention at least fifty-eight species of plants, both cultivated and natural. The year 1895 was wet and there were concerns that Camp Creek might overflow. As young people do, they planted optimistic seeds around the school house which were frustratingly dug up by their father’s Great Danes.30 Then they built what they called a Sky Garden, accessible only by ropes!

William J. Palmer was very fond of Great Danes. He is known to have owned at least one dozen dogs of this breed. Colorado College Photo Files (CCPF), Special Collections, Tutt Library, Colorado College, Colorado Springs, Colorado.

In spite of the loss of Queen, Palmer carried on an active life as a host, supported by his daughters. Here is an extract from Hamlin Garland’s account of a garden party at the Glen around 1900: [W]e entered through a most beautiful garden in which all the native shrubs and wildflowers had been


assembled and planted with exquisite art. People were streaming in over the mountain roads, some on horseback, some on bicycles, some in glittering, gaily painted wagons, and when we reached the lawn before the great stone mansion, we found a very curious and interesting throng of guests and in the midst of them, the general, tall, soldierly, clothed in immaculate linen and wearing a broad western hat, was receiving his friends assisted by his three pretty young daughters. The house was a veritable chateau; the garden was a wonderland of Colorado plants and flowers, skillfully displayed among the native ledges and scattered along the bases of the cliffs . . . grounds so beautiful by reason of nature’s adjustment, as well as by way of the landscape gardener’s art, that they made the senses ache with a knowledge of their exquisite impermanency. It was a kind of poem expressed in green and gold and scarlet. 31 Glen Eyrie has always been at risk from flash floods, often caused by cloud bursts in the upper drainage of Camp Creek. The three most destructive for the grounds of the Glen occurred in 1921,32 194733 and 1999.34 In those years, lakes, ponds, ornamental bridges and plantings were lost. Other serious local floods, at least from 1864 onwards, did most of their damage east or south of the Glen.35 To ensure adequate water for the lavish landscaping, irrigation ditches were dug in 1864 and 1874, known as Camp Creek Ditch 1 and 2. Camp Creek Ditch 1 irrigated seventyfive acres of the lower valley running south towards Colorado City and followed a course to the west of the creek. It was later owned equally by Fleming Neff and Robert Chambers. It can still be traced. Camp Creek Ditch 2 was added in 1874 to irrigate another hundred acres. It was owned equally by the above men and Penton Hardwick. General Palmer purchased both ditches. These two rights were adjudicated, for irrigation, in 1882 and assigned priorities 77 and 435 within the Arkansas Basin. The

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first general adjudication for rights other than irrigation was made in 1954.36 The original Glen Eyrie pipeline, built in 1871, was two to four inches in diameter from the masonry intake in Queen’s Canyon, suspended against the cliff, to the House Reservoir 1, from which a six-inch line went to the house. The capacity was 0.4 cubic feet per second. This line fed ponds and fountains in the Glen. In the late 1870s, John Drinkwater the plumber (so apt!) was constructing the first water system which handled irrigation as well as domestic supplies for Palmer’s house and included several fountains. Indeed, it was declared to be “as complete a system of water works as has ever been built in the West.”37 As Palmer progressively developed his gardens and grounds, he needed more water. Therefore, he hired Engineer Herbert Reid in 1898. Eventually, thanks to Reid, Palmer’s estate boasted eighteen reservoirs with a capacity of around two hundred million gallons.38 Some forty acres of the Glen were irrigated (compared with fourteen now) as well as the extensive orchards and alfalfa fields in the lower valley. As Reid began work for Palmer in 1898, he estimated that Camp Creek water was being used for 65 percent domestic, 35 percent irrigation, and he greatly increased the capacity for irrigation by building the 1898 pipeline (twelve-inch diameter) through the Glen and up into the Mesa Reservoirs from which water could be drawn back into the Glen as desired. 39 The water flow in Camp Creek is deceptive. Perhaps 90 percent of the flow moves underground in the aquifer along the floor of the Glen. Alluvial sands and gravels, largely tertiary and unconsolidated, deepen towards the east end of the Glen. Reid was an innovator. He tapped into the subterranean flows by building a “phreatic ditch,” still running underground, which discharged into what was the Alfalfa Reservoir.40 He also collected storm and flood water. Reid worked energetically. By the end of 1899, more than nineteen thousand feet of pipe had been laid.41 Looking back in 1927, he wrote that “the entire grounds are gridironed with smaller pipes, sprinkling hydrants, fire hydrants, hose connections, so that any portion of the grounds may be reached


with garden hose.”42 The Glen Eyrie water supply was connected to the city system in 1975, to furnish adequate pressure for the fire department, and drinking water was also drawn from the city system from 1987. It is noteworthy that average rainfall in Colorado Springs has significantly increased during the last century. For example, from 11.06 inches per year during 1891-1900 to 18.91 inches per year during 1991-2000.43 Therefore, General Palmer had to deal with drier conditions than currently exist. He did so, comprehensively. The coarse and shallow soil, a mixture of clay and sand, coupled with the lack of precipitation (when not in flood!) presented quite a challenge.44 Every year, Palmer’s gardeners spent much time hauling manure from Manitou, which had to be spread in all the beds to enhance the productivity of the soil. In 1883, for example, several trips were made every day for almost two weeks. That year, the General Record of Operations shows that cultivation included: peas, beans, onions, parsnips, raspberries, asparagus, gooseberries, alfalfa, currants, grapevines, mushrooms, celery, apricots, peaches, nectarines, roses, clematis, gladioli, lily of the valley, Virginia creeper, rhododendrons, hyacinths, tulips, rowans, honeysuckle, wisteria, carnations, and azaleas.45 Kentucky Blue Grass was brought in, with real Kentucky soil to encourage proper growth! 46 Mushrooms were grown in an underground shelter north of the pig pen, where Aspen Manor is now, and later under the benches in the greenhouses. More than ninety identified species of birds frequent the Glen.47 In Palmer’s day, flocks of birds were attracted by the ponds and the lush vegetation. He never allowed a bird to be molested. They had excellent appetites, and he was obliged to enclose his strawberry patch with wire fencing. However, he did not protect his one hundred fifty cherry trees in the south arm of the Glen; consequently, they tended to yield only around one-third of a normal crop. For most of Palmer’s years at the Glen, the lower valley was farmed by the Chambers family from Pennsylvania, who acquired their land in 1874 and built Rock Ledge Ranch in 1875.48 Mrs. Chambers summarized,

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As the years have gone by since 1874, the homestead claim has grown more fruit and vegetables than any other ranch in El Paso County. With its six acres of asparagus, hundreds of apple trees and hundreds of cherry trees besides other fruit, its value increased many fold and shows . . . what even barren land may become by patient persistent effort.49 And, I would add, by Camp Creek water! Camp Creek eventually watered the ranch through Palmer’s Valley Reservoirs 1 and 2, also known in the 1920s as Big and Little Chambers Lakes. There were grasshopper plagues, which caused Mr. Chambers to switch to dairying instead of planting for a while. Mrs. Chambers taught at the little log school house of District 35 in the valley. The school, which was built in 1889 and destroyed by fire in 1946, had some very pretty landscaping around it.50 The site lies between the Glen and the new Visitors Center.51 In 1900, Palmer paid $17,000 for the one hundred sixty acres of the Chambers’ property, which is now part of the two hundred seventy-seven acres of Rock Ledge Ranch Historic Site. Until recently, the vegetable house stood just south of the current boundary of Glen Eyrie, west of Camp Creek, providing evidence of the intensive cultivation at this end of the valley.52 Surrounding this building was a vegetable garden, supplying food for use at the Castle. Nearby was an acre of fruit trees. In the early 1900s, there were around one hundred fifty acres of oats, alfalfa, mangelwurzels, sugar beets, asparagus and around eight acres of orchard and small fruits.53 With a succession of owners until the 1940s, Rock Ledge Ranch continued to grow several crops of alfalfa and provide fruit each year. We are fortunate to have a daily description of the improvements carried out on the grounds of the Glen for most of the year beginning in March 1883. Seasonally, the grounds crew varied from four to twelve men. April was a decidedly busy month. Deliveries to the Glen for planting or the greenhouse in the space of two days that month comprised: 38 Japanese honeysuckle, 25 wisteria, 75 vinca major varieties,


6 climbing roses, 25 peach trees, 7 apricots, 16 nectarines, and 6 grapevines. A few days earlier, the crew had taken delivery of fifty-five foreign vines for the grapery.54 At the same time, work continued on improving and extending the irrigation and sprinkler systems. Palmer had always valued trees. The land he acquired for his new colony in 1871 was short-grass prairie, so he purchased some rights on Fountain Creek and built the El Paso Canal to carry irrigation water to the major northern avenues that he had laid out for Colorado Springs. Water was flowing alongside each avenue by 1872 to sustain the cottonwoods that he brought from the Arkansas Valley. Thus, the selling price of his lots multiplied. Prospect Lake was added in 1890 to receive the overflow from the canal. The largest known Colorado specimens of Jonathan Apple and Winter Bartlett Pear can still be found in the valley of Camp Creek—evidence of the care with which the orchards in the Glen and lower valley were maintained.55 W. B. Felton, president of the Colorado State Bureau of Horticulture in 1891, has a confirmatory snapshot from the year of Palmer’s death: Landscape gardeners have had a free hand to make the grounds as beautiful as possible. Oak shrub, cottonwood and quaking aspen trees, the natural product of the locality, have all been preserved and interspersed, with planting of all kinds of evergreen trees, flowering shrubs and acres of flowers and magnificent lawns. In 1870, Palmer and Dr. William A. Bell purchased twentysix thousand acres known as Manitou Park, north of Woodland Park, which was then called Manitou Park Station. They constructed a hotel and other amenities. Palmer later donated ten thousand of these acres to Colorado College for a school of forestry. This land is now part of the Pike National Forest.56 Palmer’s love of trees is illustrated in many ways. He donated $100,000 to found the Colorado School of Forestry in Manitou Park, which became the best field forestry laboratory

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in the country, known from 1936 as the Manitou Experimental Forest. He required his Castle patio to be built around a fine specimen, for which the circular stone mantle is still visible. Boring the servants tunnel from carriage house to Castle was halted until Palmer was assured that it was deep enough not to damage the shrubbery, and the planned steps from the library corridor were rerouted to save two cedar trees.57 He sponsored a “bold, far-sighted and comprehensive” plan for a city park system that “sought to make practical and effective use of every advantage which the position of Colorado Springs gave it.”58 Toward the end of his life, Palmer served as president of the International Society of Arboriculture. In this capacity, the Society reported that his liberality and counsel had enabled them to distribute several tons of forest tree seeds and several million trees throughout the world. He was, as the Society acknowledged, “a lover of trees and flowers . . . thoroughly versed in the character, habits and origin of all forest trees and plants.”59 In 1905, the pine tree beetle spread havoc in much of Colorado. According to Edmond van Diest, “To save several of the Glen Eyrie pines, it was necessary to chisel out the bark in the infected spots, find the little black beetles, destroy them, and fill the holes with wax. Mr. Gifford Pinchot,60 our first National Forester . . . came to Glen Eyrie to plan a campaign against these little black beetles.” 61 Palmer contributed $150,000 to the eradication fund. Palmer’s vision was that the entire backbone of the Rocky Mountain range should be a forest reserve.62 As a contemporary account noted, “General Palmer has done much to promote the cause of forest perpetuation, maintaining at his own expense very large areas of natural forest and the planting of native coniferous trees in the mountains.”63 Palmer originally had two greenhouses built alongside what is now called the Bungalow in the Glen.64 Later, because they were not getting enough sunlight, he replaced them by two very grand greenhouses (110 x 27 feet, actually five units) on higher ground, designed by Lord & Burnham of New York. These were built in 1906 against the gardener’s house and survived


into the 1960s.65 W. B. Felton described the greenhouses as “filled with flowers beautiful and rare. Orange trees, tomato plants and cucumber vines, together with potted strawberries, furnish fruits and vegetables throughout the cold season when they cannot be obtained outdoors. Three men are constantly employed in the greenhouses . . . yet not a single flower is ever sold.” It was Palmer’s custom, even when he was abroad, to direct that gifts of flowers be sent from his greenhouses to his friends in Colorado Springs.66

Gardener’s House and attached greenhouses constucted in 1906 and initially heated from the Power Plant in the inner Glen. In the 1920s, the flowers raised in these greenhouses gained many regional awards. Courtesy of The Navigators, from Special Collections, Pikes Peak Library District.

From the 1880s, there were also a grapery and a conservatory. The latter featured a fountain, with goldfish and lilies. A new rose arbor67 with dwarf roses, pergolas, summer house and sun dial was finished in 1906.68

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The Rose Arbor was finished in October 1906, built by Carl Fohn, and restored in 1997, with protective railings to exclude hungry deer. It is a favorite site for summer weddings and a memorial rose garden. Courtesy of Donald McGilchrist.

Ginny Keifer’s article, Early Flower Gardening in the Pikes Peak Region, comments that by 1907 gardening was considered “a fine art for ladies.”69 Women of fashion showcased unusual plants among the staples in their gardens. Being a community of transplanted easterners, Colorado Springs was no exception. In 1907 there were twelve florists, six nurserymen and several greenhouses listed in the city directory. The El Paso County Horticultural Society held their first Annual Show in 1898. By 1901, Palmer headed the list of subscribers (albeit with only $50) and Stephen Clark, of Glen Eyrie, chaired their Gardens and Landscape Committee.70 Patty Jewett placed two detailed accounts of the progress of local horticulture in the Century Chest in 1901. She successfully promoted roses “in this adobe soil with cold winters” and bemoaned the “lack of enterprise” among local homeowners, their passivity being “a great trial.”71 Nevertheless, she described the success of Palmer’s El Paso Canal in irrigating the better parts of town,


The lawns here are like green velvet and are the feature of the town. The streets are all bordered with irrigation ditches and every place in town is flooded once a week with 6 or 8 inches of water. We are also allowed to use the sprinklers attached to the hose every day from 6:00 to 9:00 AM and from 6:00 to 7:00 PM. Palmer’s enthusiasm for horticulture can be seen from the fact that, ten months after his crippling fall in 1906, he and his daughters spent three hours at the 10th Annual Show of the Horticultural Society “taking tea, purchasing flowers and visiting all the exhibits.” The Gazette reported that he “held no end of little informal receptions and . . . cordially greeted several landscape gardeners with whom he is acquainted, much to their delight.”72 A detailed set of annual planting proposals for the Glen, by James Dawson, was submitted to Palmer in the last decade of his life. The scale was remarkable. For example, the order delivered for planting in the spring of 1906 comprised: 75 Cottonwood, 25 Ash, 7 Silver Maple, 30 Colorado Blue Spruce, 15 Sycamore, 4 Lombardy Poplar, 30 Elm, 8 Willow, and 2 Red Leaf Maple. In addition, this one order contained four hundred forty-six shrubs and more than two thousand perennials!73 We may also gain an impression of the scale of work that Palmer invested in his gardens, towards the end of his life, by sampling the daily notes that his horticultural manager Carl Fohn maintained from 1906 until 1919. Fohn employed a grounds crew of sixteen gardeners rising to a seasonal peak of twenty-eight gardeners in the year 1908.74 They divided their time between the greenhouses, the grounds and, occasionally, the lower valley.75 Fohn’s Glen crew, of course, was separate from the very large crew employed by the General in laying out Monument Valley Park and the crews directed by Edmond van Diest that altered or constructed new buildings in Glen Eyrie during the last decade of Palmer’s life.76 These, with the years in which their architectural drawings were prepared, include:

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Cow Stable……………….. 18 stalls Carriage House………….. extended Battery House Green Houses……….now demolished Rustic Lodge………...now demolished Gardener’s House Horse Shelter………..now demolished Power Plant & Laundry Rose Arbor & Summer House Lodge & Pavilion

1899 1900 1900 c1900 1901 1902 1903 1904 1906 1907

The most important undertaking by far was the complete rebuilding of Palmer’s home and the extensions for the library and servants’ quarters, to complete what we now call the Castle (1904-1905). The building now known as Eagle’s Nest was the central part of Palmer’s pasture barns with stables for his draft horses and a workshop. East of it lay a hayfield and the Pasture Reservoir. Along this northern side of the Glen ran the Tourist Drive, to which city people were admitted to look over the Tourist Wall, drive around the fountain circle and enjoy the landscaping of Palmer’s home grounds. Palmer was generous in admitting visitors. Only once did he restrict entry, after a tourist shot a nesting eagle. A 1909 report tells us that hundreds of people visited the Glen daily during the June to October season. Dorothy Bertolotti (her father was the General’s butler) recalls the fountain where tourists would stop for a cup of water, sold by children for 5¢, with bunches of sweet peas from the grounds.77 In 1907, Palmer also built Orchard House, the Dutch Colonial home for William and Helen Sclater which is now part of Rock Ledge Ranch. It was affectionately known to his crews as the Sclater Cottage, though it boasts nine rooms and three bathrooms on the second and third floors.78 Palmer also took defensive measures to protect the integrity of his property. In 1886, for example, the lower valley along what is now Gateway Road had been platted for sale in small parcels, so Palmer purchased the land and destroyed (almost) all the maps.79 Later, at the western end of the Gateway Road


was a popular establishment known as Fatty Rice’s Place.80 After several attempts, Palmer purchased this, partly because some of his employees frequented it to purchase liquor. However, the Place burned down in 1907 and only the site of the adjoining cistern is now visible.81 Another abortive attempt to commercialize the valley of Camp Creek leading to Glen Eyrie surfaced in 1895. Some entrepreneurs organized the Garden and Glen Electric Road as a street car line from Colorado City with the intent that the terminus in the garden should feature a casino and a magnificent botanical structure to be called the Palm Palace. Prohibitive costs buried this project.82 In 1903, an eccentric local entrepreneur named Robert McReynolds proposed to carve the faces of our assassinated presidents on the Gateway Rocks, in morbid anticipation of Mount Rushmore. Palmer responded laconically, on behalf of his good friend Charles Perkins83 who owned the Rocks—“I fear that such mutilation of the natural scenery would not be in the best taste.”84 What happened to the gardens after Palmer’s death? Briefly, maintenance declined for several years, as executor George Krause pursued a purchaser. Van Diest commented in 1911—“At Glen Eyrie everything looks deserted. The spirit that pervaded the place is gone, the family scattered, and only the very simplest form of maintenance prevails.”85 Then, in 1916, Ed Dunn and Walter Eaton acquired the Glen for $150,000 on behalf of an entity that became known as the Oklahoma Syndicate. Their ambitious plans evolved rapidly: as Garden City (resurrecting the 1886 plat), as a country club and resort, and as the Glen Eyrie Mountain Colony. They eventually intended one hundred fifty villas within and around the Glen.86 Their promotion failed, but not for want of trying.87 Exalted and rhapsodic language broadcast the beauties of the grounds, in which lanterns hung from trees and floodlights illuminated the rocks at night. Poets were summoned. A brief sample of Sunny Wright’s verses will suffice: Oh magic land of hearts’ desires, which God had made with lavish hand,

MCGILCHRIST • 231

Whose fretted rocks and lofty spires, in never ending vigils stand. He makes the sunbeams gently fall, in shining mists o’er lake and lea, He keeps his loving watch o’er all, His blessings rest on Glen Eyrie.88 The Syndicate adopted the slogan “Land of Enchantment” borrowing the title of Lilian Whiting’s popular account.89 Notoriously, the Syndicate’s design featured a road bridge across Queen’s Canyon and a tunnel through Echo Rock.90 However, the continuing attractiveness of Palmer’s gardens may be gauged from the fact that the Syndicate earned $45,000 during the two years in which they had possession, by charging for public admission to the grounds.91 In 1918, the Glen was mercifully purchased by Alexander Cochran, a rug manufacturer and polo enthusiast from Yonkers, New York. He rapidly expanded the property to 6,580 acres of which 540 were under cultivation; 240 irrigated and 300 dry farmed. Cochran, who died in 1929, encouraged the commercial rather than the aesthetic aspects of cultivation. However, he was a keen ornithologist and his bird boxes remain on several trees. He imported pheasants and Hungarian partridges.92 After 1919, the Burghard family assumed responsibility for the greenhouses. Eugene W. Burghard, from Germany, had joined Palmer’s staff in 1906 and later replaced Carl Fohn as head gardener. Along with his wife Rosa and their three sons, he lived in Rustic Cottage until 1918 and then in the gardener’s house. Their sons were all taught in the District 35 school house in the lower valley. Mr. Burghard competed successfully from the greenhouses at the Glen, becoming known as “the chrysanthemum king.” The Navigators have more than fifty awards that he won in floral competitions during the 1920s. Burghard also established a wholesale greenhouse business at Wahsatch Avenue and Fontanero Street, and founded Burghard Floral in 1923.93 During the 1930s, after Cochran’s death, Glen Eyrie was held by an absentee landlord, the Hillbright Corporation of


New York.94 Only minimal maintenance was carried out until George Strake of Houston, Texas, purchased the property in 1938.95 He made considerable improvements, including two new swimming pools and an extension to the Pink House, but continued to lose money on the ranches he owned outside the Glen. The Navigators acquired Glen Eyrie in 1953 and had three purposes for the property: a training center for missionaries who would go out into the nations; a year-round conference grounds; and a center for the expanding administrative offices. In short, the Glen would function as “home base.”96 The first maintenance supervisor, John Crawford, built two new duck ponds and made various aesthetic improvements to the grounds. He planted some three hundred trees. However, in view of the poor condition of some buildings, vegetation was not the first concern. Later, The Navigators became more environmentally conscious. In 1984, a master plan was commissioned for the Glen that explicitly protects the natural environment. In the early 1990s, seventeen walking trails were restored and named and brochures were produced on the birds and wildlife of the Glen. The Glen Eyrie Garden Society was launched in 1995 with Katie DiFelice as first president. The Society drew from some fifty volunteers and initially focused upon the restoration of the gardens at the Castle entrance and the patio and the rose garden. An enthusiastic band of volunteers led by Susan Hankins continues to maintain and embellish the gardens in 2009. The new entrance island from 30th Street was added as a xeriscape garden. The rose garden is now stocked with many memorial roses. In recent years, Dave and Avis Wagner have produced fine displays of annuals in front of the new International Building. What, then, were the principles that animated General Palmer and around which he organized his engagement with the environment? I suggest the following: conservation; experimentation and innovation; lavish quantity, to the highest standards; avoidance of ostentation; and superb hospitality.

MCGILCHRIST • 233

Conservation. This shows in Palmer’s concern to preserve individual trees, such as the one protruding through the Castle patio, and in his frequent insistence that native shrubs and stands should be protected. In fact, he displayed a broad ecological commitment that was well ahead of his time, especially for the virgin West. Engineer Reid reported, “I have been ordered many a time to change my survey on a trail or road rather than to destroy a bird’s nest.”97 On a wider scale, Palmer voiced his concern in 1901 that, with two thousand tons of gold ore being mined daily in the Cripple Creek gold district, “large chlorination and other mills have, to my regret, come in recently at Colorado City and along Bear Creek for the reduction of the ores . . . and these belch out considerable smoke with odors of sulphur and arsenic.”98 Experimentation and innovation. Palmer stayed in touch with leading authorities. Examples: corresponding with Louis Pasteur on the design of the creamery, with Gifford Pinchot on pine beetles, with California foresters on importing saplings of sequoia, and with European immigrants on the growing of mushrooms. Consultations lasted more than a year on methods of lightning protection, electric gates on the Glen trails, novel use of a phreatic ditch, flues on the Castle chimney, and precise measurement of climate patterns throughout the grounds.99 Innovation was a lifelong pursuit for Palmer. The saga of the machinery installed in the power plant at the Glen well illustrates this, as does the search for the best means of smoke extraction from the Castle.100 Extant correspondence is voluminous.101 Lavish quantity, to the highest standards. One example will suffice to illustrate Palmer’s robust approach, a letter from agent van Diest of February 8, 1906, to Messrs Lee & Son: Deliver at Glen Eyrie 2,600 narrow leaf and 1,400 broad leaf cottonwoods . . . at $25 per 100 delivered; provided that all trees must be perfectly sound and healthy, with the very best possible root formation only, the branches as much as possible left on and tops not trimmed back so as to leave less than 9 feet and all to be uniform trees, not less than 1½ inches in diameter, no tap roots split,


nor cut off nearer tree than 12 inches, and there with a sharp clean cut, not broken, all smaller roots to remain intact, the whole to be done in a thorough manner so as to permit of growth of the transplanted tree with as little interruption as possible. Trees to be delivered from March 20th to April 15th and to be received, inspected, approved by Berry and McLean.102 The detailed negotiations that van Diest conducted with suppliers on malfunctioning parts or short orders or delayed shipments are remarkable. Many items were delivered, tested, returned as inadequate, from garden hoses to electric generators. Always, insistence on value for money. Avoidance of ostentation. The Glen was cultivated not for display, but for enjoyment.103 Fruits and vegetables were raised close to ornamental beds. For example, in the southern arm of the Glen, there was a large recreational swimming pool (60 x 150 feet plus bath houses) surrounded by beautiful flowers of many varieties—“in this nook is also fruit trees—apple, pear, plum, cherry, peach—red and black raspberries, currants and strawberries.”104 Across the path was the cow barn (now converted to bedrooms) which contained eighteen milk cows, half Jerseys and the rest Holsteins, well treated with hay, vegetables, grain and a very large pasture, as well as a silo that furnished winter food. The barn contained a separator to extract cream from their milk. The same approach was evident in Palmer’s private philanthropy and avoidance of public forums. He insisted that his name not be recorded in connection with his many and munificent gifts to the city and surrounding areas. Superb hospitality. Palmer and his daughters continued the pattern set by Queen. The quaint inscription above the Castle entrance evidenced a warm welcome for their many guests, “We should a guest love while he loves to stay, and when he likes not, give him loving way.” Dorothy Carr from England spent nine months as a guest at the Glen in 1903. Adjusting to the bustle of the Castle, she wrote, “Much entertaining of callers . . . callers in the morning who often stay to lunch. Callers in the afternoon who often stay to dine and sleep and callers to dine and sleep

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who often stay two days.”105 John Fisher summarizes, “There were endless visitors, all sorts and conditions of people swept together by his wide hospitality—his own friends, business acquaintances, tourists came with letters of introduction from all over the world.”106 Palmer put on a Christmas party each year for local children. He hosted many other festivities, the largest being the 35th Reunion at the Glen in 1907 for the two hundred eighty surviving members of his 15th Pennsylvania Volunteer Cavalry. This lasted nine days. Contributing to Palmer’s genius was his skill at recruiting three kinds of men: leaders from among his Civil War officers, engineers from his railroad days, and investors from his many eastern and European relationships. To these, in his final years, he added a stream of social and cultural leaders who came to enjoy his conversation and his home. William Jackson Palmer was a man of broad sensibility, dynamic in vision and meticulous in execution. He loved Glen Eyrie. He was a compassionate entrepreneur whose energetic improvements formed a fruitful partnership with the natural beauties of the Glen. He took space and fashioned place. He saw his task as creating and cultivating. A century later, we still profit greatly from his commitment to beauty and to the environment. Donald McGilchrist is a U.K. citizen, born in London. He has an M.A. in Philosophy, Politics and Economics from the University of Oxford. He then spent ten years in business in Britain. With his wife Jeanie and their two daughters, he emigrated in 1976 from England to Colorado Springs where he served until recently as an International Vice President of The Navigators. He is now their International Consultant. His interest in history has focused locally on the ownership and development of the Glen Eyrie estate.


Notes

1. Text by “H. H.” in an essay on Colorado Scenery in James Johonnot, Comp., A Geographical Reader (New York: Appleton and Company, 1882), 375-382; see also “A Symphony in Yellow and Red,” The Atlantic Monthly, vol. 36, December 1875, 670. 2�� . Including the 3,780 acres of the Douglas, Lansing and North Ranches; See Description of Glen Eyrie and adjoining Ranches for Auction on August 25, 1927, by Joseph Day of New York City, 15 pages, Navigator Archives, Colorado Springs, Colo. 3�� . North Glen Eyrie was entered through a narrow cleft in the rocks, with rustic gate, dynamited in the 1950s. See earlier photo in Archie Musick, Musick Medley (Colorado Springs: Creative Press 1971), 21. 4�� . Purchased by John Blair in 1875 and given by him the name Blair Athol (sic) from the town near the Duke of Atholl’s Blair Castle close to Blair’s birthplace. Sold as “160 acres suitable for an estate equal to Glen Eyrie” in 1891 for $10,000, to General Palmer. For a description of Blair Athol, see James �� Johonnot, A Geographical Reader, 379-382. 5. Karla Nelson Balk, “The Ecology and Vegetation of Glen Eyrie” (M.B.S. thesis, University of Colorado at Colorado Springs, 1992). 6. Out West, June 27, 1872, 3; The article continues— “Glen Eyrie… is much more closed in than the Garden (of the Gods), and therefore more complete within itself; and it is also much richer in trees and shrubbery, the waters of Camp Creek, which flow through it, giving it a greater fertility. General Palmer…is supplementing its natural beauties by artistic embellishment.” 7�� . Grace Greenwood, “Notes of Travel,” New York Times, September 2, 1873. 8��. Helen Hunt Jackson, Bits of Travel at Home (Boston: Roberts Brothers, 1878), features enticing descriptions of Blair Athol and the Garden of the Gods. Her first husband Edward Hunt died in 1863 and Hunt married William Jackson in 1875. 9�� . Isabella Bird, A Lady’s Life in the Rocky Mountains, (New York: Putnum, 1893), 152. 10. Richard Gehling, “Ute Indian Encampments,” http://www. geocities.com/Heartland/Trail/8119/. 11�� . An important resource for Palmer’s life is, Len Froisland, General Palmer and Glen Eyrie, (Colorado Springs: The Navigators, 1995-96). 12�� . Chase Mellen, Sketches of Pioneer Life and Settlement of the Great West (New York: Unknown Binding, 1935), 15. “Wild flowers of brilliant color were to be found everywhere—painter’s brush, wild crocuses

MCGILCHRIST • 237 and peas, mariposa lilies, larkspur, blue bells and briar roses. In moist places near the creeks we would find the columbine, one of the loveliest flowers that grows. There were also sunflowers, black-eyed Susans and field daisies.” W. P. Mellen, Palmer’s father in law and father of Chase, became a director of the D&RG before his 1873 death. 13.�� Another challenge was plagues of Rocky Mountain Locusts which devoured almost all crops and persisted for three annual cycles, starting July 6, 1874. Often referred to as “grasshoppers,” the species became extinct in 1902. 14��. Garden of the Gods Master Plan (Colorado Springs: Park and Recreation Department, 1994) see Soil Analysis (Medium Conditions), 33; and Lynn Seymour Larsen, Soil Survey of El Paso County (U. S. Department of Agriculture, Soil Conservation Service, 1981), Alta Vista Quadrangle (Glen Eyrie) Map Unit 4 and Table 6. 15�� . The Panic of 1873 caused hardship for the D&RG. The Depression of 1873-79 lasted 65 months, the longest in America’s history. See, “Diagnosing Depression,” The Economist, January 7, 2009, http://www. cfo.com/article.cfm/12884589. The D&RG began to expand south again in 1876. Then, the war with the Santa Fe Railroad over access to Royal Gorge began in 1878, ending with the Treaty of Boston. The D&RG narrow-gauge mileage peaked in 1889 at 1,861 miles. 16�� . John S. Fisher, A Builder of the West (New York: Arno Press, 1981), letters from William J. Palmer to Queen Mellen of June 30 and December 9, 1869. 17.� Colorado Springs Gazette, August 3, 1878, 4. 18�� . Donald McGilchrist, Short Memoir on John Blair, 1997, (unpublished) largely based on excellent research by the Blair specialist Bill Dale of Sidney, British Columbia, who privately published the monograph John Blair 1820-1906 in 1996. Navigator Archives. 19��. Chicago Journal (1844-1929). Only a few isolated runs before the Great Fire are still available for citation. 20.�� Blair was undoubtedly influenced by A. J. Downing, A Treatise on the Theory and Practice of Landscape Gardening adapted to North America ,7th ed. (New York: Orange Judd Publishers, 1865), 51-60. Downing distinguishes in Landscape Gardening the Beautiful and the Picturesque, whereby the latter “aims at the production of outlines of a certain spirited irregularity, surfaces comparatively abrupt and broken, and growth of a somewhat wild and bold character.” 21�� . Blair was not alone in his Victorian earnestness; see for example, James Ackerman, The Moral Influence of Fruit Growing (Third Annual Report of the Colorado State Horticultural Society, Denver, Colorado: The Collier & Cleaveland Lith. Co., State Printers, 1886), 145-147.

238 • THE GARDENS OF GLEN EYRIE 22�� . See Plan and Photo of Blair’s Attraction in: Charles Birnbaum & Robin Karson, eds, Pioneers of American Landscape Design (New York: McGraw-Hill, 2000), 27-30; and a detailed article by Edgar Sanders, The Prairie Farmer, June 10, 1865. Blair probably interacted with Frederick Law Olmsted Sr., national secretary for the Sanitary Fairs and creator of New York’s Central Park. 23�� . Blair (1820-1906) and Henry W. Austin Sr. (1828-1899) and Frank Lloyd Wright (1867-1959) all lived in Oak Park, Illinois where Wright purchased a lot that Austin showed him, enchanted by the “tanglewood of all sorts of trees, shrubs and vines” that Blair had earlier shaped at the corner of Forest and Chicago Avenues. Here, Wright would place his home and studio. Blair, meanwhile, had also transformed the woodland around Austin’s own home. See Christopher Vernon’s article in Volume 29-2 of Wright Angles published by the Frank Lloyd Wright Preservation Trust. 24��. Out West, June 20, 1872. 25�� . The 1874 Report of the National Land Improvement Company contains the plat of the “Villa Sites, Mineral Springs and Pleasure Grounds” of Manitou, as laid out by John Blair, “forming a harmonious and ornamental park.” The accompanying announcement observes that Manitou “has proven itself as regards healthfulness, scenery and good society to be unsurpassed….” By then, 40 sites had been sold; Bell Papers Special Collections, Tutt Library, Colorado College, Colorado Springs, Colo. 26�� . The inscription facing this Bridge asserts that it was built by Blair ca. 1880 “on the original road to the Mesa Reservoirs and Blair’s Cabin. . . .” This seems anachronistic in that the reservoirs were not constructed until some twenty years later. 27.�� Palmer would undoubtedly have been familiar with William Robinson, The Wild Garden or the Naturalization and Natural Groupings of Hearty Exotic Plants (London: John Murray, 1870). Glen Eyrie expresses many of Robinson’s ideas. 28�� . Noted photographer William Henry Jackson took a series of photos of the Glen in 1883. His friend Thomas Moran, who had traveled with Jackson in the 1871 Hayden Survey party, executed various sketches of the Glen after visits in 1881 and 1892. He often traveled in a private car provided by Palmer’s D&RG Railroad. Source: Elwood Bonney Journal, Colorado Historical Society, 2000. See also Anne Morand, Thomas Moran: The Field Sketches 1886-1923 (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press for the Thomas Gilcrease Institute of American History and Art, Tulsa, 1996). 29�� . Marjory is the spelling in Palmer’s Will and on her tombstone, although some have preferred Marjorie.

MCGILCHRIST • 239 30�� . Palmer very much enjoyed this breed. We have the names of at least a dozen of his Great Danes. 31�. Hamlin Garland, A Daughter of the Middle Border (New York: The MacMillan Company, 1921), 229; Hamlin’s reference to “the great stone mansion” is a premature memory, in that the Castle was finished in 1905. 32.�� June 4, 1921. See reprint on this flood in Colorado Springs Gazette Telegraph, June 7, 1992. Gravel accumulated 18 inches deep around the gate . . . the fine trail up the Canyon to Eagle Lake was swept away . . . the large pond and rustic bridge at the Intake Dam was demolished . . . a similar rustic bridge spanning the pond between the School House and the Castle was destroyed. We also lost a series of rustic bowers, done in cedar, with arched wood like the one surviving precariously north of the Castle. Known as the Pueblo Flood. 33.�� May 10, 1947. “[C]omplete destruction of foot bridges... washing away of several acres of beautiful lawns, trees, four rock bridges, rock walls and fences, roads, reflecting pools . . . most of the gravel roads were completely washed away, leaving holes as deep as eight feet throughout the grounds. Thousands of tons of boulders and gravel had to be hauled away. Traffic throughout the property was impossible”—eye witness account by licensed appraiser Dan Hampton who now valued the property at only $100,000 salvage, prior to repairs. At maximum flow, water reached as high as the base of the Pink House. The State Engineer informed the then owner George Strake that he would be personally liable for any further break in the mountain dam. 34. April 29-30, 1999. Severe damage to Camp Creek filled the diversion dam with boulders, exposing water and utility lines and carving away the creek bank in many places. Sixty volunteers filled and placed 3,500 sand bags. Loss of around two dozen ponderosa pines. The Glen received at least 10″ of rain . . . the Creek expanded to 45 feet wide at some points. Basements flooded . . . main water line severed. 35�� . Donald McGilchrist, “Precipitation in Glen Eyrie,” (Unpublished manuscript, March 2000). 36.� Adjudication of the Priorities of Right to the Use of Water for Beneficial Purposes other than Irrigation, in and for Water District 10 of the State of Colorado, District Court Case 13801, decreed on February 8, 1954, 127 pages. 37.� Colorado Springs Gazette, March 30, 1879. 38�� . Fourteen of these eighteen reservoirs were fed directly or indirectly from the 1898 pipeline which drew from the Camp Creek

240 • THE GARDENS OF GLEN EYRIE catchment area estimated by Reid at 6,246 acres with a maximum elevation of 9,700 feet. Annual runoff from this drainage, Reid calculated, was around 1,666 acre feet or 543 million gallons. See Donald McGilchrist, “Glen Eyrie: Original Water System,” (Unpublished manuscript, May 1995), based on Reid’s Maps and especially on research by Dr. Curt Poulton, The Emergence of Appropriative Water Rights in Colorado Springs, Colorado, (Ph.D. thesis, University of Minnesota, 1989). 39. Reid was City Engineer during 1883-1898 and 1900. The fall from the intake in the Canyon to Mesa 3 is 63 feet and the main pipeline runs for 7,085 feet. 40�� . Phreatic (Greek phreata = well/cistern) earliest citation of this term in OED 3 is 1891. This partly porous ditch, made of tile, drained the entrance to the inner Glen between the Dakota Hogbacks. Capacity 4.18 cu. ft. per second. 41. In his 1913 report to executor George Krause, Reid estimated water use in grounds and gardens at 160 acre feet for the 40 acres under cultivation. Source: letters from Reid to Krause of February 12 and February 18, 1913. Navigator Archives. 42�� . After Palmer died, his executor George Krause worked at selling the property. In 1915, for example, we find him proposing to the City Council three schemes by which they might acquire the water rights from the estate; See Gazette Telegraph, August 10, 1915. Krause had been Palmer’s private secretary and became the President of the Colorado Springs Company. He died in 1950. 43�� . Archives of Colorado Springs Station at National Climatic Data Center, Asheville, N.C. 44�� . The early settlers, faced with such unfamiliar conditions, maintained an Experimental Garden beside the Antlers Hotel. See Chase Mellen, Sketches of Pioneer Life and Settlement of the Great West, 22. 45��. General Record of Operations, 1883. This describes maintenance and construction in the Glen, with the number of persons employed on each project. It is especially detailed on irrigation, water works and planting. Ms0252, Special Collections, Tutt Library. 46�� . Nor should we forget the native species of the Glen. A partial list of these was prepared in 1990 by Dorothy Donley, Chairman of the Kissing Camels Garden Club. 47.�� Source: Field List prepared by Scott Morton, July 1991. 48�� . From 1871, this 160 acres had included Walter Galloway’s claim to the Southeast Quarter of Section 34 in Township 13. Carol Kennis, “A Landscape Puzzle Solved,” The Annunciator, March 2003.

MCGILCHRIST • 241 49�� . Emily Johnson, The White House Ranch (Colorado Springs: O’Brien Printing and Lithographic Press, 1972), 11. 50�� . For a description of the District 35 School, see Harriet Seibel, A History of Colorado Springs Schools, District 11 (Colorado Springs: Century One Press, 1975). 51�� . Traces include a few broken tiles and the beehive incinerator beside the modern trail. 52�� . For Root Cellar, See, Carol Kennis, ”In Search of Root Cellars,” The Annunciator, Nov. 2002. 53�� . Hon. W. B. Felton’s article in The Denver Republican, March 19, 1909. Felton had served as President of the Colorado State Bureau of Horticulture in 1891. 54��. General Record of Operations, 1883, Special Collections, Tutt Library. 55�� . Identified in Notable Trees of Colorado Springs, (Colorado Springs Park and Recreation Dept. Forestry Div., 1997). 56�� . Source: Map of northern Teller County with history at Pikes Peak Library District, SCHMAP912.78858.M278H. 57�� . See Glen Eyrie Construction Costs Report, 1910 by van Diest. Navigator Archives. 58�� . First Report of the Park Commission of Colorado Springs, 1908. 59. The ISA was organized in 1897 and Palmer succeeded J. S. Morton to become their second President in 1902. He continued until his death. See Yearbook of U.S. Department of Agriculture 1908, 510. See also Palmer’s ISA connection in the History by Richard Campana, Emeritus Professor of Forest Pathology at the University of Maine, in the Froisland Collection; see also, ”General Palmer’s Interest in Arboriculture,” Arboriculture, April 1909. 60�� . Pinchot became the first chief of the US Forest Service in 1898 and founded the Society of American Foresters. He coined the phrase “conservation ethic.” 61�� . Edmond van Diest, “Some Recollections of General William J. Palmer and the Building of Glen Eyrie.” Lecture, 1942, held in the Navigator Archives, 15-16. 62�� . Letter from van Diest of December 16, 1905 to Dr. Hopkins in Washington, D.C., Special Collections, Tutt Library. 63�� . J. P. Brown, Practical Arboriculture (Chicago: Henneberry Press, 1906). 64�� . One is still in use by the Colorado Springs Parks & Recreation Department (1907 West House) contributing to the 185,000 annuals that the department grows.

242 • THE GARDENS OF GLEN EYRIE 65.�� Lord & Burnham were considered the foremost manufacturer of glass houses in the USA from 1860 until 1966. Their records are now held in the Library of the New York Botanical Garden. 66�� . Dr. James Gregg in Mary G. Slocum, ed., Tributes to the Late General William J. Palmer from His Fellow Citizens in Colorado Springs (Colorado Springs: Colorado College, 1909). 67. This was partially restored and rededicated in 1997 as the Rose Garden, containing many memorial roses, with new iron fencing to exclude the persistent deer and sheep. Palmer maintained a deer park in the Glen. 68�� . John Berry’s article in the 1907 Annual Report of the State Board of Horticulture in Colorado describes 45 species of rose as locally suitable. 69�� . Ginny Keifer, “Early Flower Gardening in the Pikes Peak Region,” West Word (Old Colorado City History Society), August 1999. 70.�� See Report on the Horticultural Society in the Colorado Springs Gazette, February 3, 1901. For additional context, also located in Special Collections, Tutt Library, Century Chest MS0349, Box 6, Folder 58. 71�� . However, she had the means. “I have 500 �� rose bushes and will put in as many more this year.” Source: Jewett’s Letter to the Lovers of Gardens, August 3, 1901. She lived at 1507 North Cascade. Century Chest, Special Collections, Tutt Library. 72.� Colorado Springs Gazette, August 24, 1907, 4. 73. Edmond C. van Diest Papers, Ms. 0233, Special Collections, Tutt Library. 74. Carl Fohn (1860-1943) emigrated from Germany. In 1909, he was honored as a life member of The Society of American Florists and Ornamental Horticulturalists. Palmer owned two hundred acres on the road to his mountain reservoir outside Woodland Park. This was used to prepare young trees and alpine flowers for the Glen. Fohn had a house on this estate to which he eventually retired. The property was called Glen Aspen and has been maintained for the last thirty years by Lee Pavlica, a distinguished architectural blacksmith, on behalf of the Leonard Johnsons (Sr. and Jr.) to whom Fohn bequeathed it. In January 2008, it passed to the Pikes Peak Council of the Boy Scouts of America. Lee Pavlica, interview by author, November 11, 2008, and conversation with Mike Caruthers, January 2009. 75�� . Expenses for the similar crew in the previous year 1907 amounted to $16,928 maintenance, $5,606 improvements, $1,354 supplies, $5,865 trees and plants = $29,753. Adjusted for inflation to the year 2007, using the Google Inflation Calculator, this amounts to $654,000.

MCGILCHRIST • 243 76�� . According to Edmond van Diest, Palmer’s construction engineer, the work on the Park peaked with more than 800 men and 400 teams employed; van Diest, “Some Recollections of General William J. Palmer and the Building of Glen Eyrie.” 77. Notes of interview with Dorothy Bertolotti by Rhoda Wilcox, examined by me at the Wilcox home on June 11, 1992. 78. See 1914 Prospectus. Helen was Queen Palmer’s half-sister. 79. �� Richard Gehling, “Plat of Garden City,” http://www.geocities. com/heartland/trail/8119/ 80.�� For an account of Fatty’s Place and Palmer’s attempts to purchase, see, Richard Gehling, http://www.geocities.com/ heartland/trail/8119/ 81�� . Fatty & Phoebe opened for business in 1892…with a curio shop in front and a beer hall in rear. Palmer paid $15,000 for the property and two retail stands across the road. See, The Pioneer Courier (Colorado Springs: El Paso County Pioneers’ Assn.), April 2003. 82.� Richard Gehling, http://www.geocities.com/heartland/ trail/8119/ 83.�� Perkins, owner of the Burlington Railroad, had purchased 240 acres of the Garden of the Gods in 1879, for $4,000. He died in 1907. His wife and children fulfilled his wishes by conveying his then 480 acres to the City of Colorado Springs in 1909. 84�� . Palmer Papers at Colorado Historical Society…letter of April 10, 1903 to McReynolds from Palmer, who permits himself to comment that President McKinley “has already a sufficient monument in Cuba and the Philippines, in the thirty odd thousand graves and the heritage of distress and disgrace resulting from his two causeless wars of invasion!” Letters reprinted in, Colorado Prospector, Vol. 17, No. 4, July 1986. 85�� . Letter of April 1, 1911 to Konrad Meier who had worked with van Diest on equipping the Power Plant. By 1913, with the estate still unsold, Mayor McKesson suggested to the Secretary of the Interior that the Glen would make a summer home for the U.S. President, see Colorado Springs Gazette, August 29, 1913, 5. Incidentally, the Glen was used for a 1915 silent movie directed by Romaine Fielding entitled The Eagle’s Nest: no copies extant. 86�� . The 1916 brochure for the Glen Eyrie Companies (the vehicle for the Syndicate) refers to “over 100 miles of horse-back trails, skillfully constructed,” Navigator Archives. Palmer had trailside rocks painted white for night riding (Wilcox). Some of these trails had electric gates, operated without dismounting by inserting a card in a slot; see Jim Albertson, “Electric Gates on Horse Trails of Glen Eyrie,”

244 • THE GARDENS OF GLEN EYRIE (unpublished manuscript), Navigator Archives, 1992. Batteries were regularly replaced by Palmer’s crew using a horse-drawn sled. The entrance gates to the Glen were also electrically operated. DC Current had come to the Glen in 1882. 87��. Colorado Springs Gazette, January 25, 1917, and various descriptive advertising materials and sketches. The set of ten colored postcards of the grounds is attractive. Though the Syndicate did open a tavern and a tea room in the Carriage House, no villa was built. The foundation of their sales office is visible in the central Glen. They also stocked the Mesa Reservoirs as fishing lakes, a move that was still causing a pungent aroma from fish in the pipeline in the 1950s. 88�� . Sunny Wright, Verses on Glen Eyrie and the Castle, (Denver, Smith-Brooks Press), 1924. 89�� . Lilian Whiting, The Land of Enchantment: From Pikes Peak to the Pacific (Boston, Mass.: Little, Brown and Company, 1906). Lilian warmed to Colorado Springs—“On the basis of temperance, education and morality the town is founded. It is laid out with generous ideas and with unfailing allegiance to municipal ideals of taste.” 90�� . See July 1917 plan by American Park Builders, Navigator Archives. 91�� . See July 23, 1921, report on Alex Cochran Estate, by Charles E. Thomas, architect, Navigator Archives. 92.�� George Burghard, Interview by author, January 13, 1992. 93.�� Burghard Floral still exists at 2312 North Wahsatch Avenue under the ownership of John Lendenmann who has photographs of the wholesale buildings. According to George Burghard (January 13, 1992), Cochran maintained that the greenhouses were the only part of his property that paid its way. 94��. Cochran had inherited great wealth in the form of the Alexander Smith & Sons Carpet Company of Yonkers. His estate amounted to more than $130 million. He was a noted yachtsman and philanthropist. 95�� . The 3 Volumes of The Strake Years at Glen Eyrie compiled by Forrest Graham in 1997 and largely based on George W. Strake Jr.’s Papers, with accompanying narrative, are an invaluable resource for this period. The Navigators also hold an 8mm amateur color film (22 minutes) showing the luxuriant flower terrace and the chrysanthemums and poinsettias of the greenhouses, as late as 1940. 96.�� For The Navigators, raising the $300,000 to purchase Glen Eyrie was a huge challenge…more than their annual budget in 1953. Founder, Dawson Trotman, wrote in his Bible—“Lord, if you entrust this all to us, I want to dedicate it now…to be used for your glory, to make known your holy name in all the world.” See Betty Lee Skinner,

MCGILCHRIST • 245 Daws: The Story of Dawson Trotman, Founder of the Navigators, (Grand Rapids: Zondervan Pub. House, 1974), 347. 97�� . John S. Fisher, A Builder of the West: The Life of General William Jackson Palmer, 309; However, there was a nascent environmental enthusiasm. I cite Hamlin Garland’s appeal in his 1901 reflection on The Mystery of the Mountains—“I plead for the preservation of the forests and cry out against the desecration of the crystal streams. Let me emphasize the inestimable value of beauty here in your splendid Colorado, so essential, so far-reaching in its effect upon the lower lands…let me beg of you to offer sternest opposition henceforth to all wanton destruction of things beautiful. Be harshly forbidding to all who pollute the streams, deface the rock or needlessly assault the earth.” Century Chest, Special Collections, Tutt Library. 98�� . William J. Palmer, Century Chest, Special Collections, Tutt Library. 99�� . Frequent storms caused damage. In summer 1903, a large tree near the Castle and Major Domo (unique rock formation) were both struck. Two men were killed. After prolonged correspondence with the most noted electrical experts of the day, Palmer chose a solution that has well protected the Castle. In part, it involved climbing Major Domo to affix a conducting wire. 100�� . Donald McGilchrist, “Description of The Power House,” (Unpublished manuscript, 1993). 101�� . On a broader canvas, we find Palmer investigating electric power for the D&RG Railroad, in order to eliminate smoke in urban settings: Letter from van Diest of February 16, 1906, to Arnold in New York. He also advocated, on aesthetic grounds, that electric transmission lines be buried rather than strung from poles. See Century Chest Transcription 2. 102.�� Wm. J. Palmer, Volume B…van Diest, February 6, 1905-May 12, 1906, MS233, box 79, Special Collections, Tutt Library. 103. The promotional postcards of the Glen issued by the Oklahoma Syndicate in 1917 confirm that the rustic and arboreal style pioneered by John Blair had been well maintained. 104.�� Hon. W. B. Felton in the Denver Republican, March 19, 1909. 105�� . Transcript from The Diary of Dorothy Comyns Carr 1902-03, courtesy of Starsmore Center for Local History, Colorado Springs Pioneer Museum.; also see William C. Holmes, “An English Lady At Glen Eyrie: The 1902-03 Diary of Dorothy Comyns Carr,” Cheyenne Mountain Kiva, Vol. 4, No. 2, Spring 2000, 3-11. 106. John S. Fisher, A Builder of the West, 296.

William Jackson Palmer voiced strong opinions against jingoism— extreme patriotism and aggressive foreign policy. This 1899 political cartoon, titled “Lest we forget,” shows a robust, confident Uncle Sam and standing behind him, in his shadow, is a thin and tattered Uncle Sam. “Lest we forget” is the refrain in Rudyard Kipling’s 1897 poem, Recessional, published during the peak of the British Empire. The poem cautions that reckless empires are fragile and ephemeral. In 1899, the U.S. emerged from the Spanish American war as a quasi-imperial power. Homer Davenport, the cartoonist, may be cautioning the U.S. to be mindful of the dangers of imperialist ambitions. From the Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division Washington, D.C.

General William J. Palmer, Anti-Imperialist, 1895-19051 George L. Anderson NOTE: This was the address before the Annual Meeting of the Colorado State Historical Society, December 12, 1944. Dr. Anderson was Associate Professor of History at Colorado College, Colorado Springs. This chapter is reprinted with only minor format and spelling revisions to the original version. State and local history constitute the major interests of a state historical society. That is as it should be. Local history has sufficient interest and intrinsic value to justify the support of the state. It is more intimately related to the people of a community. It affords greater opportunity to the person for whom historical research is a hobby or an avocation. It provides the safest and the soundest approach to general history because the historian must first understand the local and specific phases of a problem before one can hope to understand it in its broader ramifications. In any case students of history have discovered that the study of an apparently isolated, local subject frequently leads into wider fields of historical research or sheds new light upon some general subject. The attitude of General William J. Palmer toward the foreign policies of the United States during the late 1890s is a case in point. He gave wide circulation to his views, not only in this country but in England as well. He openly challenged or warmly commended the views expressed by others. He maintained his position with complete consistency for at least ten years; taking the same position when Spain was the chief foreign country involved as he had taken when England had been the country under fire. The fact that he was numbered among a small minority did not seem to disturb him. He was willing to be a dissenter and a non-conformist, to stand up and be counted in order to register his protest against American interference in the domestic affairs of other nations.2 • 247 •

248 • ANTI-IMPERIALIST

There is no evidence that General Palmer had a political or economic interest in either the Venezuelan boundary dispute of 1895-1896, or the Cuban rebellion and the Spanish-American war which followed it. He was at the time a successful businessman, about sixty years of age, possessed of mature capacities for thought and expression and experienced in the methods and techniques of war and propaganda. Two Colorado Springs newspapers did accuse him of being pro-English on the occasion of the Venezuelan boundary dispute, but neither one produced evidence to substantiate their allegations and General Palmer’s reply to one of them is at least as convincing as the charges. One editor went so far as to state that Palmer was an Englishman and that his opposition to the government of the United States in the Venezuelan matter was to be expected.3 It may be conceded that his frequent trips to England and the prominence of English capital in his business interests might have colored his views when England was under attack,4 but a similar bias cannot be premised when it was Spain that was involved. His stand in each case was taken upon the same ground: that there was no justification for interference by the United States in the internal affairs of another nation. Before presenting Palmer’s views in greater detail it will be helpful to refer briefly to the confused domestic and international conditions that formed the background of the specific events under discussion. In 1895 Grover Cleveland was nearing the end of his second term as president. His policies were under attack not only from the opposition party, but from the western wing of his own party. Populism was on the march, labor difficulties were occurring with alarming frequency, trade relations particularly with continental Europe were not satisfactory, the free coinage of silver at the ratio of sixteen to one was the theme song of millions in the West. It was a period characterized by a rising tide of nationalism and of nationalistic history writing. A nation growing to maturity was looking beyond its immediate frontiers to broader theaters of activity. The nation did not lack men to express and to stimulate the growth of the desire for expansion. It was the day of yellow journalism, jingoism, and expansionism.

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The international scene was even more confused and chaotic. The European nations seemed on the verge of springing at each other’s throats. Germany was on the make and becoming more aggressive. Russia and England were at swords’ points; the French were viewing the English activities in Egypt with undisguised hostility. The Turks were massacring Armenians, the Spanish were experiencing frequent changes in their government, the Irish were still discontented, and the Japanese victory over China was upsetting the balance in the Far East. The relations between Great Britain and the United States during the 1890s are of particular interest. A well-defined movement in favor of a formal Anglo-American alliance was being nursed along on both sides of the Atlantic. The arguments on behalf of such a development ranged all the way from simple ones based upon expediency to highly complex ones based upon the concept of Anglo-Saxon superiority. The trend toward such an alliance seems to have been most pronounced just at the time that the Venezuelan boundary question was brought so abruptly into the limelight.5 But the talk of an AngloAmerican alliance should not obscure the fact that there were many sources of friction in the relations of the two countries. The Alaskan boundary question had not been settled. The seal fisheries question was still hanging fire. Many Americans had become suspicious of the manner in which Great Britain had handled its indemnity claim against Nicaragua during the early part of 1895. The Clayton-Bulwer treaty was becoming more and more obnoxious to the United States and there were many Americans who felt that if it could not be abrogated this country should proceed to the construction of an isthmian canal under its own auspices and control. Moreover the British were disputing the possession of the island of Trinidad with Brazil and the Falkland Islands with Argentina.6 It was into the midst of this extremely complex pattern of international relations that Secretary of State Richard Olney launched the claim that the Monroe Doctrine gave the United States the right to intervene in the boundary dispute between Great Britain and Venezuela. This subject has been studied in such great detail by historians that a mere outline of the facts


will be sufficient.7 The dispute dated back to 1814, when Great Britain acquired British Guiana from the Netherlands. No boundary line had ever been agreed upon either prior to 1814 or after that date. Half-hearted attempts were made to reach an agreement on several different occasions. In 1840 a surveyor under the auspices of the British located a line, but Venezuela refused to accept it until several decades later. By that time the British had changed their minds. Both Great Britain and Venezuela suggested arbitrations at various times, but never at the same time. In 1887 Venezuela broke off diplomatic relations. Almost coincidentally gold was discovered in the contested area, the British apparently enlarged their claim, and Venezuela granted concessions to American mining companies.8 There is more than a little reason to believe that as the nineteenth century was drawing to a close Venezuela was determined to embroil the United States in the controversy in spite of the fact that on at least five occasions prior to 1865, and at least as many more after that date, the United States had refused to invoke the Monroe Doctrine in support of Venezuela and against European intervention.9 Then on July 20, 1895, Secretary Olney communicated his famous message to Lord Salisbury claiming the right of the United States to intervene in order to secure a settlement of the matter. He rested his case upon an expanded interpretation of the Monroe Doctrine and expressed it in unnecessarily offensive language. The British reply was not received in this country until after Congress had assembled in December—a move that many Americans interpreted as a studied attempt on the part of Lord Salisbury to belittle the United States.10 In a special message to Congress following the receipt of Salisbury’s reply, which denied the applicability of the Monroe Doctrine to the Venezuelan dispute, President Cleveland asked Congress to authorize the appointment of a boundary commission to ascertain the facts and in effect threatened to resort to war if Great Britain did not accept the findings of the commission. The motives of President Cleveland and Secretary of State Olney in pressing for the settlement of a question that had been hanging fire for more than three-quarters of a century are not

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entirely clear. There were those who said that Grover Cleveland had third term ambitions. Others asserted that it was a counterirritant designed to divert the attention and wrath of the farmers and workers of the country from domestic problems to foreign affairs until the election of 1896 had rendered the nation safe from Populism. One of the correspondents of General Palmer attributed the whole affair to President Cleveland’s “early unacquainted-ness,” which had postponed his knowledge of certain questions until late in life, and like grown people with children’s diseases, he took his newly found doctrines seriously. “Thus . . . he discovered the Monroe Doctrine with the aid of a corporation counsel and advocate. The idea took like an infection and he erupted a message whose rashness was like adult measles.”11 Another explanation that has been offered is that President Cleveland was afraid if the problem remained unsettled it would lead to war between Great Britain and Venezuela and that Congress would insist upon involving the United States in the war.12 A qualified version of this view is contained in a letter to General Palmer from Boston. The writer summarized the views of the Collector of Customs at Boston, Mr. Warren, to the effect that Cleveland was worried lest the brusqueness and impracticability of Salisbury and Chamberlain would arouse such a jingoistic spirit in Congress and among politicians generally as to form a prominent feature in the presidential campaign that was just around the corner and thus “become very harmful to the country.” It was further suggested that the President had taken the matter into his own hands and away from Congress in order to manage it to a final, peaceful end. A marginal note in General Palmer’s handwriting says, “The 3rd time that this report has reached me in the last six weeks from entirely different sources—all very close to the President.”13 One feature of the explanation of Cleveland’s action in terms of political motivation is particularly interesting. The President, like General Palmer, had been accused of being too friendly to the English, a serious liability not only among the IrishAmericans, but also among the free silverites of the western states.14 Cleveland’s devotion to the gold standard, of which


Britain, so the argument ran, was the principal beneficiary, was rapidly losing him the support of western members of his party. The Venezuelan affair might have been viewed as a fine opportunity to capitalize on western antipathy toward the British without making even the smallest concession to western leaders on the money issue. The action of British investors in selling American securities when the war scare was at its height, thus causing notable declines in values and in some instances causing failures among American business houses, was all that was necessary to convince some western editors that the gold-mad Britons were plotting the dismemberment of an American republic for the purpose of monopolizing a new source of the yellow metal.15 There is no evidence that President Cleveland precipitated the Venezuelan question for the purpose of winning support for the administration among western silverites, but it did have that effect. For a time it seemed that he would be successful in appropriating the thunder of the Republican imperialists and in silencing the western critics in his own party—no mean political achievement.16 The reasons for the policy of President Cleveland did not interest General Palmer. His attitude was simply that the points at issue did not concern, hence did not involve, the United States. An early statement of his point of view was contained in a paper read by him before the Mahogany Club of Colorado Springs, in December 1895. Although the paper was printed and widely circularized a copy of it has not come to the attention of the writer, but the Evening Telegraph in criticizing and answering the arguments contained in it gave a measure of publicity to its contents. Specifically, it accused Palmer of ridiculing a cardinal tenet of our foreign policy as expressed in the Monroe Doctrine; of suggesting that the Monroe Doctrine was untenable and inapplicable to the Venezuelan situation; of asserting that the President and Congress were mad; of declaring that the country was unprepared for war; and of out-heroding Herod by asserting that the Monroe Doctrine was of academic interest only after Lord Salisbury had admitted its general validity.17

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In a reply published in the Evening Telegraph the following day, General Palmer did not deny any of these allegations, but pointed out that if Lord Salisbury had accepted the Monroe Doctrine there was no need for “a great popular upheaval to maintain it.” Moreover the only question at issue was its applicability in a particular case and not the maintenance in letter and in spirit at whatever cost of a great historic policy. The statement by President Cleveland that “any adjustment of her boundary which Venezuela may deem for her advantage and may enter into of her own free will, cannot of course be objected to by the United States;” was answered by General Palmer in the following words: Now if this business be not a boundary dispute in good faith, but as the President believes, a disguise under which Great Britain is attempting to extend her possessions in America, what right has he to permit Venezuela to swap or sell out, should the “quid pro quo” be tempting enough to her? Does not this conception of the Monroe Doctrine relegate “a great national policy” to the dimensions of a question of propriety of sympathy and aid to Venezuela in a quarrel with England? Under this precedent could not Spain sell Cuba, and Mexico part with Lower California or Sonora, to any European power, without protest from us? But poor American though I be, I may say that such transactions would not be altogether acceptable to me—however far President Cleveland or the Evening Telegraph, which you say “stands with him” might feel bound to concede it. Evidently this Monroe Doctrine requires still further explanation. Would it not on the whole be simpler to trust to no shibboleth, but rest calmly on our conscious strength; and standing “four square to all the winds that blow,” put down our foot only when our interests are really menaced?


Under date of December 22, 1895, General Palmer caused to be printed and also to be put in circulation a petition some two pages in length of which he was apparently the author and principal sponsor. Its first paragraph disapproves of the “Venezuelan message of the President and the precipitate action of Congress thereon.” A number of reasons are given for assuming this position: there was no danger to the United States from the encroachment of European powers on this continent; there was no likelihood that such expansion would be attempted or desired by England or any other country; and there was no way of applying the Monroe Doctrine to the Venezuelan boundary dispute except by straining it. After an expression of regret that England had refused arbitration and a statement that in the opinion of the signers the resources of diplomacy had not been exhausted, the petition continues: They [the signers] think the President having thus invented a grievance, that he and Congress have united, by throwing down the gauntlet and breathing defiance to a country with which we were at peace, to treat the issue in an arbitrary manner, that has, perhaps, no sanction in any previous behavior of a self-respecting country towards a friendly one. . . Finally they believe that there could be no greater crime against civilization than to provoke a war between the United States and England on an issue of such trifling importance to our honor and welfare. The letters which General Palmer received in response to the widespread distribution of his paper and petition shed further light on his views. A friend in Colorado Springs wrote him: I return the enclosure, saying only that swayed by personal friendship I should remain silent, but in view of the public interest, my feeble voice concurs with its condemnation of the Administration and of Congress in this Venezuelan affair. It were best to throw the “Monroe Doctrine” to the “moles and bats” as the old missionary

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hymn proposes for the idols of the heathen if it puts on this country the duty and right now claimed.18 Assurances came from New York City that “all thoughtful and unprovincial people in the East” shared his views;19 and that nearly all who came to the University Club in New York City felt as he did.20 From the other side of the continent came a similar letter which contained a very specific and faithful restatement of Palmer’s views. It reads in part, I think your arguments dispose of the Monroe Doctrine as an actuality. It is obsolete. I thoroughly agree with the first paragraph on page eight which states the case in a nutshell. Each crisis to be treated on its own merits is the proper rule—it is sufficient for all time—it involves us in no quarrels—commits us to nothing—and gives no handle to the ambitious, the unscrupulous or the stupid—as you justly point out.21 A conspicuous example of lack of agreement with General Palmer on the part of one of his correspondents is contained in a letter which he received from A. B. Garner, an officer of his Civil War regiment and a resident for many years of the territory in dispute between Great Britain and Venezuela. Garner confessed that his sympathies were with Venezuela, but the phase of the controversy that interested him most was the fact that the English government had denied a “reasonable and courteous request of the American government oft-repeated, for a friendly and independent arbitration of the question at issue, and that the English premier in the exercise of his duty has deemed it advisable to decline the request in a curt and offensive manner.”22 General Palmer defended Great Britain against charges that it had enlarged the area claimed and then answered the main argument as follows: You think Great Britain has denied a reasonable and courteous request to arbitrate. And so Spain, I imagine, will deny the “good offices” which our Senate has just


proposed to offer to her to help her get rid of Cuba. The question at issue, I think in each case is the propriety of our interference. You refer to Lord Salisbury’s “curt and offensive manner” in declining that request. . . but I have not been able to discover it in his actual correspondence.23 In a letter written on the same day to Oscar S. Strauss, Palmer commented on an article by Strauss in the February 1896, Forum, saying that the defense of President Cleveland was “forcible and compact.” He concluded in a prophetic vein, “The Cuban interference seems to be merely a logical following. In fact, we seem to be making ourselves a common nuisance among the nations.”24 An indirect approach to the views of General Palmer on the Monroe Doctrine lies in his reaction to the speech delivered in the Senate of the United States by Senator Edward 0. Wolcott on January 22, 1896. The occasion for the speech was the introduction of the Davis Resolutions, which would have given formal congressional approval to the Monroe Doctrine. On the day following the delivery of the speech General Palmer sent Senator Wolcott a congratulatory telegram and a few days later he wrote a letter expressing his commendation more fully. Amidst all of the inferiority and cowardice which prevail out here and throughout the land, your brave stand is as bracing as a mountain breeze, and your eloquent words make one once more proud to be an American and a Coloradan. I almost envy you the exultation you must feel at being able to tilt your lance straight in the face of all the low mindedness and vulgar anglo-phobia. Few have ever had a finer chance and fewer could have utilized it more nobly.25 In a letter to another correspondent, General Palmer remarked that he had seen only one Colorado newspaper that had expressed approval of Senator Wolcott’s stand.26 The

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newspaper was in all likelihood the Manitou Springs Journal, Palmer’s own newspaper.27 A file of this paper does not seem to be extant, but a clipping from the issue of January 30, 1896, is filed with the Palmer letters. After commending Senator Wolcott for the views expressed in his speech to the Senate, the writer asserted: The fuss made about the Monroe Doctrine is the variest jingoism that has engrossed Congress for quite a spell. The doctrine itself has no defense in law or equity, precedent or philosophy. . . The United States has really no more right to meddle in Venezuelan boundary affairs than it has to meddle in the boundary of the Kingdom of Heaven. The views expressed by Senator Wolcott which received the approbation of General Palmer were to the effect that the Monroe Doctrine had never been recognized by any other country nor formally approved by the Congress of the United States; that it had been misapplied in the controversy between Great Britain and Venezuela; that it was not intended to form the foundation for the establishment of republican forms of government in this hemisphere; that it was not directed at monarchies, but only at forcible extension of the program of the Holy Alliance, and that it was a doctrine of self-defense developed in a period when the United States was weak and actually menaced. The speech also called attention to the incendiary character of the ClevelandOlney messages, to the part played by the British in winning independence for Venezuela, to the historical background and interpretation of the Monroe Doctrine, to the presence of despotic forms of government in Latin America and to the glorious possibilities of Anglo-American cooperation.28 During the spring of 1896, General Palmer took a trip to California and while there he hastened to write a letter to Edward M. Shepard, one of his attorneys in New York, who, it must be said, disagreed with him on almost every point. After expressing the hope that the Venezuela question would not be settled before he could get the letter to him, General Palmer


summarized and restated his convictions. He hoped that the dispute would not be settled in any manner that would seem “to justify or palliate our interference in the boundary quarrel.” Of the actions of the American people and press, he said: I confess that the history of the past four months has made me profoundly ashamed of my country, and it is not diminished by reading such thoughtful, judicious and experienced papers of state as that of President Diaz on the Monroe Question. I should think its perusal would have caused the cheek of our President and that of Mr. Olney to tingle with shame. . . I can feel no sense of pride at being treated with more respect in tone because of the President’s assertion of our “enormous power” provided we were wrong. . . Hence it all comes back to the question of whether we had any right to interpose with our insults, our threats, and our commission. It is we Americans who are to suffer shame, and permanent havoc, from the crime or mistake if we made one: the arousal of brag and bluster and the jingo spirit to torment us as a nation for long years. I have not considered or cared for the effect on England from the beginning. It is our own interests and our honor that I believe have been uselessly jeopardized by this interference. Right away it led on to the further atrocity of the attack upon Spain.29 General Palmer must have known when he wrote this letter that the sequence of events could be interpreted to justify the intervention of the United States. Some time during January 1896, the war scare began to subside.30 It was accompanied by a change in tone in the English press, by a much less bellicose position on the part of President Cleveland and by a much more conciliatory attitude on the part of Lord Salisbury. Prominent men who had important connections on both sides of the Atlantic began to smooth the way for an understanding. Venezuela was squeezed out of the question. The boundary commission received every possible courtesy at the hands of the English government. A treaty was negotiated and ratified,

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and arbitration took place which resulted in the English obtaining the greater portion of the area in dispute. All was settled apparently to the satisfaction of all concerned by 1899. One important reason for the shift in sentiment in the United States in favor of a peaceful settlement with England was the rise to prominence of the Cuban question. There is reason to believe that this diversion of attention was not wholly accidental. The imperialists in the Republican party who had felt it necessary to support President Cleveland when he espoused one of their favorite principles so vigorously were shocked at the well-nigh universal character of public support given to him. If the Democratic leaders were to be prevented from capitalizing on this public support at the ensuing election it would be necessary to rattle the sword loudly enough to drown them out. It would be necessary to discover an international situation that could be exploited to such good advantage as to place Republicans at the head of the procession instead of Cleveland.31 The Armenian massacres by the Turks were explored tentatively, but they were too remote. There was a problem nearer at hand that contained explosive possibilities—the Cuban question.32 Cuban juntas had been busy preparing the way.33 Cleveland had not given them much encouragement. He had not appropriated the political fruits of the episode as he had in the Venezuelan question. Whether deliberately promoted or not, the Cuban question served the same purpose in diverting the American people from the sins of the English to the bloody deeds of the Spanish that the Krueger telegram had performed in diverting the attention of the English from the Americans to the Germans. Cuba replaced Venezuela in the headlines and the leadership of the movement passed from Cleveland and Olney to Lodge, Roosevelt, Foraker, Proctor and Thurston. This was precisely the development that General Palmer had feared. In several letters he expressed the opinion that the behavior of the people of the United States in the Cuban question was a logical outgrowth of their behavior in the Venezuelan boundary dispute. On one occasion he declared that, “Bryan with his vealy confidence in his country being able to make a


thing right because it does it, is to my mind a legitimate child of President Cleveland and Secretary Olney in their Venezuelan homilies about the ‘healing effect of popular self-government for all nations.’”34 This view expressed by General Palmer at the time of the controversy coincides with the conclusion reached by the most recent biographer of President Cleveland that the worst consequences of the President’s policy lay in “two waves of feeling which swept the country—a primary wave of warlike enthusiasm, followed by a secondary and vaguer wave of imperialist sentiment.”35 The concern manifested by General Palmer in 1896, lest the Venezuelan controversy lead to further interference in the domestic affairs of other countries, foreshadowed his condemnation of the policy that the United States took toward Spain in 1897-1898. The first complete presentation of his point of view was again in a paper prepared for delivery before the Mahogany Club of Colorado Springs, on December 8, 1897. The opening paragraph of the paper, which is in reality an answer to an article by Hannis Taylor in the North American Review,36 keynotes his whole attitude. In it he says, “What I think our behavior should be toward the nation of which Cuba is a part, is simply the behavior we asked of European countries when the U.S. was in similar straits—that they should leave us alone.” General Palmer, feeling himself to be on surer ground with respect to the Cuban question, possibly because he could not be accused of being a Spaniard at heart but more likely because of his actual military experience in similar situations, constantly compared the civil war raging in Cuba with the Civil War of the United States in 1861-1865—the one in which he had fought on the side of the Union. Spain in 1895-1898 was in the same position as the United States in 1861-1865 fighting for nationality and unity. The United States in 1895-1898 was playing the role that Great Britain had played in 1861-1865; Cuba and the Confederate states were comparable. Canovas was the man of “blood and iron” instead of Lincoln and Stanton. Establishing his whole argument on this type of comparison, General Palmer took all of the arguments advanced by the interventionists— economic, social, political, humanitarian and racial—and answered them either with quotations from the English press

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during the Civil War or with instances taken from his own experiences in that war. He insisted that the people of the United States give to Spain the right to preserve its unity and nationality that America had demanded of Europe only thirtyfive years earlier. He concluded this phase of his argument with the comment: And so the wise man comes to the conclusion that even as regards the welfare of the discordant family and certainly of his own, the simple fact that it is a family, whose members are of like blood, history, instincts, characteristics, education, etc., renders it almost certain that however badly they may be getting along together, it is nevertheless better as it is, than for a stranger to step in and take sides and become responsible for the future of either fragment. The second portion of the paper begins, “But it is in justice to ourselves, more even than to another and friendly nationality that I object to our interference.” Then he lists the following reasons why the United States should not meddle in the domestic affairs of Spain: the racial problem was sufficiently complex because of an unsolved Negro problem, the exclusion of the Chinese, and the agitation for more stringent immigration laws, without introducing another discordant element; the democratic institutions of the United States were already endangered by attempting to stretch them over too wide a surface and too discordant human elements; the United States ought not to assist in the dismemberment of Spain if it was not ready to annex or to establish a protectorate over Cuba; the republican form of government was not necessarily the best for all peoples; the free play of national vanity was doing grave injury to the United States by distracting attention from serious domestic problems; the purposes for which the government of the United States was established did not include the use of national resources and credit for the promotion of political experiments in other lands; and the usual excuses for interference were lacking and intervention would certainly lead to war.


The sinking of the U.S.S. Maine and the investigation that followed produced a voluminous three-cornered correspondence between General Palmer, George Foster Peabody, and Edward M. Shepard. The last named was an ardent supporter of the policy of the interventionists bringing to bear all of the familiar arguments: it was a case of preventing war and not making war; inasmuch as war was already in existence in Cuba, it was the duty of the United States to intervene to terminate it; and Spain would welcome a bloodless war with the United States because it would assist Spain in solving domestic problems. Even the familiar example of a great bully beating a small boy while a large, powerful man walks indifferently by was pressed into service.37 General Palmer and George Foster Peabody found themselves in substantial agreement on the fundamental issues, but Palmer was much more severe in his condemnation of the American people generally and the “hysterical Senators” in particular. With respect to the Maine disaster, General Palmer insisted that the proper and decent thing to do was to accept the Spanish disclaimers at full value and wait for a final decision from the investigating commission before taking any definite action. But, he continued, the attitude of the American people generally amounted to saying to Spain: “We don’t believe your disavowals and expressions of sympathy are genuine and we are going to be ready to jump on you if our divers show that you have lied.”38 A few weeks later a fuller statement of this general point of view was sent to his friend. After paying his respects to the “jingoes” and the “yellow journals” Palmer asserted: But the “calm and self-restrained classes” pretty generally declared in effect that if our divers should discover and the Commission report, that notwithstanding Spain’s disclaimers and sympathy, it were found that she had been lying about it, war ought to be declared, and that, even if nothing should be discovered to indicate that Spain had committed the deed, she must be ordered to pay a big indemnity or have war. The absurdity of

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a country paying a huge indemnity to avoid war and then risk being at once told that she must still give up a portion of her territory or fight seemed to strike but few minds. Mostly they were too “calm” to notice that detail, I think.39 The report of newspaper correspondents and of American consuls and the speeches of American senators who had made quick trips to Cuba were discounted by General Palmer because they were derived almost wholly from Cuban rebel sources. He did not accept the atrocity stories that emanated from Cuba and asserted that he could match them all with similar stories from the activities of Union armies during the Civil War of the United States.40 In any event he did not feel that waging war upon Spain would be the quickest and simplest way of getting food and medical supplies to the starving non-combatants in Cuba.41 The one thing that rendered General Palmer almost inarticulate was the nearly universal practice among the American people of praising their composure, their moderation, and their self-restraint in not rushing immediately into war. The praise showered on President McKinley for not plunging the nation into war immediately called forth the following expression of disgust, “Did they take him for a driveling idiot so mad and hot that he could not even wait until his ammunition was at hand.” This last was an indirect reference to the presidential request made prior to the report of the Maine Commission for an appropriation of $50,000,000 to provide for the defense of the Atlantic coastline. Palmer asserted that the request and the act of Congress granting it in the face of the Spanish disavowals was a deliberate attempt to “bullyrag” Spain into declaring war upon the United States. “Since,” he continued, “there is not a man, woman, or child in the United States that believes Spain would attack us if we let her alone, and, but for the Maine incident there was no more occasion for ‘defending’ our coasts than before.”42 The reasons for the conduct of the American people, which he condemned so vigorously, received some attention from General Palmer. On this subject he wrote:


The absence of strong neighbors and of the wholesome social friction resulting there from and the ignorance of other people and consequent inability to imagine their views and to put themselves in their places—a general low order of education (largely by means of newspapers) and perhaps neglected family discipline accompanied by the belief that we are the most wonderfully enlightened and superior people in the world and that we have a form of government which every country in the world should imitate—these are the convictions, I think, which cause all of this vulgar insolence and make a thoughtful man hang his head with shame.43 The fact that the English newspapers and public leaders were supporting the American stand in the Cuban question neither consoled nor impressed him. “I utterly reject such approval. It is one of the lamentable results we have brought on ourselves by our bullyragging of England about her boundary line—the greater difficulty of getting honest, impartial criticism.”44 The position taken by General Palmer was not that of the absolute opponent of war. He did not object to “talk of war” if it was a question of being forced to defend the United States, but he asserted repeatedly that no thinking person could imagine Spain attacking the United States in spite of all of the provocations that the U.S. had given Spain. He frequently compared the behavior of the American people with what he asserted would have been the behavior of the people of any European nation, instancing in particular the Germans and the English. On this last point he wrote: I cannot imagine such dreadful manners as we have manifested through Senators and Congressmen’s talk, political leaders, newspapers all over the country and innumerable interviews of people thought to have weight in this Maine affair. And if it were so manifest I venture to say that they wouldn’t simultaneously brag of their wonderful moderation, composure and reserve. I think they would have waited until the divers

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had come up anyway. No—I am disgusted and feel as though I had been dreaming a nightmare located in the slums.45 General Palmer took some comfort in his conclusion that if Abraham Lincoln were dealing with the situation he would not have been guilty of “breaking into Spain’s house for any reason given anywhere and certainly not in the interests of humanity.”46 With the help of some of his friends, General Palmer took concrete steps to forestall the coming of war with Spain. He wrote letters of approbation to Senators Wolcott and Elkins for their attempts to introduce reason and justice into the acts of the Senate. To the latter he wrote: Your views are those which I have held from the beginning—ever since our own Civil War in fact—and I have been amazed that they have not been more generally held by public men and editors. . . I applaud your efforts to bring reason and justice to bear in this hysterical moment and wish I could have more hope for their success.47 Palmer also prepared, circulated, and wired the following petition to President McKinley: We earnestly hope that in behalf of justice, humanity, and of our permanent national welfare the United States will continue to refrain from hostile intervention in Cuba. A false step at this time may bring war, and it is possible for victory by begetting a willingness to interfere in the affairs of other nations, to produce results that might be worse than defeat. We deplore the unfortunate suffering in Cuba, but would not have our country invite the risk of calamities much more shocking to human sympathy, or assume any responsibility for the doubtful future of a SpanishAmerican Republic.


It is not peace at any price that we advocate, but what we consider the truest patriotism, and the best interests of humanity. Although on two distinct occasions in less than five years General Palmer had stood with the small minority that had unsuccessfully tried to stem the flood tide of American imperialism, he maintained his point of view unchanged as late as 1905. In that year, in response to a letter from his brotherin-law praising President Theodore Roosevelt’s foreign policy and the beneficent rule of the United States in the Philippines, he condemned the whole administration policy including Roosevelt’s intervention in the Russo-Japanese war. The postscript to the letter suggests his attitude. Instead of “conceding the swashbuckler a little credit” and therefore being pleased, I sincerely regret his connection with anything and everything that tends by its “good company” to extend his influence in preaching and practicing the heresies I have referred to—believing that they are vastly more harmful to this country in the long run than those of George the Third, Calhoun, or Jefferson Davis.48 Thus General Palmer indicted three consecutive presidents with meddling in the affairs of other countries. He had remarked on an earlier occasion that, “They all seem tarred with the same stick—McKinley, Cleveland and the lot, and seem incapable of putting themselves in any other nation’s place—in other words of understanding international manners.” While thus indicting the presidents, General Palmer seemed to be pleading with the American people to do two things with dignity and decency: to refrain from interfering in the internal affairs of other countries, and to extend to the peoples of other countries the same rights that they as Americans claimed for themselves. If the former impresses some people as being isolationism pure and simple, the latter may be viewed as realistic internationalism.

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George L. Anderson (1905-1971) taught history at the University of Kansas, Lawrence, from 1943 until his retirement in 1968. Anderson authored and edited numerous books and articles, including: General William J. Palmer: A Decade of Colorado Railroad Building, 1870-1880, (1936); General William Jackson Palmer: Man of Vision (1960); and Four Essays on Railroads in Kansas and Colorado (1971).

Notes

1. This was the address before the Annual Meeting of the State Historical Society, December 12, 1944. Dr. Anderson was Associate Professor of History at Colorado College, Colorado Springs. 2. The present paper is based almost wholly upon a small file of Palmer Correspondence in the possession of Coburn Library, Colorado College. Its purpose is to present the point of view of General Palmer toward certain events and not to analyze the events. 3. El Paso County Democrat (Colorado Springs). December 28, 1895. 4. For a statement of this point of view see the Colorado Springs Evening Telegraph, December 23, 1895. 5. Jennie A. Sloan, “Anglo-American Relations and the Venezuelan Boundary Dispute,” Hispanic American Historical Review, XVIII (1938), 486-506. 6. The Chicago Record used these and other illustrations to support its allegation that Britain was a habitual aggressor and a chronic land-grabber. Quoted in the El Paso County Democrat, January 4, 1896. 7. Some readily available accounts are: Thomas A. Bailey, A Diplomatic History of the American People (New York, 1941), 477493; Samuel Flagg Bemis, A Diplomatic History of the United States (New York, 1936), 415-422; P. R. Fossum, “The Anglo-Venezuelan Boundary Controversy,” Hispanic American Historical Review. VIII (1928), 299-329; John H. Latane and David W. Wainhouse, A History of American Foreign Policy (New York, 1940), 479-488; Allan Nevins, Grover Cleveland: A Study in Courage (New York, 1932), 630-648; Dexter Perkins, Hands Off: A History of the Monroe Doctrine (Boston, 1941), 171-191; J. Fred Rippy, Latin America in World Politics (New York, 1938), 114-121; J. Fred Rippy, The Caribbean Danger Zone (New York, 1940). 24-29; William S.

268 • ANTI-IMPERIALIST Robertson, Hispanic American Relations with the United States (New York, 1923) 105-112; and Richard W. Van Alstyne, American Diplomacy in Action (Stanford University, 1944), 203-212. 8. El Paso County Democrat, October 26, 1895; The Nation emphasized the involvement of American mining; interests, January 2 and 16, 1896, 5-6, 44. Thomas F. Bayard, American ambassador to Great Britain, called President Cleveland’s attention to the fact that, “Speculators in the United States have thrust their soiled hands into the business and sought to embroil the United States in sustaining their corrupt practices.” Bayard to Cleveland, February 12, 1896. Allan Nevins (editor), Letters of Grover Cleveland, 1850-1908 (New York, 1933), 429. 9. William H. Gray, “American Diplomacy in Venezuela, 18351865,” Hispanic American Historical Review, XX (1940), 574. British sources interpreted the Venezuelan Revolution of 1896, as an attempt to sharpen the conflict between the United States and Great Britain. Noted in the El Paso County Democrat, January 11, 1896. The Venezuelan efforts to drag the United States into the controversy were noted and severely criticized by John Bassett Moore, the distinguished student of international law. Robert McElroy, Grover Cleveland: the Man and the Statesman, 2 volumes (New York, 1923), II, 184-185. 10. The Nation, December 12, 1895, 417. 11. Unidentified correspondent to William J. Palmer from New York, February 5,1896. In a letter to Thomas F. Bayard, December 29, 1896. President Cleveland confessed to an earlier lack of interest in and understanding of the Monroe Doctrine. Nevins, Letters, 417. 12. McElroy, op. cit., II, 177. Nevins, Grover Cleveland, 640. 13. Unidentified correspondent from Boston, February 25, 1896. The writer continued, “That was Mr. Warren’s theory and I find others have a similar idea. I replied that if true it was still playing with fire, but while he did not exactly say so I suppose the adherents of this theory would claim that the results now apparently reached justify the step.” 14. President Cleveland thought that the record of his administration in trying to stem the tide of “jingoism” merited some concession from the British in the Venezuela matter. Letter to Thomas F. Bayard, December 29, 1895. Nevins, Letters, 419. 15. El Paso County Democrat, December 21, 1896. The tie-up between the silver issue and the Monroe Doctrine is suggested in Van Alstyne, op. cit., 209.

ANDERSON • 269 16. Another plausible explanation for the abrupt approach of Cleveland and Olney is that the Monroe Doctrine was invoked in the Venezuela question where a good moral case could be found and where American interests were not directly involved so that the United States might avert coming to blows with Great Britain on the canal issue in which its position was not so strong. Sloan, op. cit., 491. Among the motives listed by Professor J. Fred Rippy are: 1. Cleveland and his advisers viewed with suspicion and disapproval the policies of the European nations in all parts of the world; 2. a feeling that Great Britain was expanding at the expense of Venezuela; 3. a firm attitude toward Great Britain would be calculated to evoke popular applause and improve the electoral prospects of the Democratic Party; 4. the ardent nationalism of Cleveland and Olney; 5. the prestige of the United States would be enhanced by successfully defying the British; 6. it was a safe time to defy Great Britain since she feared an attack by Russia upon India. The Caribbean Danger Zone, 25-26. 17. Colorado Springs Evening Telegraph, December 23, 1895. 18. C. L. Tracy, a friend of President Cleveland, to William J. Palmer. December 24, 1895. 19. Unidentified correspondent from New York City, to William J. Palmer, February 6, 1896. 20. W. W. Nevin from New York City to William J. Palmer, January 3, 1896. 21. Edward S, Holden, Lick Observatory, University of California, to General Palmer, March 4, 1896. 22. A. B. Garner, from Newark, N. J., to General Palmer, February 27, 1896. 23. General William J. Palmer to A. B. Garner from New York, March 2, 1896. 24. General William J. Palmer to Oscar S. Strauss from New York, March 2, 1896. The February Forum contained three articles on the controversy: Theodore S. Woolsey, “The President’s Monroe Doctrine,” Oscar S. Strauss, “Lord Salisbury and the Monroe Doctrine,” and Isaac L. Pike, “The Duty of Congress.” (February, 1896), 705-732. 25. General William J. Palmer to Senator Edward O. Wolcott, January 28, 1896. 26. General William J. Palmer to a Mr. Gorham, February 14, 1896. The El Paso County Democrat condemned Wolcott and called him a Tory. January 25, 1896.

270 • ANTI-IMPERIALIST 27. John S. Fisher, A Builder of the West: The Life of General William Jackson Palmer (Caldwell, Idaho: Caxton Printers, 1939), 300-301. 28. Congressional Record, January 22, 1896, Vol. 28, p. 856 ff. 29. General William J. Palmer to Edward M. Shepard from Santa Barbara, California, May 5, 1896. The message referred to was one delivered by President Porfirio Diaz on the opening of the Mexican Congress, April 1, 1896. The portion which relates to the Monroe Doctrine can be found in Alejandro Alvarez, The Monroe Doctrine (New York, 1924), 185-187. 30. Many �� reasons have been given for the sudden shift in sentiment both in the United States and in England. The telegram of Kaiser Wilhelm II to the leader of the Boers, Paul Krueger, was indicative of rising Anglo-German tension and had a profound effect upon public opinion in England. If it was not decisive in causing a change in English opinion at least it served to convince the English that their major interests were in South Africa and not in South America. A recent writer suggests that the Krueger telegram did not influence the English decision in the Venezuela case, but no supporting evidence is included in the account. Van Alstyne, op. cit., 211. On the other hand, Professor J. Fred Rippy asserts categorically that the Krueger telegram had a decisive effect. Caribbean Danger Zone, 28. In a letter to President Cleveland, Ambassador Thomas F. Bayard, writing from London on January 29, 1896, expressed the view that the Jameson Raid, and its aftermath had a very close relation to the Venezuela question. Nevins, Letters, 427. 31. The Davis Resolutions were interpreted by one Democratic paper as a Republican attempt to push Cleveland into the background. El Paso County Democrat, February 8, 1896. 32. Clipping from the New York Evening Post, March 2, 1896, in the Palmer file. 33 � George W. Auxier, “The Propaganda Activities of the Cuban Junta in Precipitating the Spanish-American War, 18951898,” Hispanic American Historical Review, XIX, 286-305. 34. General William J. Palmer to George Foster Peabody, October 14, 1896. 35. Nevins, Cleveland, 641. 36. Hannis Taylor, “A Review of the Cuban Question In Its Economic, Political and Diplomatic Aspects,” North American Review (November, 1897), 610-635. 37. Edward M. Shepard to George Foster Peabody, March 23, 1898.

ANDERSON • 271 38. General William J. Palmer to George Foster Peabody, March 7, 1898. 39. General William J. Palmer to George Foster Peabody, March 27, 1898. 40. General �� William J. Palmer to Senator Stephen B. Elkins of West Virginia, March 25, 1898. Palmer said in part, “We were quite as downright inhuman, if you please, at times in treating non-combatants in bushwhacking sections of the South during our war. . . ” 41. General William J. Palmer to George Foster Peabody, March 27, 1898. 42. Marginal note addressed to G. F. P., March 27, 1898, contained on a letter from Edward M. Shepard to George Foster Peabody March 21, 1898. The same ground is covered in another letter by Palmer to Peabody of even date. 43. General William J. Palmer to George Foster Peabody, March 13, 1898. A similar point of view was expressed in a letter of March 5, 1898, addressed to Senator Wolcott in which reference was made to “those callow minds who think our political experience warrants our overturning every other form of government in this hemisphere and ramming ours down their throats.” 44. General William J. Palmer to George Foster Peabody March 27, 1898, contained on a letter from Edward M. Shepard, March 21, 1898. J. Y. Sargent writing; to General Palmer from England on May 31 1898, did not think that the professions of love and brotherhood of the English for the Americans were at all genuine. The same writer in an earlier letter, May 17, 1898, had said, “However humiliating to an Englishman, I am forced to think that the fear of a European combination against England has driven our diplomatists to try and curry favor with the people of the United States so as to pave the way for an alliance with a mob who hate us, whose aims are entirely different from ours, and who by this time must despise us.” 45. General William J. Palmer to George Foster Peabody, March 13, 1898. 46. General William J. Palmer to George Foster Peabody, March 27. 1898. 47. General William J. Palmer to Senator Stephen B. Elkins, from New York. March 25, 1898. 48. General William J. Palmer to Chase Mellen, September 8, 1905.

Elsie Palmer Myers with William J. Palmer in a wheelchair holding his granddaughter, Elsie Queen. Courtesy of Starsmore Center for Local History at the Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum.

William Jackson Palmer: Living While Dying Chris Nicholl At the end of nine weeks the patient [William Jackson Palmer] was up daily, taken out in a wheel chair, and very soon was lifted into his automobile and was taking long rides. During the following year he often drove for five or six hours a day, with no apparent fatigue, was taken to a number of social functions in his own and adjoining towns, and took keen, active interest in all affairs of life. Mentally, he was extremely active, at times giving close application to business affairs for six or seven hours a day. He frequently remarked that he had never been able to turn off so much work or to give so much time to the enjoyment of his friends. Dr. Will Swan1 One can imagine the difficulty William Jackson Palmer confronted in reconciling his sudden paralysis with his previous vital physicality. Although regarded as a prudent and thoughtful man, Palmer had in fact lived his life with a reckless, joyful abandon: galloping over difficult terrain astride his favorite horses, spying on enemy forces, riding atop moving carriages to take in the inspiring splendor of nature, courting and marrying the love of his life, hiking and running the hills and valleys of Glen Eyrie, building the American West and a castle. Following his paralyzing riding-accident of October 28, 1906, Palmer’s physician, Will Swan, recalled “there were a number of periods of great physical weakness and mental dullness, but . . . these responded to medicines.”2 Swan’s observations of the brief time Palmer remained bed-ridden, coupled with the rapid recovery of his mental acuity reveal much about Palmer—the man. His love of life, his thrill in the sublimity of nature, and his attention to detail in all that he did are the embodiments of the • 273 •

274 • LIVING WHILE DYING

concept of “living in the present moment.” And it is that rare characteristic, possessed by a privileged few, that allowed William Jackson Palmer to live fully and imaginatively throughout his lifetime, even in his final years, when held captive in an all but helpless body. As a youthful railway surveyor, Palmer outlined his philosophy of a well-lived life in a letter, If you were here to day, we would obtain a pair of surefooted but fine-spirited mountain horses, and ride . . . about 8 miles . . . to enjoy the vistas. . . . Man has to go to the mountains for health and he must go there likewise, if he would get a true insight into things.3 A decade later, when appraising the Colorado region that he would claim for his home, Palmer described a moonlit ride that illustrated his relish for life, lived in awe of the natural world. Arranging his blankets atop the coach, he had “slept soundly in the fresh keen air until awakened perhaps by the round moon . . . I found the magnificent Pike’s Peak towering immediately above.” Enthralled by the “splendid panorama of the mountains,” Palmer “sat up and drank in along with the draughts of pure air the full exhilaration of that early morning ride.”4 Perhaps a decade later, Palmer’s oldest daughter Elsie recalled precious hours with her father that so wonderfully define his ability to “live in the moment.” We spent hours lying in the soft grasses among the rocks of north Glen Eyrie . . . Our mood was a very happy one; we sang, we made up rhymes about the stealing of these hours that should have been spent in town. . . . In the evenings we generally read aloud, and often a talk would begin that lasted until very late. At these times he would spread about him a very delightful sense of leisure. Never, not even at his busiest, a slave of time, in moments of relaxation he had—in an extraordinary degree—the gift of enjoying the passing hour and of making others enjoy it.”5

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Illuminating his kinetic energy, Palmer’s visits to his family in England were, [A] great event, eagerly awaited, though his coming, with all his restless, vivid energy and activity, disorganized . . . While he was there, there was a bustle of coming and going—a breath of electric Colorado air in the calm English days; there were the business talks, the rides, the meals delayed, the catholic crowding of guests; there were the jokes, the games of “circus” with the little girls; there were the walks, on summer mornings or in the winter darkness when he stared up at the stars while his children led him along the muddy English lanes. There were journeys abroad—a walking tour in Switzerland, a trip to Italy.6 Following his wife, Queen’s death, the Palmer daughters’ lives were transformed by their father’s vitality. Elsie’s memory of that period, when the girls came to live in Colorado, is an intimate snap shot of her father’s powerful presence and of his passion for reveling in every moment, My father’s energy swept us along; he was eager for us to share all his outdoor pursuits. First of all, there was his run before breakfast—a fixed habit, which was not the one we took to most kindly. . . . followed by a long, leisurely breakfast in the course of which many stories were told and many books of reference consulted. . . . Then there would be hours spent by him in the den, and at last, when all the business was finished, no matter how late it might be, there would be a walk with us children and the dogs. . . . Frequently, too, there were riding expeditions when we all went up into the mountains to spend the whole day.7 An avid horseman, Palmer was oblivious to the potential risk to himself or others. Elsie recalled dangerous riding escapades: trips on narrow, steep trails when her “father would ride ahead quite unconscious of the terror that would occasionally seize


his daughter.” 8 Among Elsie’s cherished memories was one of her father lifting her up “on the saddle in front of him,” an exciting but perilous adventure for her as a small child. Once the horse stumbled, sending father and daughter “rolling over into the dry bed of the creek. By some miracle [they] escaped unhurt.”9 A visitor to Glen Eyrie witnessed a similar episode, “In the afternoon . . . I rode with General Palmer. His horse reared & fell over backwards with him & he was thrown but luckily not hurt.”10 According to Jesse Bass, the Glen Eyrie horse trainer, although “an expert horseman,” Palmer’s jaunty riding style, combined with his exuberant appreciation of the western landscape ostensibly contributed to his eventual “needless” accident. Also an expert horseman, Bass warned Palmer “not to ride these trails loose-legged, but to grip the horse tightly with his knees.” And he often cautioned Palmer of the unexpected hazards of western trails, “an unseen hole, a falling rock, a coiled snake. All the Cavalry riding in the world could not prepare or insure anyone against such things.” Palmer’s habit of standing in the stirrups, the better to point out “the beautiful scenery to his guests,” was a constant worry for his trainer.11 Palmer’s friend, Francis Wolcott, posited another source for his accident: he “rode every day one of the two spirited horses used by him in the last year of the Civil War. They were old in point of years and fairly unmanageable in spirit.”12 On the day following his funeral, a news account described his careless enthusiasm for riding that verged on recklessness. He was a great rider and lover of horses. Every day he took at least one ride, and usually two, and always rode at a gallop. He was a splendid rider. He never seemed to take risks into consideration. It was this lack of fear, bordering onto recklessness, that led to his death. It was on one of those daring rides that his horse stumbled and threw him over his head. It was an accident that might have befallen him many times before.13 Perhaps it was not rashness alone but a feeling of immortality arising from his superb physical conditioning that fueled

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Jesse Bass, horse trainer for William J. Palmer. His sole job was the care and training of the two stallions that were the mainstay of Palmer’s famous breeding herd, “The Moor” and “Forest King.” A gentle, soft-spoken trainer, Bass never raised his voice nor struck an animal with a quirt. Photo ca. 1905. From Special Collections, Pikes Peak Library District.

Palmer’s high spirited riding. A friend recalled his vitality even recovering from a serious bout of influenza, General Palmer was ill. . . . Never have I seen an illness cause such utter confusion. No wonder. The mainspring of Glen Eyrie ill. . . . In 1906 no anti-bodies. One just had to get well by plain strength. . . . [After ten days] General Palmer was still weak but his weakness was equal to an ordinary man’s daily health!14 But despite his near superhuman vigor, the peculiar circumstances on the day of his final accident left him a quadriplegic—whether resulting from an unruly horse, a startling hazard, or Palmer’s dangerous riding style or his distraction on the trail. With all of those various factors


considered, the riding fall and Palmer’s subsequent paralysis take on an air of inevitability. Much changed after that disaster. Throughout his life, he had controlled his environment, whether commanding troops, developing the West, reining in horses, or crafting a day’s social calendar. One acquaintance observed, “I am sure General Palmer ruled his family with a rod of iron. He made plans for each day and everybody in the household fell in line. But they all adored him so he must have been a charming tyrant.”15 Another recalled that hosting a camping trip he “was always the regimental commander. Everything . . . proceeded by military routine, prearranged and exact. . . . [He] issued orders as if we were a troop of cavalry on special exploring detail.”16

William J. Palmer enjoyed the attention of his nurses, family and dogs, even when confined to his bed. Courtesy of Starsmore Center for Local History at the Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum.

With his paralysis came loss of control, over his life, his body, and his day-to-day functioning. Reacting to his heartbreaking and permanent paralysis, Palmer, a renowned breeder, who housed his prized horses in a pristine barn and covered them with golden trimmed red blankets, was said to have ordered

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that the horse be shot. Accounts vary as to why. Francis Wolcott recorded that it suffered a broken leg and was shot to relieve its misery. Jesse Bass reported a different story that, if true, offers insight into Palmer’s post-accident psychological trauma. Bass claimed that contrary to his “normally kind way of doing things,” and perhaps “out of frustration, pain, and helplessness,” Palmer ordered his stable manager “to destroy the horse.”17 Francis Wolcott compassionately described Palmer’s altered circumstance, He who had spent his life in acquiring rights of way for railways, inveighed against the unlicensed freedom of motors which could go where they would without let or hindrance. But in those terrible years when he faced pain and inaction, his only excitement was to lie prone in a motor driven at breakneck speed.18 Indeed, the ever-practical Palmer, accustomed to seeking health and a better perspective in the mountains, swiftly came to terms with his paralysis. He shifted from horse to motor transportation.19 Within four months of his injury, a specially equipped car was manufactured. Revealing his social prominence in eastern circles as well as in Colorado, the New York Times published the following account, An electric surrey, with a reclining chair in place of the customary rear seat, has just been constructed for Gen. William J. Palmer, a well-known horseman of the city, but who is now living in Colorado Springs, where he has been recovering from a serious accident last Summer, when he was thrown from his horse, severely injuring his neck. . . . Always fond of open-air exercises, Gen. Palmer has been anxious to obtain an easy riding carriage, in which he would be free from all vibration and jar. An electric vehicle . . . especially constructed for ease and convenience in riding has just been ordered . . . The car will have an extension leather top, and a large reclining chair will be fitted in the rear. The carriage will be shipped in a few days to Colorado Springs.20


In acquiring that car, Palmer reclaimed a level of control. Colorado City resident, Lillian Burnham Morrison, recalled meeting Palmer in 1907. Dashing to the street to call for help in extinguishing a house fire she accidentally started, Palmer arrived first. Seeing the problems, he instructed the distraught woman to “stay right there” and then sped away, notifying fire fighters. Morrison’s memoir offers a wonderfully rich portrayal of Palmer’s genuine and personal concern for others. [T]he first automobile I’d ever seen was coming up the street . . . they stopped, and it was General Palmer. . . . I didn’t know who he was, of course . . . He had had his accident, and he had this peculiar thing built for a seat, was all rubberized. And so he just sort of half leaned back in the car. But for ten days, he came everyday then would send the chauffeur up to see how I was getting along. And he brought me books, and things . . . every once in awhile . . . he would telephone me after that. So, I felt we were very good friends. He certainly was [a kind person] . . . to take all that trouble. . . . as long as he lived . . . he’d have his gardeners bring flowers [to plant in] my garden.21 Stories of Palmer’s exploits while a quadriplegic are, as in his healthier days, the stuff of legend. With limited charge capacity, the electric car allowed only short trips. Glen Eyrie Martin, Palmer’s driver recalled that he “always wanted to drive into the hills . . . wanted to see everything” so he purchased a more powerful car, a Stanley Steamer, that let him “go anywhere and do anything.” A large, showy, white car, with red leather interior, the steam-driven auto was outfitted to accommodate Palmer and a bevy of nurses and other intrepid travelers. Revealing the degree of his helplessness as well as his adaptability to unchangeable destiny, the once vital man was handled as though an infant. To prepare for an outing, two servants hauled Palmer through the castle in a sling-like blanket, transferred him to a wheeled stretcher or chair, then propelled him to the auto. Finally, his body was lifted and fitted into “a case made for the car. . . . a sort of seat,

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just like a spoon case, made out of hair and feathers, and it just fitted the general.” With the ever curious Palmer settled, his party embarked “on extended cruises . . . to Austin Bluffs, the Garden of the Gods, to the Cave of the Winds, to Manitou Park . . . even to a circus—requiring a section of seats to bought for the entire day and removed to accommodate Palmer’s touring car. Determined to see the circus no matter the cost or bother, Palmer was pleased to buy the extra seats, purchasing for himself and his entourage entry to the matinee show, and offering the evening spaces to his staff and friends.22 Florenz Ordelheide, a servant at Glen Eyrie, recalled Palmer’s occasional stubborn or even childish demands. But that employee as well as Palmer’s friend, Percy Hagerman, agreed that although suffering constant pain, Palmer was congenial and “easy to get along with.”23 As much as possible, Palmer continued living his normal, exuberant lifestyle.24 Hagerman spoke of Palmer’s resilience, when he was for two years confined to his bed or a wheel chair with a broken neck, he used quite often to ask me to go over and talk with him. No one ever saw greater courage under pain and adversity than he displayed. He was a fine and very genial host and gave wonderful parties at the Glen Eyrie castle.25 Prior to his accident, Palmer’s lavish house and garden parties were legendary and his paralysis hardly interfered with his social calendar. By one account, on every Saturday afternoon from November 1906 to June 1907, Palmer diverted himself by hosting the pupils from the many regional schools: elementary, secondary, Sunday schools and Colorado College. Their host provided transportation, entertainments—including music and movies, and served refreshments and “made the occasion one long to be remembered by all participants.”26 Some fifty years after her visit, a woman recalled the delightful experience of meeting Palmer and her description of his home illuminates the exquisite beauty in which Palmer surrounded himself,


[I]n the front parlor . . . the most beautiful room that I had ever seen, done in mahogany and white striped satin, with its bay window looking out through leaded panes upon the wild scene; and within, all lined with boxes of blooming lilies-of-the valley, sat the General in dressing gown in his wheel chair.27 On a blustery January day in 1907, the students and staff of the Colorado School for the Deaf and the Blind enjoyed a specially organized day at Glen Eyrie. Some twenty-seven carriages, provided by Palmer, transported the party. What an adventure that was for the children. Some unable to see and others hearing impaired, they experienced sensory loaded tours of the green house with its vast variety of flowers. They visited the stables, encountering Palmer’s numerous horses and they met dogs of many breeds. They were introduced to an especially significant dog, the mother of “Rab,” given by Palmer to the school’s superintendent when it was a puppy. But the best part was visiting with Palmer in his castle with its unrivaled array of amusements and bountiful treats. We entered the recreation room where we left our hats and overcoats, and then went up stairs to enjoy the entertainment of the library where General Palmer and [Miss] Palmer met . . . and entertained [us] with music, moving pictures, and other forms of diversion which made the afternoon pass quickly. In the evening [we] were conveyed home in the Palmer carriages. Before we left . . . there was a dainty luncheon served . . . The table was very long and loaded with refreshments. . . . We cannot give you more particulars of the good time we had, but we enjoyed our patron’s hospitality to the full.28 In August 1907, Palmer threw a $50,000 party in honor of the thirty-fifth reunion of his own Fifteenth Pennsylvania Cavalry Regiment. Nearly two hundred eighty aging veterans arrived in Colorado Springs at Palmer’s invitation. Their generous host paid all expenses, from the time the men left home until their

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return—equivalent to roughly $1.1 million in present value. For nine days, the old soldiers were feted, paraded, wined and dined. Glen Martin described a well-stocked room in which there was “champagne and liquor stacked clear up to the ceiling.”29 Although typically reticent to the point of reclusiveness, Palmer, perched in his steamer, served as the parade Marshal, Through solid phalanxes of cheering spectators . . . General Palmer, in his automobile, led his old comrades . . . Never before in the history of Colorado has there been such a demonstration of popular sentiment, amounting almost to worship, as was exhibited by the thousands of spectators who packed the streets and vied with each other in doing honor to the first citizen of Colorado and his brave old heroes of the civil war. The progress of the parade through the cheering crowds seemed like the triumphal procession of a monarch, but in it all was the genuine sentiment of honor for the grand man who founded the city and for the brave men who followed him with the devotion of old soldiers for a beloved commander. . . . the wide street was jammed with the most enthusiastic crowd ever seen in this city, and, in spite of the ever-increasing downpour of rain, [they] stuck to their places and greeted the general with showers of bouquets and shouts of welcome.30 Palmer hosted his annual holiday parties, for his household staff, for his valued friends in Colorado Springs, and for the city’s youngsters. The 1908 children’s party “was one of wonder and lights.” Palmer, sitting propped up by pillows, personally handed the children their gifts and “made sure nothing was omitted for the children’s pleasure.”31 Daughter Elsie’s wedding was celebrated at Glen Eyrie in January 1908, and in June 1908, Palmer embarked on a tour of Western Europe accompanied by an entourage of doctors, nurses, assorted servants and family members. En route home, it was his curious nature that perhaps led to his ultimate physical decline and death. In typical Palmer style, he wanted to see everything. He insisted


on seeing the oceanscape from the ship’s upper deck. When being transported, Palmer suffered an accidental head injury.32 Although his condition deteriorated over the remaining months of his life, Palmer continued living his inimitable life. On New Year’s Day 1909, with three months of life remaining, a news article announced, “General William J. Palmer and daughter are receiving about two hundred and fifty girls of Colorado College at Glen Eyrie this afternoon. Invitations were extended to every girl in the college. The magnificent residence has been thrown open to the young women, and a banquet will be served late in the afternoon.”33 Hamlin Garland, the Pulitzer Prize winning author, recalled an August 1907 visit to Colorado Springs when he learned that his friend, Palmer was “a helpless cripple.” The news was “especially shocking” to Garland, for during his pre� vious visit Palmer had taken him “on a survey of his for� est, riding his horse like the trained cavalry leader that he was, erect, youthful, with straight thrust of legs and proud uplift of head. He had seemed in the prime of life, skilled and confident.”34 Elsie Palmer greeted the visiting author in the castle’s great hall and then, without warn� ing, Palmer emerged, “the big doors opened and two men appeared, pushing a long, Hamlin Garland often visited the Palmer family at Glen Eyrie, perhaps high, wheeled couch beside providing inspiration for his popular which walked two enormous novels. This illustration, by Charles wolfhounds.” Nearly speech� M. Reyea, appeared in Garland’s Her less in the presence of the once Mountain Lover, which was published vital man, Garland quickly in 1901 and contains many episodes within Colorado. Library of Congress learned that although Palmer Prints and Photographs Division.

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was in fact an invalid, he remained the commanding, ebullient man Garland known. Palmer declared that he was “not entirely helpless.” He could move his left hand and lift his head; then demonstrated by hand-feeding scraps of food to his devoted hounds. Revealing his “brave acceptance of defeat,” Palmer recognized the irony of his paralysis, relating that “after a life in the saddle, and while riding across an oat field, my horse stumbles, I am pitched to the ground, and here I lie!”35 Then transcending the predictable and forgivable despair of a once vital human changed into a “hopeless cripple,” Palmer announced he would escort his guest on an auto tour of his fields and show him the location of the tragic, paralyzing accident. He ordered his servants to prepare for the journey. Garland’s memoir of that amazing and entirely perilous last journey with Palmer is an eyewitness description of Palmer’s adjustment to his paralysis. It is a remarkable account of a “superman” of larger than life achievement, who once and briefly commanded all he surveyed. He was leveled in an instant of cosmic irony— in which the great are laid low, even those whose humbleness and humanity permeates their being. While the General’s command to prepare for the outing surprised Garland, the nonchalant acceptance of his orders signaled that such an extraordinary adventure was an ordinary event at Glen Eyrie. The road, located in a field, was little more than a deep gully with steep bends and dangerous ravines. Garland observed, the crippled man’s head bobbing about like a ball on a string . . . Whatever the pain of the passage had been he refused to display any sign of it. He possessed an unconquerable soul. . . . At the end of the ride he was able to return to his wheeled couch and have tea with me.36 As Hamlin Garland composed both fiction and non-fiction, it is tempting to suggest that his nearly unbelievable story of his perilous auto tour was composed with a fair measure of literary license. But other accounts support Garland’s. Florenz Ordelheide recorded that Palmer would demand outings in his


open-topped car, no matter the weather. “He might get an idea . . . in the winter-time when it was cold . . . he would insist to take . . . a ride.” Perched in his specially designed protective seat, Palmer sat higher than the windshield, and as Ordelheide remembered it, “He really got the benefit of the wind and the cold.”37 Until the day before his death Palmer ensured that every moment counted, he remained vitally alive, relishing the companionship of old friends, touring his estate in his car, and shaping the environment to his satisfaction, as described in a final news account: [T]wenty-four hours before he lapsed into unconsciousness, he braved the deep snow and the chilling winds that broke the record of thirty-five years, and took his old friend, Colonel D. C. Dodge of Denver, for an automobile ride. . . . Glen Eyrie was walled with snow three feet deep. . . . ‘we shall ride,’ he said . . . ‘But, general, that is impossible,’ remonstrated the man who had known him all those years through which they had struggled to help build an empire. . . . ‘Nonsense, we shall go,’ laughed the general . . . Men fell to from all sides, clearing the roads in the Glen. What at first seemed a physical impossibility soon shaped itself into the general’s requirement. Drifts were cut with shovels, plows were put to work, and in a short time [they] were making a circuit of the Glen . . . After returning to the castle he was in excellent spirits.38 William Jackson Palmer died on March 13, 1909. With no public fanfare, his body was cremated in Denver, the ashes returned to Colorado Springs for burial. On March 15, in homage to a great man, upwards of seven thousand mourners lined the funeral route from the Rio Grande Depot along Pikes Peak Avenue to Evergreen Cemetery. There the life and times of William Jackson Palmer were commemorated in a brief ceremony in which three Psalms and a prayer were recited.39 His burial place is marked with a small granite boulder, engraved with his name and dates. A description, by one who knew him in his prime and in his infirmity is the supreme eulogy for William

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Jackson Palmer, the man. “We saw him . . . in New York . . . after his horse stumbled . . . breaking his neck. He lived, but he was paralyzed, living the rest of his life on a stretcher. However, he was still General Palmer, vital, forceful, dynamic.”40

Notes

1.�� John J. Lipsey, “General Palmer’s Last Illness,” CU 39.103, Special Collections, Pikes Peak Library District. 2.�� Ibid.; Lipsey’s account of Palmer’s extravagant behavior following his crippling accident is based on the memory of Glen Eyrie Martin, named by his mother, who wanted a western name for the only one of her four children born in the West. According to Martin, who worked at Colorado Springs’ first auto dealer, Strangs Bicycle Shop, Palmer purchased an electric auto with the condition that a driver be provided. Martin drove the auto to Glen Eyrie where Palmer “installed him in a guest room at the castle.” According to Martin, Lipsey’s account, later published in The Westerner’s Brand Book, and Marshall Sprague’s, in his Newport in the Rockies, are inaccurate versions of his years with Palmer, although he did not specify the inaccuracies; see Glen E. Martin obituary, Colorado Springs Gazette and Telegraph, February 10, 1971. 3. William Palmer to �� Isaac H. Clothier, ed. Letters, 1853-1868, Gen’l Wm. J. Palmer (Philadelphia: privately printed, 1906), June 12, 1859. 4.�� Palmer letter to Queen, July 28, 1869, quoted in Colorado Springs Evening Gazette, March 13, 1909. 5.�� John S. Fisher. Builder of the West: the Life of General William Jackson Palmer (Caldwell Idaho: Caxton Printers, 1939), 285. 6.�� Ibid., 291. 7.�� Ibid., 285. 8.�� Ibid., 285. 9.�� Ibid., 232-234. 10.�� March 30, 1903, Dorothy Comyns Carr Diary, Nicholson/ Palmer Collection, Starsmore Center for Local History, Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum. 11.�� Dorothy Bass Spann, Black Pioneers (Colorado Springs : Little London Press, 1978). 12.�� Francis M. Wolcott, Heritage of Years; Kaleidoscopic Memories (New York: Minton, Blach & Co., 1932), 157. 13.�� “Something About Palmer, the man, as he was known to his friends,” Colorado Springs Evening Telegraph, March 13, 1909. 14.� Colorado Springs Free Press, June 3, 1959.

288 • LIVING WHILE DYING 15.�� Ibid. 16.�� Hamlin Garland, Companions on the Trail, (New York: The MacMillan Co., 1931), 84. 17.�� Wolcott, Heritage of Years, 157; Spann, Black Pioneers, neither Wolcott nor Bass were eyewitness to the event they chronicled. 18.�� Wolcott, Heritage of Years, 157. 19.�� Lipsey, “Last Illness.” 20.�� “Gen. Palmer’s Novel Electric Surrey,” New York Times, February 25, 1907. 21.�� Lillian Burnham Morrison Oral History 002, Box 1, folder 19, Special Collections Pikes Peak Library District. 22.�� Lipsey, “Last Illness.” 23.�� Florenz S. Ordelheide, Oral History IV, box 2, folder 16, Special Collections Pikes Peak Library District. 24.�� Spann, Black Pioneers. 25.�� Percy Hagerman, Colorado Springs Gazette and Telegraph, April 2, 1944. 26.�� “General Palmer’s Beautiful Country Place at Glen Eyrie,” Eagle County Blade, March 25, 1909. 27.�� Hattie Finlay Jones to Mrs. E. O. Nicholson, June 6, 1960, MS0335, Special Collections, Tutt Library, Colorado College, Colorado Springs, Colo. 28.�� Roy M. Stelle, “A Brief Historical Sketch of the Colorado School for the Deaf and the Blind,” CU 34.45 Special Collections, Pikes Peak Library District; quote from the Index, February 7, 1907. 29.� Colorado Springs Gazette, June 30, 1907, “Reunion will cost $50,000;” Lipsey, “Last Illness.” 30.� Colorado Springs Gazette, August 22, 1907. 31.�� Spann, Black Pioneers. 32.�� Lipsey, “Last Illness.” 33.� Colorado Springs Telegraph, January 1, 1909, quoted in The Colorado Prospector, April 1990. 34.�� Hamlin Garland, Companions on the Trail, 353-357. 35.�� Ibid. 36.�� Ibid. 37.�� Florenz S. Ordelheide, Oral History IV, box 2, folder 16, Special Collections Pikes Peak Library District. 38.� The Rocky Mountain News, March 15, 1909, quoted in The Colorado Prospector, April 1990. 39.�� The 15th, 24th, and 121st Psalms were read by family friend, Episcopal Reverend Arthur Taft. 40.� Colorado Springs Free Press, June 3, 1959.

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According to Jesse Bass, the Glen Eyrie horse trainer, although “an expert horseman,” Palmer’s jaunty riding style, combined with his exuberant appreciation of the western landscape ostensibly contributed to his eventual “needless” accident. Courtesy of Starsmore Center for Local History at the Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum.

This portrait of William Jackson Palmer, in his horseback-riding clothes and holding a riding crop, was painted by Bavaria-born Hubert von Herkomer in 1905. Herkomer lived a short time in the U.S. before opening an art school in Bushey, Hertfordshire, England, which closed in 1904. From Special Collections, Pikes Peak Library District.

General William Jackson Palmer’s Riding Accident, Palliative Care & Death, 1906 to 1909 Lynn A. Gilfillan-Morton On October 27, 1906, General William Jackson Palmer was critically injured in a riding accident. As he stated in a dictated letter nearly three weeks after the accident, it was not the first time that he had fallen from a horse.1 In that letter of November 17, 1906, transcribed by his secretary, Ms. Jacobeit, Palmer indicated, “I have had at least a hundred falls from my horse, in the course of my life.” But it was this fall, his most serious and his last, that would define the remaining twenty-eight months of Palmer’s life. What started as a leisurely mid-morning ride on an autumn day, in the company of his adult daughters Dorothy and Marjory and their childhood friend, suddenly became one of the most tragic events in the Pikes Peak Region of the early 20th century. Today, those interested in the “historical forensics” of this accident and its related events are left to gather and sort the details of the people, the horses, the support cast, and of Palmer’s injury, treatment, activities and pending death. What really happened? Are the sources and the facts that are available to us now enough? Are they accurate? Are there yet to be located details in other public or private files? Will new information provide sentimental attributions to Palmer, or will it add strength to the legends of his character and behavior, especially his last few survival strategies. And what about the roles of those who were part of Palmer’s support structure during those final months and years? Who were they whose knowledge, skills, labors, tenacity and enduring patience supported Palmer’s survival but who may have become lost in the long shadow cast by Palmer up until today? • 291 •

292 • ACCIDENT, PALLIATIVE CARE & DEATH

This paper begins with October 27, 1906, and pulls together into one narrative as many scattered details as possible. These will include the injuries, clinical observations, diagnoses, treatments and some of the psychosocial activities that dictated several lives through the next twenty-eight months. Palmer’s death and autopsy are also part of this story. The author hopes that this paper on General Palmer’s accident, treatment and death, will be accepted as a work in progress. As expanded questions, insights and details become available, this tragic and historic event can continue to be brought forward in time, complete with tributes, truth, insights, and ironies, to render Palmer and his final months relevant and meaningful to the 21st century reader. The Legend—Palmer’s Accident, Care and Death The Beginning of This Legend: The Accident Palmer frequently went into the foothills and the mountains by himself, riding horseback as transportation for business ventures as well as riding for pleasure. That he frequently rode with family and friends was also widely known. In the first print media announcement of the previous day’s accident to the Colorado Springs and Pikes Peak communities, the Colorado Springs Gazette of Sunday, October 28, 1906, stated that General Palmer was on his “usual morning ride . . . in company with his daughters.”2 The Denver Post used the same phrase, probably from a telegraphed or telephoned report to them, that General Palmer was “riding in company with his daughters.”3 The actual location of the accident is less clear. In that first article, the Gazette stated that Palmer was riding near his estate at Glen Eyrie and, in a paragraph farther into the same article, adds the accident “occurred on the road leading from the Gateway to the Garden of the Gods.” The Denver Post echoed, “. . . near the gateway of the Garden of the Gods.” In Palmer’s dictated letter of November 17, 1906, he casually described to recipient Alma Erichs, a young lady familiar with the area, that he was “between the schoolhouse and the Garden of the Gods Road.”4

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John Lipsey and Glen Martin were mid-20th Century residents of Colorado Springs, each interested in, and each able to contribute information about, General Palmer. To Lipsey’s 1951 writings about General Palmer, Martin added, “The General was riding along through Chamber’s Ranch in the valley and came up to a gate to open it. The horse caught one foot on a rock and threw the general off on his head.”5 The Horse as Legend, Too In Lipsey and Martin’s description, as well as almost all other accounts of what precipitated General Palmer’s mid-day accident, it is his mount that is blamed for the initial misstep. The Gazette previously said “the horse stumbled and threw him to the ground.”6 The Denver Post related the horse “stumbled on a rock in the roadway, throwing him over its head to the ground.”7 General Palmer recalled in Alma’s letter that he was riding “Schoolboy, the broncoh [sic]” that day. Palmer also added that the trail was smooth. He went on to describe his accident’s location, “a little farther down the valley” on the same path on which Alma had recently ridden another horse, Bounce.8 Palmer also assigned additional accountability to the horse by saying “the quadruped seemed to have so little power of recovering himself after stumbling.” Freedom Forever Lost: The Initial Injury and the Transport Immediately, as he hit the ground, the Civil War medalist, the builder of timely mass transit and timeless stone dwellings, was rendered helpless. In a medical paper written later by three of the four physicians who provided care to General Palmer for the first two weeks after his accident, his initial injury was characterized as an “immediate and complete motor and sensory paralysis below the neck without loss of consciousness.”9 Both the Sunday Gazette and the Sunday Denver Post acknowledged that it was William A. Otis who helped to transport the paralyzed Palmer back to Glen Eyrie after the accident. In one account Otis, a member of the Otis elevator family, was described as a Colorado Springs banker and broker.10


In another source, Otis “a millionaire from Cleveland.”11 While both are true, perhaps more importantly, given the early 20th century small town business community of Colorado Springs, it was highly probable that Palmer and Otis were already acquainted. That it was Otis who came upon the accident in his automobile shortly afterward and provided almost immediate transport of Palmer, within the first hour after the accident to Glen Eyrie and Palmer’s caring attendants, was one of the ironies of this event. The transport was accomplished with an invention that Palmer was reported to have despised at the time—the automobile. Within that first hour, as General Palmer rode his last horse, he also took his first automobile ride as a quadriplegic. From that point on, Palmer’s horses changed to the horseless carriage kind, except in those cases when the Glen Eyrie stable horses had to rescue Palmer and his companions, and the unreliable automobile, from some of the many rides that would consume the next twenty-eight months. Palmer as Patient: Initial Descriptions of Palmer’s Injury In the letter to Alma, General Palmer modestly described his injury, “I had a hard knock on my forehead.”12 Sunday’s Gazette13 and Denver Post14 articles made good use of details that came to them during the daytime hours immediately after the accident. Because they were both Sunday morning papers, they also had the advantage of an 11:00 p.m. Saturday evening statement given by the physicians who were called to attend General Palmer. Gazette headlines reported, “Spinal Column is Injured.” The article said, “No bones were broken, nor were there any serious bruises or external injuries,” adding that his most serious injury was probably to his spine. The Denver Post headlines included, “His Limbs are Paralyzed.” They also reported that he received a number of bruises and cuts about the head and face, stating, “the gravest injury is to his spine which is said to have been so badly wrenched as to cause partial paralysis of the lower limbs.” Given the communications and transportations in Colorado Springs in 1906, it seems truly remarkable that Dr. Will Swan,


a local Colorado Springs physician, reached General Palmer’s bedside within the first hour after the accident.15 In his notes Swan later described his first clinical observations of Palmer. Patient was pale, pupils widely dilated, anxious expression, extremities cold, entirely conscious, complaining of tingling in all extremities, pulse imperceptible at the wrists, complete loss of voluntary motion, except of the head, which motion was painful. All sensation was abolished below the level of the third rib in front. There was a bruised, excoriated area over the bridge of the nose and forehead. . . . Breathing not embarrassed, regular, but superficial.16 Dr. Swan’s specialty was tuberculosis treatment. Though General Palmer may have been his regular patient, Dr. Swan immediately called for his colleague, Dr. Charles Fox Gardiner, a well-known local and regional specialist, to share in the diagnosis and treatment of his famous patient. Together the two of them continued to attend to and direct General Palmer’s initial care. However, both of them soon agreed that they needed to tap into their statewide network of physician colleagues, a network fostered by their memberships in the Colorado Medical Society and their attendance at local, regional and national medical conferences. In Denver, Dr. Charles T. Powers, neurosurgeon, and Dr. Howell T. Pershing, neurologist, both received word of General Palmer’s serious injury. The notice brought both of them by train to Colorado Springs. They arrived at Glen Eyrie on the evening of that first day at “half-past seven o’clock.”17 Palmer as Patient: Early Clinical Observations The two Denver physicians conducted interviews with each eyewitness and with Palmer. Most importantly, they observed how Palmer’s body was and wasn’t functioning. Palmer was conscious, alert and lucidly conversant. The injured patient could move his head and neck. He could bend his elbows slightly, but at that point in time he could do little else voluntarily.


A strong peripheral pulse had resumed, the General could breathe with little complication, and he could swallow. Palmer’s temperature was near normal, and he had not vomited immediately after the accident nor since. Even in the seriousness of the moment, these were all positive signs, indicating that Palmer had sustained no significant brain injury. It was evident, however, that nerve function to the gastrointestinal and the genito-urinary systems of the body had been compromised immediately upon injury. To the trained clinician, this was an immediate and ominous indication of serious injury to the central nervous system below the brain. The physicians combined these facts into their late 19th century and early 20th century medical education, training and experiences. They concluded that Palmer’s spinal cord was injured. Their initial estimate was that the injury lay somewhere within the area of the mid-cervical spine in General Palmer’s neck, probably somewhere in the area of the 3rd, 4th, and 5th cervical vertebrae.18 The exact location and the nature of the injuries to the vertebrae of the spine, and the exact location and extent of the injury to the spinal cord, were yet to be determined. Palmer as Patient: The Clinical Examination—Day 1 Palmer fell from his horse around noon that Saturday. Some time after 7:30 p.m., nearly eight hours later, the physicians conducted their first manual examination of his spine. With great caution and concern about further and perhaps fatal injury to Palmer, Dr. Powers, neurosurgeon, examined the back of General Palmer’s neck, gently but expertly using his fingertips to palpate the natural curve of the cervical spine in search of irregularities. As skilled as Dr. Powers was, there still must have been great concern about a potential clinical catastrophe for the four physicians. One false move or an ever-so-slight addition to what they perhaps suspected as a vertebral impingement on the spinal cord, could have resulted in instant death for Palmer. By whatever careful method it was completed, Dr. Powers concluded that there was an irregularity at the 5th


cervical spinous process, the bony dorsal extension from the main body of the vertebra, palpable immediately under the skin.19 That physical examination solidified their previous observations of the loss of control and function of most motor and sensory activity below the cervical portion of the spine. Palmer could not move his toes, feet, legs, hips, shoulders, arms, hands, or fingers or thumbs to any great extent, and nerve function to critical organ systems had been compromised. The physicians ordered initial treatment to begin and Palmer was given “moderate doses of morphine.” Later in clinical report it was said that he spent “a fairly comfortable night.”20 Continuing Clinical Protocol: The Examination—Day 2 Day Two continued the clinical examinations and speculations. An event of that day offered testament to the physicians’ clinical and professional thoroughness, as well as their understanding of their patient’s status and high profile. In Dr. Power’s contribution to the paper presented by the four physicians at the American Neurological Association in May 1910 he stated, “On the following day Drs. Mayhew and Childs took x-ray pictures.”21 But it was Dr. Lester Williams’ paper of 1985, seventy-nine years later, that provided a hint as to the complicated logistics of that procedure. Dr. Williams wrote, “The following day Drs. Mayhew and Childs uprooted their x-ray machine from their office at 2 North Cascade Avenue and hauled it to Glen Eyrie with horse and wagon and took Xrays.”22 Palmer’s Diagnosis: Details, Plus Hope The results of the x-rays helped to solidify the diagnosis of General Palmer’s spinal injuries. Noted in Dr. Power’s original contribution to the medical paper, the x-rays confirmed “an irregularity of the third and fourth spinous processes but practically no irregularity of the bodies or arches of the vertebrae.”23 That explanation indicated that indeed specific cervical vertebrae seemed to be damaged, but that the critical alignment


of the slight curve in the cervical section of the spine was still intact. There also appeared to be no broken vertebrae and no obvious bone fragments that endangered the spinal cord. The physicians could only speculate then as to the exact location and the nature of the injury to the spinal cord. Palmer’s physicians were immediately of one mind when they determined that they would not attempt any surgical intervention. That decision was based first of all on General Palmer’s age of 70 years. Secondly, with no obvious vertebral or spinal cord disruptions, any less obvious injuries would be too difficult to find and to repair if surgery were attempted. The physicians also agreed that surgical stabilization or fixation of Palmer’s cervical spine also was not appropriate. That would have prevented any range of motion for the head and neck, and the activities that General Palmer did resume would have been even more difficult.24 Hope for Recovery Early spinal cord diagnoses were then and still are communicated with two things: initially with specific details, about the diagnosis and the proposed treatment, and secondly, with hope as a component of the prognosis. Some of the ‘wait and see’ hope for General Palmer was based on what the physicians could not palpate and could not see on x-ray, the spinal cord itself, plus any injury to the soft tissues, including the muscles and the small blood vessels in the immediate area of the injury. Palmer’s medical corps of four hoped that any local swelling around the immediate cervical injuries would dissipate. They also hoped that the bruising at the site of the spinal cord injury would diminish, reducing the pressure on the cord and returning function to areas of Palmer’s body. They hoped that in a few days or weeks this reduced swelling might allow improvement in Palmer’s voluntary motor function and in his involuntary organ function.25 This would mean that the tragic paralysis that had befallen this active and iconic man might be lessened, at least enough to allow him to resume a somewhat normal, active life. But during his brief visit


from Philadelphia, Dr. Silas Weir Mitchell argued against this, noting to the four attending and consulting physicians that the paralysis and numbness were practically instantaneous.26 Beginning Life as a Quadriplegic General Palmer’s physical condition did improve somewhat during the next weeks and months. He experienced some sensory improvement on his left side, as noted in Dr. Pershing’s neurology report. First to be restored was the sense of pressure or touch, then pain, then temperature. However, the right side sensations continued to be “more anesthetic.”27 Motor or voluntary muscle control on his right side recovered more than the left. He could abduct or lift his shoulders. He also had some use of the right deltoids, the triangular-shaped muscles at the top of the arm that allowed him to move his right arm away from his body. He was able to have limited flexion of his right forearm at the elbow using the biceps, and he could slowly and partially roll his forearm to pronation—palm down, and to supination—palm up. Dr. Swan in 1910 and Dr. Williams in 1985 both described Palmer’s writing as using the “whole arm method.”28 That was accomplished when he lifted the shoulders, moved the right arm away from his body, bent his elbow, pronated his hand, and held the pen or pencil against the first finger with his somewhat restored thumb function. The samples of his writing after his accident certainly spoke to a different kind of “Palmer Method” penmanship! The same thoughtful and slow progression also allowed him, as noted by Dr. Swan, to feed himself occasionally with his right arm, either with a spoon or by taking food in his hand. Palmer also had some right wrist extension, which was created when he moved the back of the hand, palm down, toward his the elbow. When he did that, he probably also gained what is called an “automatic hand,” whereby the tendons of the right fingers, attached on the forearm, drew the fingers closed, toward the right palm. He may have grasped some objects that way. The General did recover very limited motion in his right leg. He was able to extend his right hip, knee and ankle somewhat


in the following weeks, though it provided little use for him. There was almost no improvement to motor function of the left arm and left leg. Over the next few weeks and months, Dr. Pershing performed periodic faradic or muscle stimulation tests directly on specific muscles and groups of muscles.29 Each time, most muscles that he tested responded at least to a certain degree. This acknowledged that there was no injury to the muscles themselves, but that the pathway that carried the nerve stimulus to the muscle from the brain, instructing each muscle to move in its own unique way, was blocked by the injury high on the spinal cord. Dr. Pershing continued to find that reflexive responses were maintained. The tap on the knee, the tap on the heel, demonstrated that the reflex messages that flowed 360 degrees between the extremities and the spinal cord, even though below the site of the spinal injury, still worked. These few and limited improvements must have produced much elation and hope for full recovery at first. But the high spinal cord injury, even as miniscule as it would eventually prove to be, and in hindsight, the physicians’ reluctance to intervene surgically, re-created this slight but mighty man as a quadriplegic for the remainder of his days. So active a few short weeks before, Palmer, the independent master of most that he touched, was never able to stand or walk by himself again. He had no use of his overall trunk muscles, including his chest, abdomen, hips or back muscles. He was never able to roll over by himself nor was he ever able to remain in a sitting position without support. Insightful Medical Management From the paper presented at the American Neurological Association in May 1910, the details of Palmer’s medical care were presented for the enlightenment of their medical peers by three of his four attending and consulting physicians. From that paper, important details of his medical care are identifiable. In a footnote in that paper, Dr. Charles T. Powers, neurosurgeon, identified the participants in Palmer’s immediate


post-accident care. “We jointly remained in constant attendance [living at Glen Eyrie] for something over two weeks. Dr. Swan continued as attending physician, while Dr. Pershing, Dr. Gardiner and I saw the patient frequently in consultation.”30 Though they came a few weeks later and contributed perhaps comfort to the four immediate medical providers only, Dr. Powers extended professional courtesy when he reported, “Drs. S. Weir Mitchell and Dr. M. Allen Starr came to Colorado in consultation and rendered valuable aid.” Dr. Powers also described the immediate and important insights into Palmer’s care by the four attending and consulting physicians. “The surgical management was very simple. A few hours after the accident the patient was placed on a suitable water bed.” Unfortunately, Powers gave neither additional details of where the bed was acquired nor how it was installed in Palmer’s residence. Probably from chart notes Dr. Swan recalled that Palmer’s bladder was catheterized, in the first four or five weeks after the accident, “three times a day, then later four to ten times in twentyfour hours.” Each catheterization was performed with the use of sterile surgical gowns, rubber gloves, and sterile dressings. The immediate microscopic inspection of each sample of urine, plus the daily administration of the drug Urotropin, prevented the complication of a bladder infection. It was an extreme risk to the life of a bedridden or paralyzed patient in the early 20th century, and it continues to be a risk even now in the early 21st century. Dr. Powers also acknowledged the bladder catheterizations, as well as the daily skin inspections, were performed by Dr. Watt. “A resident physician, Dr. Henry C. Watt, whose efficient zeal was untiring, was installed in the house. He attended to the aseptic catheterization of the urinary bladder and he personally inspected all portions of the patient’s skin daily.” Dr. Williams recorded that Dr. Watt prepared for all of his medical procedures with a thorough, ten-minute surgical scrub. Dr. Watt’s “zeal” was further explained. “A daily journal was kept in which the condition of the skin was certified, a complete examination of the urine recorded, and the general condition of


the patient noted. This rigid regime was kept up until the death of the patient, some twenty-eight and one-half months after the accident.”31 Waterbed, Blankets, Feathers and Hair Two of the physicians, in the May 1910 paper, related Palmer’s initial complaints about, then acceptance of, the waterbed. Dr. Swan mentioned, “Once there was redness with slight induration of the skin over the sacrum. This occurred after a few days’ refusal to lie on a water bed and promptly cleared up when he returned to it.”32 Dr. Williams described Palmer’s complaint, then acceptance, “Once he refused to lie on the mushy thing, and within a few days his skin began to redden and he offered no objection against return to the water bed. The redness promptly disappeared.”33 How Palmer rode for hours on end in his automobiles on the numerous El Paso County “cruises,” as well as the continental cruises, also came from Dr. Williams’ descriptions. Those details also told how Palmer was taken to and from the Castle, as well as from floor to floor within the Castle, and how moving him was managed on European tours. “Each evening the housemen would carry the General from the house to the wheelchair in a blanket fitted with straps, wheel him [in the wheelchair] to the car, lift him gently into the car and fit him into a case made for the car. The case was a sort of seat, made like a spoon case with hair and feathers, and it just fit the General.”34 Hour by Hour Care Palmer’s physicians described his medical management. Others described how Palmer was transported, and who moved him from place to place daily. However, almost nothing was said about who prepared Palmer for each day, as well as who bathed, dressed, fed and shaved him during the day, followed doctors’ orders, administered his medications, then got him ready for bed each night. Palmer indicated in the letter to Alma Erichs on November 17, 1906, “Mr. Harrison is still with us, and waiting for Dorothy


[Palmer’s second daughter] to accompany him to England, where she will spend the winter and learn the work of a nurse.”35 From this the reader might conclude that Dorothy was to become one of her father’s nurse caregivers. However, other accounts described that Dorothy’s intentions were to be more focused on the needs of the poor in England. Perhaps the nurses who cared for General Palmer hourly were better identified through other descriptions of Glen Eyrie activities. As he noted Palmer’s automobile rides, and the mechanical skill and custodial care with which Glen Martin drove Palmer in the electric car almost every day, Dr. Williams also noted, “When they started out for an evening jaunt, the entourage often consisted of the patient, Martin, two nurses and the doctor.”36 In another account, describing the automobile rides after General Palmer had purchased the steam-driven vehicle, Dr. Williams wrote, “The General, Martin, with nurses, attendants, and perhaps the doctor, embarked on extended cruises.” “Private duty nurses” are described in other Colorado Springs and Pikes Peak Region health care history archives. Those nurses were registered through the local Colorado Springs chapter of the Colorado Nurses Association or through one of the local hospitals’ nursing offices.37 Each nurse was specifically recommended by the attending physician and hired by the patient’s family. Who Palmer’s nurses were, where they previously trained, and what specific duties they completed toward Palmer’s daily care may eventually be found in additional archival sources. For twenty-four hour, round-the-clock care, two nurses would have been the minimum needed, for at that time twelvehour shifts were the accepted division of labor for nurses. That both were female might be concluded, for the regional attempts to utilize male nurses for male patients proved unsuccessful two decades earlier in this region.


The English Connection With Palmer’s great appreciation for and reliance on many things English, it was perhaps the one attribute that solidified Dr. Watt’s candidacy as the “physician installed in the house.” In 1985 Dr. Williams related, “Dr. H. C. Watt, for whom is named the Watt Memorial at Sunnyrest Nursing Home, was installed as resident physician at Glen Eyrie. He was an Englishman who had immigrated to Colorado Springs in 1904.”38 In an earlier paper, Dr. Williams wrote that Watt’s birth year was 1872.39 Perhaps an occasional topic of conversation between Watt and Palmer included the acknowledgement that Dr. Watt was the same age as General Palmer’s city of Colorado Springs. Dr. Watt was a member of the Society of the Apothecary in England from 1895 to 1905. This organization’s members were pharmacists who dealt with the mixing and dispensing of medications, and Dr. Watt was an English medical school graduate, as well. Medications In 1906 Palmer’s physicians prescribed drugs of choice, including medications that prevented and medications that enabled. As Dr. Swan described, “By the use of moderate doses of morphine.” General Palmer’s anxiety and his physical pain and discomfort at the end of his first day of paralysis were somewhat relieved. Swan later added, that during the entire twenty-eight months, “Sleep was always difficult, requiring constant use of hynotics.”40 General Palmer’s paralysis left him unable to empty his bladder, increasing the risk of infection from the chronic retention of urine. In addition to the catheterizations, the risk was managed by the use of Urotropin, the turn-of-the-century trade name for methenamine. This drug was administered to General Palmer daily and was used as a urinary tract antiseptic. Few bacteria or fungi could survive in its presence. Broken down by the body, Urotropin was converted to formaldehyde, then excreted in the urine.41 Its classification as an antiseptic identifies an aspect of the science of medicine in 1906, because antibiotics were not developed for use until the mid-1920s.42 Dr.


Swan added, “Only once was there a considerable infection of the bladder, which cleared up after a few days. Many times the urine became somewhat cloudy when the use of Urotropin was tentatively stopped, but at once became clear when it was again administered.” Palmer’s paralysis also meant that he was unable to voluntarily empty his bowels. Dr. Swan’s report described for his medical peers, “There was often marked tympanites and digestive disturbance, but for the most part the bowels were easily moved by laxatives and enemata.” Dr. Swan also mentioned the drugs Calomel and Diuretin for relief of Palmer’s gastric distention and distress, though the frequency of administration, the route of administration and the dose of each is not described. Meditations Dr. Swan noted that for Palmer there seemed to be within the first few weeks extended periods of “mental fatigue.”43 Dr. Williams noted, “As might be expected when a man’s vigorous and full life is brought to an abrupt halt, the patient exhibited serious depression.”44 Palmer’s staff, family, colleagues and friends attempted to console him and to provide business and recreational diversions for him. Williams also added, “Discipline at Glen Eyrie disintegrated.” Entire families lives were impacted, especially those in Palmer’s employ who were dependent on this great man for their housing, their daily keep, and the exciting work that he directed them to do. Eldest daughter Elsie became so concerned about Palmer and the state of affairs at Glen Eyrie that she contacted the noted Philadelphia neurologist who had published papers and books on effective methods of psycho-therapy, Dr. Silas Weir Mitchell. Dr. Mitchell arrived at Glen Eyrie, only to be “blown off” as we might say today by General Palmer. Palmer’s sensible justification, even through a fog of depression, was that he knew he was not insane. After several days, with travel and consulting fees piling higher, General Palmer consented to allow Mitchell to examine him.45


What is Normal? Almost eight weeks after his disabling injury, General Palmer became enabled once again. Dr. Williams wrote, “Suddenly one morning just before Christmas 1906, General Palmer underwent a startling metamorphosis. He must have decided, either in his conscious mind or in his subconscious, that he had had enough of being an invalid.”46 Whether it was Dr. Mitchell’s brief visit, encouragement from colleagues, General Palmer’s innate creativity, his engineering and directive mind deciding to get on with life, or a combination of all of these, we probably will never know. Dr. Pershing also reported his observations of Palmer’s progress in the May 1910 paper. “While always complaining more or less of pain or vague distress, sometimes having short spells of depression, and never showing any pathological exaltation, the patient bore his terrible disability with remarkable cheerfulness. He took the greatest interest in his family and social relations, enjoyed simple recreations, and was active in philanthropic work, sometimes on a very large scale and again in many minor ways.” Dr. Swan also observed that Palmer was again mentally active, “at times giving close application to business affairs for six or seven hours a day.”47 Many of the events for the next year and a half, from December 1906 to June 1908, were themselves smaller legends within the greater legend of this period of Palmer’s life. For example, Palmer continued to host the annual Christmas parties for the region’s and for Glen Eyrie’s children, complete with tall and lavishly decorated trees, exciting gifts and tasty treats for each child. Hundreds of dollars of circus tickets were purchased and given away. Palmer directed that greenhouse flowers be sent to the patients in the hospitals and sanitoriums in town. He honored his Civil War cavalry unit and brought them all at his expense to Colorado Springs during the summer of 1907 for their annual reunion. All two hundred eight of them stayed for a week at Palmer’s Antlers Hotel, enjoying room, recreation, remembrance and even just a little recuperation, before they all returned home again, round trip guaranteed.


Each of Palmer’s social events came and went, at the cost of great physical exhaustion to him and the others around him. But it was his newly found love, the automobile, that created a continuous path of pleasure for him throughout the last months of his life. Same Man, Yet Another Iron Horse For Palmer, known to be private, reclusive, contemplative, and demanding, his days of being able to escape, to his library or on horseback to be by himself were over. With the exception of thinking, everything that he needed or accomplished in the span of a day had to have at least one other person involved. “Independence” as Palmer had known it needed to be redefined. Up the Hill, Blaze the Trail The automobile became Palmer’s new symbol of independence, his new definition of what was normal. By riding away in the cocoon of his specially-formed chair in the back of his automobile, he escaped for a few hours the physical prison of his body, the enclosure of his waterbed suite, the thick walls of his great castle, and Queen’s Canyon, so long his haven and his respite. The daily automobile outings took their place within the legend, as well. Dr. Swan described, “During the following year [up to late 1907] he often drove for five or six hours a day, with no apparent fatigue.”48 The physicians mentioned just a few details of the automobile outings in their papers. Dr. Williams relied on the interviews of Glen Martin for John Lipsey’s 1951 paper. It was Glen Martin who was at the wheel of General Palmer’s automobile, from the very first drive until Palmer’s death.49 Martin carried-out Palmer’s instructions for rides to places that didn’t yet have roads constructed, much less for the automobile. The General commanded Martin to take him into the second canyon beyond Queen’s Canyon, Blair Athol. There Palmer was nurturing a habitat for pheasants and quail that were rare in this region, at the request of a biologist.


After one strenuous trip into that canyon, Dr. Watt or Dr. Swan, it is not clear, ordered Martin not to take Palmer again into Blair Athol, on such a steep terrain and into an area that was so inaccessible. On the next evening, Palmer insisted on going again. Knowing whom his boss really was, Martin drove up the road again, as far as he could to the dead-end, then backed down as far as he could. When he couldn’t turn the automobile around, one of the passengers walked back to Glen Eyrie, to get the stable horses to pull them home. On one outing, probably east on to the plains, the car ran out of power. Marjory had determined from previous outings that the long hours through which they waited to be rescued by the horses could be reduced if a motorcycle followed them, at her request out of earshot. With the motorcycle rider hurrying back to Glen Eryie, at least the stable was alerted more quickly that rescue by horses was needed. The Labors of Others One day the General and his party drove, with Martin at the wheel, up the road past the Cliff House in Manitou, into Williams Canyon. On this outing, they became not only the first passengers in the first automobile on the road, but also the first passengers in the first automobile that was to become “detopped.”50 When the auto, with the top retracted, became wedged on the wagon road between two rocks at what was called “The Narrows,” Martin asked what to do. Palmer declared, “Go ahead, tear the top off.” In his blanket, carried by attendants holding the leather straps, Palmer was transported into Cave of the Winds, his first visit there. John Lipsey and Dr. Williams both related Martin’s continuing story. “At the point dubbed ‘Fat Man’s Misery and Tall Man’s Headache,’ his mummy case stuck and alterations had to be made before he could proceed. Lipsey added the rest, “The General ordered a saw and had the ledge cut off for his release.”


The extravagance and the effort of these outings, to please and occupy Palmer during this first year of his paralysis, were perhaps best detailed by one of the trips to Austin Bluffs. One evening Palmer wanted to go to Austin Bluffs, to the area that he had recently purchased and given as a gift to the city, the area later called Palmer Park. When they arrived, Palmer instructed Martin to drive around to the east side of the area, then queried Martin as to whether the car could go up a bridle path, so the adventurers in his company could see the sunset from Grand View Point. Palmer in his horseback-riding days had sat many times on the west end of that bluff, to partake its awesome, unobstructed view of the valleys descending from the summit of Pikes Peak. Martin assured him that the automobile could muster the power to get Palmer and party to Grand View Point, but Martin warned that the drive would ruin the tires at the price of $95 each. Price be damned, up the bridle path they went. The sunset was spectacular. Martin felt that it had indeed been a great experience for General Palmer to be able to sit and gaze across the valleys, with friends of comfort beside him. But Martin later recounted that he indeed purchased and replaced all four tires after this trip, with each wheel involving a lengthy human tussle with six hard-to-release lug nuts.51 But wait, this outing wasn’t over yet either. When the group returned through the gate back at Glen Eyrie that night, they met Purley Nichols who was in charge of building all roads for General Palmer. It was bad timing for Mr. Nichols. The General asked Nichols if he thought that he could assemble the right men, animals and materials to build a road along the same bridle path on Austin Bluffs, so the party could return again and again to Grand View Point. Mr. Nichols said that it could be done and that he’d get a group together in the morning, including the estimated extra wagons, horses, men, and tents, as well as a cook. Not satisfied that Mr. Nichols wait until morning, General Palmer commissioned him to gather what he needed and move to the campsite that night. How many families in his employ


were awakened in the middle of the night, to fulfill General Palmer’s anxious request for a road to be built for him and his outings? Could it not have waited util morning? Normal Continues There is at least one more strenuous story, related to John Lipsey by Glen Martin. For General Palmer to spend a few days to see Manitou Park again, two horse-drawn wagons of supplies were sent to the Manitou Park lodge two days ahead of General Palmer’s larger party’s departure from Glen Eyrie. On the departure day, accompanied by the Haynes, a gasolinepowered automobile, the group started west over Ute Pass, then northward out of Woodland Park. In a downpour, the road flooded and the General’s automobile mired in the mud. With the rescue underway for several hours, once again led by horses, plus this time the Haynes, General Palmer remained on board his vehicle until it finally reached the lodge. Then, for nearly thirty-six straight hours, Glen Martin worked to restore Palmer’s vehicle for the on-time return to Glen Eyrie as scheduled. Once again, great human toil kept the General safe, entertained and recreated. Martin later told Lipsey that it was his conclusion that the General saw nothing unusual about the trip. The Beginning of the End John Fisher, Palmer’s biographer in 1939, described Palmer’s later years, after he sold his railroad and before the riding accident, “As he grew older—he was in his late sixties now—he became more autocratic and masterful, and life at Glen Eyrie was more formal and stately.”52 In his eighth decade, after the riding accident, Palmer’s autocratic ways continued. After his post-injury depression subsided, as he shared with his physicians and his colleagues, General Palmer seemed pleased with his relationships and accomplishments. He felt in many ways that life was perhaps even better than it had been prior to his fall. Dr. Swan described Palmer’s comments to him, “He frequently remarked that he had never been able to turn off so much work or to give so much time to the enjoyment of his friends.”53


Dr. Pershing wrote, “It also seemed to me that the brain itself gained something by having part of the sensory impulses from the body stopped at the site of the [spinal cord] lesion.” And he added, “He was clearly conscious of a change in his coenesthesis and expressed surprise at finding himself happier than before the injury.”54 In addition, comments made by his physicians indicated they felt that Palmer’s body, though devastated by paralysis, had in other ways improved. Dr. Swan noted that he felt Palmer’s prolonged bed rest had improved the arteriosclerosis and the “heart dilatations” that Palmer experienced seven months before the accident. The gouty eczema that Palmer experienced for years prior to October 1906, and which reappeared for two to three weeks after the accident, completely disappeared.55 But Dr. Swan and Dr. Pershing also recorded the clinical observations that marked the beginning of Palmer’s mental and physical decline. Dr. Swan said, “At the end of eighteen months, he had become more sleepless and depressed.” Dr. Pershing identified the specific month, “The condition lasted for the most part until he left for England in June, 1908.”56 Dr. Williams provided details about the trip to England. “In 1908 the General decided on a trip to England. A new White Steamer was purchased and sent ahead to Liverpool, where it was assembled by Glen Martin who had gone ahead. Making the trip besides the General and Martin were two doctors, two nurses, two governesses, two grandnieces, and fourteen employees, including a secretary and a caterer.”57 Hope was Gone A comment by Rhoda Davis Wilcox may have most accurately described the underlying reason for Palmer’s great Grand Tour. “After a strenuous trip to Europe to see a specialist, which was to no avail.”58 For General William Jackson Palmer, the anticipation of recovery was dashed. The hope of returning to a once masterful life was gone. Dr. Pershing commented on Palmer’s continuing depression. “[O]n his return in November [1908] he was somewhat depressed and remained so until his death.”59


Dr. Swan believed there was a physical cause. “During his six months’ stay there [England and Europe] he had an attack of bronchitis and lost ground in all ways, coming home in November 1908 considerably weaker physically and less active mentally than when he left.”60 Glen Martin, who drove Palmer’s second White Steamer through Europe as well as here, attributed Palmer’s decline to a suspected head or additional neck injury. As he told John Lipsey, “On the ship coming back from England, I think General Palmer received the injury that finally killed him. “They handled him, as I said, in this blanket. Coming up the gangway, one of the loops or handles on the blanket broke, and he rolled over on one side and hit a brass rail. His head flopped over. They were carrying him to an upper deck at the time.” Perhaps releasing his frustrations with all the demands that Palmer put on him and others over the years to fulfill Palmer’s own comforts and desires, and with an expression of continuing grief that this last injury could have been avoided, Martin continued, “He had to go up there. He wanted to be on the top deck and they didn’t have an elevator, so they had to carry him up the stairway.”61 Palmer was Gone John Fisher credited Palmer with a brave struggle in the months after the return from England in the fall of 1908. “Yet once again his spirit triumphed over his body, and when he was back in Colorado his strength actually seemed to revive.” 62 Fisher, also acknowledged that after a few positive events through the autumn and winter, Palmer began to fail. “But, as February drew into March, he began to sink. The letters, till now so carefully dictated, so full and clear, grew shorter and shorter and at last ceased.”63 Noted in the May 1910 paper, 64 the clinical cause for the final physical decline was uremia or kidney failure. No longer capable of cleansing the wastes from the blood, kidney failure led to a cascading effect of multiple systems failure.


“His death, when it came, was quiet and easy,” wrote Fisher. “That night he slipped from his sleep into a coma from which he never roused again, and on March 13, he died.”65

Claude Bowman, resident chauffeur at Glen Eyre, posed in front of William J. Palmer’s white steamer, ca. 1908. Courtesy of Starsmore Center for Local History at the Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum.

The Last Diagnosis General Palmer’s body was taken to Denver. John Lipsey wrote that with the permission of General Palmer’s family an autopsy was performed. Dr. Powers identified that the autopsy was performed by Dr. J. A. Wilder.66 Dr. Pershing provided clinical details. “The aorta showed a few small atheromatous patches [or plaque]. Wall of left ventricle thinner and its cavity dilated,” continued Dr. Pershing.67 “Cardiac valves competent. Lungs, stomach, intestine, liver, spleen normal,” he added. “Kidneys on microscopical examination show sub-acute, diffuse inflammation. Bladder wall thickened; mucous [membrane] shows areas of congestion but there is neither mucus or pus.” The autopsy also revealed the true condition of the spine and the spinal cord. At last the injury could be seen and described.


Dr. Pershing continued from the autopsy transcription. “The bodies of the fourth, fifth and sixth cervical vertebrae have been fractured by a crushing force, the fragments having united in nearly normal position, while the spinous processes, laminae and articular processes remained uninjured. “From the junction of the lower edge of the body of the fifth and the upper edge of the body of the sixth [vertebrae] a small exotosis [the fractured, bony edge of the vertebrae trying to heal itself, perhaps from this or a previous injury] projects about two millimeters into the spinal canal. It extends from the median line to the left and leaves a linear impression across the ventral [front] surface of the upper part of the seventh cervical segment of the cord.” Then Dr. Pershing described the investigation of the spinal cord at the site of the injury. “Incision of the cord at this mark reveals a lesion bilateral, although mainly on the left side, not noticeably softened but discolored as by hemorrhage. “Details of the histological examination of the cord, unfortunately, cannot be given, but the usual ascending and descending degenerations are well marked on both sides.”68 Microscopic Confirmation From the autopsy in 1909 the microscope told the story. The tissue slides of Palmer’s spinal cord revealed that the reasons for Palmer’s paralysis were clearly visible. Once the bruising of the spinal cord had taken place, the bruise—as small as it was—stopped the transmission of electrical messages in both directions from that point. There were no nerve messages from the brain downward past that point, and there were no nerve messages from the body upward to the brain. Electrical impulses stopped at the bruise. Dr. Power’s and Dr. Pershing’s early 20th century knowledge had accurately diagnosed the injury. To Recognize More Than One Hero General William Jackson Palmer was a hero in many ways. The tributes, though typically deflected by him during his lifetime, continue to this day. It is difficult to credit many of his


great accomplishments because he kept them—and asked that they continue to be kept—from public view. However, with even a small amount of information about his business and social relationships, we receive insights into whom Palmer trusted and with what. It is evident that he surrounded himself with bright, knowledgeable, and skilled individuals. For the final days of Palmer’s life, which Dr. Lester Williams figured to be “868 Days” in all, to be as productive, fulfilling and comfortable as they were is a tribute to Palmer’s acceptance, albeit reluctant, of his condition. It is also a tribute to those who surrounded him, cared for him, and tolerated him. Without the paper presented to the American Neurological Association in May 1910, there would be little record of Palmer’s medical care and medical providers. Three of the four initial attending physicians wrote and presented the paper, and in doing so created a valuable clinical record of Palmer’s care, as well as creating a testament to each other and their mutual respect for one another. Unanimously, Dr. Swan and Dr. Pershing credited Dr. Watt for his brilliant and skilled medical management of the two risks that created constant peril for Palmer’s life, a urinary tract infection and the skin breakdowns. From Dr. Swan, “Much credit is due Dr. H. C. Watt, who acted as resident physician, and to his most competent and faithful [skill] in averting serious bladder infection and bed sores during this long period.”69 Dr. Powers, even in the midst of his rather self-focused portion of that paper, credited Dr. Watt with Palmer’s quality of life. “In concluding this very brief summary I beg to say that I have never before known a patient with such an injury to be accorded the rigid hourly care which this man received. I have never before known a patient to go through twenty-eight months of similar spinal paralysis without a broken skin or badly infected bladder.”70 Dr. Pershing made no statements about Watt, but as a neurologist, he’d have concurred that the neurogenic bladder and Palmer’s inability to readjust his position, lying or sitting, created immediate and constant risk of bladder infection and bed sores.


Dr. Williams added a clinical reflection of his own in his paper of 1985. In conclusion we might point out that every illness has two aspects, one physical and one psychological. Neither can be neglected without detriment to the patient. . . . Palmer certainly had the most advanced care possible for his injury and his 28½ month survival is a testimonial for this. With such an injury today, the same problems would be faced and most patients would eventually die with a kidney infection.71 And then Williams added his admiration as a physician for Palmer. “As to the psychological, his immediate depression was an understandable reaction to a blow, crushing in more ways than one. His indomitable will and restless energy drove him to do all things he crammed into those 28 months, to see again all the vistas he loved in his—and our—Pikes Peak Region.”72 Lynn Gilfillan-Morton has been involved with public school, university, and proprietary education, with the creation of innovative health promotion programs and is currently a health promotion consultant in the Colorado Springs area. She has presented at three Pikes Peak Regional History Symposia and is the co-author of The History of Health Care in the Pikes Peak Region with Bob Hoff.

Notes

I began to work on the “History of Healthcare in the Pikes Peak Region” about a year before the Springs Millennium celebration of 2000. How this came about is a story for another time, but suffice it to say, my original intention quickly evolved to an evenings and weekends pursuit of enough information to be able to just say “I’ve got my arms around it.” Since then I’ve been aided and abetted by a number of people who’ve given their time and expertise to support my interest in the topic. In order to prepare this paper and the presentation given at the “William Jackson Palmer: Legends, Labors, and Loves” symposium, I again relied on the help of others.

GILFILLAN-MORTON • 317 A sincere “Thank you” from my head and from my heart is extended to manager Tim Blevins and his staff at the Special Collections, all of whom provide great tolerance and patient assistance for my various projects including this one; to Edith Knight, a volunteer at The Navigators whom I met per chance at a political rally in the fall of 2004. Edith offered her expertise and her time to give me a thorough tour of Glen Eyrie in the midst of a busy holiday schedule and provided me with valuable papers about General Palmer’s accident and care; to Len Froisland, a Navigators volunteer, who provided his time, valuable papers, and his knowledge of horseback riding for this “horseless only” author; to my husband, Max Morton, for not only sharing his knowledge of neuro-anatomy, physical rehabilitation, scanners and PowerPoint with me, but who also bore with great patience the many hours that I’ve put into this paper, on evenings and week-ends; to Sarilu Sosa Sanchez, certified trauma nurse, for her great enthusiasm for nursing and her willingness to help me articulate Palmer’s 21st century emergent care and diagnosis; to Dr. Glen House, a gentle, patient and enthusiastic teacher of the art and science of spinal cord injury and rehabilitation, who not only loved learning the historical medical details of Palmer’s care but who “walks the talk and roles the role” for others with spinal cord injuries. Bless them, one and all! 1. William Jackson Palmer, letter dictated to Ms. Jacobeit, November 17, 1906; transcribed, Navigators Archives, Colorado Springs, Colo. 2. Colorado Springs Gazette, Sunday, October 28, 1906; transcribed, Navigator Archives. 3. Denver Post, Sunday, October 28, 1906; transcribed, The Navigator Archives. 4. William Jackson Palmer letter, November 17, 1906. 5. John J. Lipsey, “General Wm. J. Palmer: His Twenty-eight and a Half Months of Life After a Fatal Injury,” June 1951; transcribed, Navigator Archives. 6. Colorado Springs Gazette, October 28, 1906. 7. Denver Post, October 28, 1906. 8. William Jackson Palmer letter, November 17, 1906. 9. Willam. H. Swan, M.D., Charles T. Powers, M.D., and Howell T. Pershing, M.D., “An Unusual Case of Fracture of the Bodies of the Fourth, Fifth and Sixth Cervical Vertebrae with Injury of the Spinal Cord,” presented to the American Neurological Association, Washington, D.C., May 10, 1910; transcribed, Navigator Archives. 10. Colorado Springs Gazette, October 28, 1906.

318 • ACCIDENT, PALLIATIVE CARE & DEATH 11. Denver Post, October 28, 1906. 12. Palmer letter, November 17, 1906. 13. Colorado Springs Gazette, October 28, 1906. 14. The Denver Post, October 28, 1906. 15. Swan, et al., “An Unusual Case.” 16. Ibid. 17. Ibid. 18. Ibid. 19. Ibid. 20. Ibid. 21. Ibid. 22. Lester L. Williams, M.D., “The Life of General William Jackson Palmer and How He Lived 868 Days After a Fatal Injury,” 1985; transcribed, Navigator Archives. 23. Swan, et al., “An Unusual Case.” 24. Ibid. 25. Colorado Springs Gazette, January 25, 1907; transcribed, The Navigator Archives. 26. Swan, et al., “An Unusual Case.” 27. Ibid. 28. Swan, et al., “An Unusual Case,” and Williams, “The Life of General William Jackson Palmer.” 29. Swan, et al., “An Unusual Case.” 30. Ibid. 31. Williams, “The Life of General William Jackson Palmer.” 32. Swan, et al., “An Unusual Case.” 33. Williams, “The Life of General William Jackson Palmer.” 34. Ibid. 35. Palmer letter, November 17, 1906. 36. Williams, “The Life of General William Jackson Palmer.” 37. Jo Ruth, M.S.N., R.N., Colorado Springs, Colorado. 38. Williams, “The Life of General William Jackson Palmer.” 39. Lester L. Williams, “Dr. Henry Chorley Watt,” original manuscript, no date; MSS 0127 SC, Special Collections, Pikes Peak Library District. 40. Swan, et al., “An Unusual Case.” 41. Ted Lewis, M.D., e-mail, May 2005. 42. Glen House, M.D., professional interview, May 2005. 43. Swan, et al., “An Unusual Case.” 44. Williams, “The Life of General William Jackson Palmer.” 45. Ibid. 46. Ibid.

GILFILLAN-MORTON • 319 47. Swan, et al., “An Unusual Case.” 48. Ibid. 49. Lipsey, “General Wm. J. Palmer.” 50. Ibid. 51. Ibid. 52. Fischer, 311. 53. Swan, et al., “An Unusual Case.” 54. Ibid. 55. Ibid. 56. Ibid 57. Williams, “The Life of General William Jackson Palmer.” 58. El Paso County Heritage, Breckenridge and Breckenridge, entry C 76, p. 107, written by Rhoda Davis Wilcox. 59. Swan, et al.,“An Unusual Case.” 60. Ibid. 61. Lipsey, “General Wm. J. Palmer.” 62. John S. Fisher, A Builder of the West: The Life of General William Jackson Palmer (Caldwell, Idaho: Caxton Printers, 1939), 318. 63. Ibid. 64. Swan, et al., “An Unusual Case.” 65. Fisher, A Builder of the West, 318. 66. Swan, et al., “An Unusual Case.” 67. Ibid. 68. Ibid. 69. Ibid. 70. Ibid. 71. Williams, “The Life of General William Jackson Palmer.” 72. Ibid.

Colorado College dedicated the Palmer Hall of Science on February 23, 1904, with a crowd of five hundred attending. The Gazette reported that Colorado College President William F. Slocum “formally and impressively” dedicated the building “named after General William J. Palmer because he has been the greatest friend the college has ever known.” Palmer was conferred an honorary degree of doctor of laws during the dedication exercises, which was preceded the day before by a spectacular banquet at the Antlers Hotel, that the newspaper claimed “Was [the] most notable function ever held by [a] Western college.” Colorado College Photo Files (CCPF), Emery photos from Special Collections, Tutt Library, Colorado College, Colorado Springs, Colorado.

Tributes to the Late William J. Palmer From His Fellow Citizens In Colorado Springs Edited by Mary G. Slocum NOTE: This chapter is reprinted with only minor format and spelling revisions to the original version. It is the wish of the trustees of Colorado College that a brief record be published of the witness borne by the fellow citizens of General William Jackson Palmer at the time of his death to his great friendship to the community of which he was the foremost citizen and the College of which he was the founder. The story of his life as a youth, as a valiant soldier, as a pioneer in western railroad engineering, cannot be told here, and only the briefest outline of the last months of his life can be given. On October 27, 1907, General Palmer was thrown from his horse not many miles from his home and sustained injuries from which he never recovered. Until this time he had had unusual health and vigor and took great delight in exercise in the open air, walking and riding many miles each day. During the months that followed this accident, he often had much suffering and always great physical restriction, both of which were borne with great bravery. On March 13, 1909, he died peacefully in his home at Glen Eyrie, surrounded by all the members of his immediate family and a few close friends. The arrangements for the funeral were made in accordance with his own wishes and those of his family for all absence of ostentation, at the same time with the consideration of the public that wished to pay outward respect to the memory of the greatest benefactor the city and the State has ever had. The body was cremated in Denver and on the arrival of the remains at noon on March 17, was met at the station by a large number of personal friends as well as the bearers, Mr. W. • 321 •

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A. Bell, Mr. D. C. Dodge, Mr. T. J. Fisher, Mr. F. Greene, Mr. L. H. Myers, Mr. W. W. Postlethwaite, Mr. W. L. Sclater, Mr. W. F. Slocum and Mr. E. C. Van Diest. Many were also there who, though not personally known to the General, counted themselves as friends because of what he had been to them as a fellow citizen. The faculty of Colorado College formed a body guard on either side of the hearse, while the student body followed it to the grave on foot and with uncovered heads. It was one of Colorado’s glorious typical days. As the long line went on its way to Evergreen Cemetery, though with sad hearts and a sense of irreparable loss, a note of hope and promise for the future was struck, as the great friend of all would have had it, in the suggestion of strength and of promise that came from the hundreds of young lives present for whom and for many students to come after them, he had made so much possible. As they marched on in the sunshine under that clear sky, following all that was mortal of their friend, one could not but feel the immortality of such a service as his life had been. A path of pine boughs led from the main road to the family lot. This lies on the plains facing the mountains and overhung by native pines. One could not conceive of a place more suitable for this last resting place. The lot was entirely covered with flowers laid on pine branches. Immediately surrounding it were the men employed in the Glen Eyrie home and close to this came a circle composed of hundreds of men, women and children, who stood quietly and reverently through the service. General Palmer belonged by birthright to the order of Friends. Though a deeply religious man, he shrank from any expression of religious faith or experience. In the service specially prepared by the Reverend Arthur N. Taft of St. Stephen’s Church, the emphasis was laid upon his great love of justice, his sense of obligation to his fellow men and his inherent modesty and avoidance of any act that seemed in the least to draw attention to his own personality. This was especially marked in the following reading from the Scriptures at the opening of the service: “The righteous live for evermore: their reward also is with the Lord and the care of them is with the Most High.

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“For what doth the Lord require of thee but to do justly and love mercy and to walk humbly with thy God. “If a man be just, and do that which is lawful and right . . . he shall surely live, with the Lord God. “For the righteous Lord loveth righteousness and his face shall behold the thing that is just. “Lord, who shall dwell in thy tabernacle: or who shall rest upon thy holy hill? Even he that leadeth an uncorrupt life: and doeth the thing which is right, and speaketh the truth from his heart. “He that hath used no deceit in his tongue, nor done evil to his neighbor: and hath not slandered his neighbor. “He that setteth not by himself, but is lowly in his own eyes: and maketh much of them that fear the Lord. “He that sweareth unto his neighbor, and disappointeth him not: though it were to his own hindrance. “He that hath not given his money upon usury: nor taken reward against the innocent. “Whoso doeth these things: shall never fall.” The urn containing the ashes was lowered into the grave by General Palmer’s son-in-law, Mr. Leopold H. Myers and by his close friend and business associate of many years standing, Colonel D. C. Dodge of Denver. After the simple service the large crowd dispersed as quietly as it had gathered. Its spirit was singularly unlike that of those who are wont to gather at the grave of a distinguished public man. It seemed rather as if only personal friends were paying their last outward token of love and respect to a dear personal friend. During the day business was suspended in the city and the schools were closed. On the following day a public service was held at 3:00 o’clock in Perkins Hall of Colorado College. Dean Edward S. Parsons presided and the Reverend Arthur N. Taft led the devotional service. Addresses were made by President William F. Slocum, Mr. Irving Howbert and the Reverend James B. Gregg, D.D., all personal friends of General Palmer and each representing a large circle of interests which had been fostered and strengthened by him.

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The addresses are given here in full. President Slocum’s Address A great man has passed out from our midst, but the influence of his life can never go from us. It is very seldom that so much has come from a single person to any city or community as has come to this commonwealth and to this city from the life of General William Jackson Palmer. Whatever he has brought to pass and whatever his generosity has accomplished are the outcome of his character. Grateful as we are for the gifts from his hand, our gratitude is still greater for these traits of his character and that noble manhood which have left to this community ideals of integrity, of citizenship, of personal kindness, of the power of leadership, which are the best contribution that any man can bequeath to others. While we have in mind the gifts without which this institution would not be here today, and which have done so much to transform Colorado Springs into one of the most delightful places of residence in our whole country, we are thinking especially of his character, of his spiritual quality, of his intellectual power, which were expressed in what he did for others. It is most difficult to analyze a character like that of General Palmer. So modest and unassuming, that he never asked anything for himself, he was a statesman who wrought for his country without ever asking any official recognition. He was a soldier who was always at the front and who never asked others to bear heavier burdens than he did, or exposed them to any more serious danger than he himself faced. His imagination created an empire with its cities, its homes, its factories, its educational foundations, where others saw only an arid plain stretching up to barren mountains. With prophetic insight he acted where others hesitated. By what he did we can know his character and those intellectual qualities which ranked him among America’s foremost men. General Palmer was a man of superb courage. He did not know what personal fear was. His sense of justice was the main factor in his character. There was nothing which he sought more earnestly than to be

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absolutely just to every human being. It was this that led him to that unusual act of setting aside, with his business associates, a million dollars from the sale of their railroad property to divide among its employees. This was done because he felt that they had a just claim to it. He never regarded it as an act of philanthropy, but as a payment of a recognized debt. He was a man of unusually clear convictions which were often in advance of his time. They were the result of careful thought and close study of persons and events. He had an accuracy of memory for infinite detail which is rarely equaled and almost never surpassed. His fund of knowledge in regard to a great variety of subjects was phenomenal. It was seldom that one called his attention to a subject of importance without soon finding that already he was familiar with it and had views of value concerning it. The judgments which he passed upon great questions, upon public men and upon large enterprises usually proved in the end to be correct. In any just estimate of his character one must place at the very front his great courtesy and personal kindliness. He was born to command; few men ever possessed greater capacity for leadership than did General Palmer. Soldier and citizen alike felt the power of his commanding personality and delighted to obey him. Instinctively he led and others followed. But however great was this commanding personality, and however far-reaching this power of leadership, he never for one moment lost that marvelous courtesy which impressed itself upon every human being with whom he came in contact. The simplest servant on his place at Glen Eyrie, the most ordinary brakeman on a railroad train, the servant at his table, felt that princely courtesy just as much as the most distinguished guests that were entertained in his home. No trait in all his character more thoroughly exemplified the greatness of this great man than this never-failing, courtly, simple and genuine courtesy, which was the outcome of his inner spiritual life and that great kindliness which he felt for all classes and conditions. His courtesy was the outcome of his great kindliness. No one will ever know who comprised the vast number of people who have experienced the results of his generosity. He never let his left hand know what his right hand was doing, but

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his right hand was ever busy with acts of practical charity. His benevolence was the outcome of a great sympathetic and generous heart which ever considered the personal need of the individual. It was this personal interest in human beings which led to his large gifts. It was because he wanted children happy and everyone to enjoy the beauties of nature and the health that came from out of door life, that he gave our boulevards and our parks and the many paths and drives through the mountains. It was this same personal interest in humanity that made him the founder of this college. Before there was a house on this arid plain he set aside this campus for an institution of learning. When there was nothing here he thought of the unknown men and women who were to be blessed in the years to come by this college. As the pressure upon him of his great enterprises relaxed and he retired as far as possible from the business world, he took much of the time at his command to think and plan for what he wanted the college to be. He studied the plans for its buildings, the arrangement and parking of the campus and the equipment of the laboratories; in fact every detail of the institution was known to him. He asked questions about its students, what they were doing, what became of them, and what service they were rendering to their country. No one more conscientiously attended the meetings of the board of trustees and had clearer views of the individual members of its faculties. Because he knew what the college was and what it might become, he gave to the erection of its buildings and to the creation of its endowment. His life is recorded in the history of the commonwealth in what he did for it. Dr. Gregg’s Address A great English poet has spoken of [William Wordsworth] “That best portion of a good man’s life, His little, nameless, unremembered acts Of kindness and of love.”

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Few lives covering more than three score years and ten have been so rich in such acts of kindness as this life that we remember with gratitude today. There are men of wealth who bestow large sums of money in public munificence which assures the blazoning of their names abroad, but to whom individual needs, the needs of the unknown man or woman―poor, sick or in any sort of trouble―do not appeal. General Palmer, while a far-seeing and most generous benefactor toward public ends―witness Colorado College, Tuskegee College, and our magnificent Colorado Springs park system―abounded also in personal ministries. He made, for example, a most generous annual contribution to our Associated Charities. But he went farther, quietly and privately―he came to the relief of the poor wretch in the grip of the unscrupulous and merciless chattel-mortgage lender, extorting from his victim interest at the rate of 60 percent a year, and loaned to the hapless sufferer the money needed at 5 percent a year. He purchased for the cripple an artificial limb; he paid for the performance of a needed operation by the most competent surgeon, and sent the patient subsequently to a low altitude for several months to recover, paying all bills. He paid rents for widows in destitute circumstances, and helped persons out of financial embarrassment. None of his old comrades in arms coming into stress of need appealed to him in vain. His response to these who sought help was quick and generous. He was reluctant to withdraw his help and sympathy even from those who showed themselves unworthy of it. His disposition was to give them another and another chance. “He was kind to the unthankful and evil,” said one who had served under him during the war, and had known him for nearly a half a century. “He was the most forgiving man I ever knew.” Two magnificent acts made known in a striking way to the world at large his thoughtful care for all who, even in the lowliest capacity, had served under him. One was the distribution, upon the sale of the Rio Grande Western railroad, of a million dollars among all employees of the road, from the superintendent down to the tracklayers. The other was the bringing out to Colorado Springs, and liberal entertainment

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here for five days, of all the surviving members of his old regiment who could come―285 men in all, from 25 states of the Union. Those who saw it will never forget his affectionate remembrance and greeting of each and every one of his old comrades. The wide publication in the newspapers of this princely act of hospitality and kindness to old army men, brought to him many appeals for veterans or their widows from all over the country, and these, too, after proper investigation, did not go unregarded. But those who have been near General Palmer know that these unavoidedly published instances of his personal sympathy with all who had wrought under him, only revealed his thoughtful regard for all who, in private as in more public capacity, were in his employ. There are thousands of persons all over the world today who will echo the words of William Alexander Platt’s grateful tribute in this morning’s Gazette: “Kindness and consideration from him marked every step of our intercourse.” Courtesy was native to him, kindness a law of his being. He was by nature and habit a sharer of all things that he himself enjoyed. I remember from my school days Xenophon’s characterization of the Persian prince, Cyrus; how, when especially delicious viands came upon his table, he would send thereof to his friends, desiring his bearer to say, in presenting them, “Cyrus has been delighted with these, and, therefore, wishes you also to taste of them.” That was General Palmer’s fashion of directing, even when he was abroad, flowers to be sent from his greenhouses to his friends in Colorado Springs; and of sending, as Mr. Platt notes, clippings from newspapers, with marginal comments, or a good jest that he thought his friends would enjoy as he had done. I never had to do with any man who was so prompt and unfailing in replying to every communication and in acknowledging everything that might be construed in the light of a service or a favor. It was a joy to do things for him, because he was so appreciative of every service. He gave generously of his money to all that were in need. But he gave something better, nay, the best, he gave unstintedly himself. And through

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all his beneficence, in the words of the greatest of our American poets [James Russell Lowell], there ran “A graciousness in giving, that did make The smallest gift greatest.” In fine, as I think of this great good man, of his character and his life, there keep flowing into my mind sentences of the good great book, and especially of the Sermon on the Mount, which seems most adequately to portray what he was, the strength and dignity and charm of his nature: “Blessed are the merciful !” “When thou doest alms, let not thy left hand know what thy right hand doeth, that thine alms may be in secret;” “Not until seven times shalt thou forgive, but until seventy times seven;” “Freely ye have received, freely give;” “Do not your righteousness before men to be seen of them;” “Then shall the King say unto them: Come, ye blessed of my father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world; for I was hungry and ye gave me to eat, I was thirsty and ye gave me to drink, I was a stranger and ye took me in, naked and ye clothed me, I was sick and ye visited me, I was in prison and ye came unto me.” Such words suggest what General Palmer was and what he was accustomed to do. Our hearts are heavy today for the loss of one who belonged to us all, who was a common good. We can but Mourn for the man of amplest influence, Our greatest, yet with least pretense; Great in council and great in war, Rich in saving common sense, And, as the greatest only are, In his simplicity sublime. We revere, and while we hear The tides of music’s golden sea Setting toward eternity, Uplifted high in heart and hope are we, Until we doubt not that for one so true

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There must be other nobler work to do, And victor he must ever be. What know we greater than the soul? On God and Godlike men we build our trust. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust, He is gone who seemed so great— Gone; but nothing can bereave him Of the force he made his own, Being here, and we believe him Something far advanced in state. And that he wears a truer crown Than any wreath that man can weave him. Mr. Howbert’s Address The life of General William J. Palmer has been one of the most potent factors of the four decades in the upbuilding of the city of Colorado Springs, the state of Colorado, and the entire west. It has touched and inspired, in almost every line of activity, the growth and the development of this region. Of his remarkable genius, of his charity and philanthropy, of his many benefactions to city and state, of the courage that achieved on the battlefield, and in the struggles of the pioneer west, of his splendid character, of his manhood and his broad humanity— of all these you have heard. There is, however, in another direction something to be said of the imprint which General Palmer left upon his time and generation. In a strictly material sense, there is due to him an everlasting debt of gratitude from the community which owes its very existence and its presentday prosperity to him, and to him almost exclusively. It is fitting that something be said, upon this occasion, to bring to you a realization of the far reaching influence which its founder has exerted in the making and in the molding of the life and character of the city of Colorado Springs. Let us go back to the summer of 1869, when General Palmer made his first visit to this region. Colorado City, then 10 years old, had played an important part in the early history of El Paso County and of the surrounding section, but in the lull that followed the first mining excitement, the town had

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gradually decreased in size until it then had less than one hundred inhabitants. Since the boom days of 1860, there had been no newspaper published in the town. So small was the business over the telegraph line which ran from Denver, that the company kept no operator, but maintained the station only for the purpose of testing the line. At Manitou, there was a single claim cabin built and used by the persons who had taken up a homestead to acquire title to the mineral springs. Cattle, grazing on the hillsides, drank unmolested from the springs, around which no protection had been thrown. The beautiful scenery and splendid climate of the region were known to very few outside of the people of this locality. That part of the present site of Colorado Springs east of Monument creek was entirely unoccupied. Along Shooks Run, a few claims had been taken up, presumably for the purpose of controlling the water that came to the surface, rather than with the object of acquiring title. The land where the town is located had previously been taken up and subsequently abandoned because the poor soil and lack of water gave too little promise of its ever being of value. For years it had been used principally as a grazing pasture for sheep and cattle; at times great herds of antelope roamed over it, and only a year previous hostile Indians had killed three persons within its limits. Most of the valley of the Fountain, for twenty miles below Colorado City, was occupied by ranchmen; considerable land was under cultivation, but the lack of a market made farming unprofitable. The eastern portion of the county was sparsely settled by cattle and sheep men whose herds and flocks wandered over a wide extent of unoccupied country. On the divide, a few sawmills were cutting timber, but there was little profit in the business because it took a week to make a round trip to Denver, the only market for the product. In the entire county there was possibly a total population of 1,000. Wagon roads, largely as nature made them, connected Colorado City with Denver and the south. The ancient trails made by the Spaniards in their early explorations and travels to the north, crossed the townsite of Colorado Springs near or

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possibly over the present College campus. The old Indian trails, straggling in from the east, met at a point on Monument Creek, ran up the valley of the Fountain to the wonderful healing springs, the fame of which had spread among tribes near and far, and there joined to form the historic Ute Pass trail. To this barren and arid plain, to this region apparently lacking in all resources, except the limited ones I have mentioned, in the summer of 1869, came General William J. Palmer. With that clearness of foresight and that remarkable insight into the future, with the prophetic vision of a great empire builder, he realized the unique and the unsurpassed advantages, and saw the tremendous possibilities of this “worthless” flat at the foot of Pikes Peak. Where others had seen nothing that even hinted of future greatness and prosperity, General Palmer pictured a beautiful city and dreamed of a community whose fame should spread with the increasing years to all parts of the globe. On this spot he conceived the Mecca of the tourist, the invalid and the home seeker—the ideal residence city of the continent. After his first visit, General Palmer wrote: “I am sure there will be a famous resort here soon after the railroad reaches Denver.” When his plans became known in Colorado City, there were those who termed them visionary, but others of us saw the great possibilities, and we gave to him in his new work all the assistance in our power. The coming of General Palmer was the turning point in the history of this region. From the day he first rode over the site of the city which is today his proudest monument, practically dates all the prosperity this county has experienced. Seeing, he acted. With his boundless faith in the future of this great, unmeasured west, this energetic clear-sighted pioneer and prophet, this hero of many battles and builder of railroads and communities, mustered the forces which resulted in the founding of the colony and the subsequent development of the Pikes Peak region. He laid the foundation on broad principles; he saw as no one else could see, the possibilities of this region as a health resort; he realized how attractive nature’s wonders could be

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made to the tourist; he appreciated the superior qualities that would make his colony a city of homes. This worthless tract of land he bought. And upon it he laid out a town with broad avenues and ample streets. Each street he lined with trees, and then to supply these trees and the town site with water, he constructed canals and a network of ditches–-all of this without expense to the people. Even as he surveyed the contour of the land, he mapped out the site of Monument Valley Park and laid plans which have given to the city today its magnificent system of parks, driveways and mountain trails. Soon afterwards he established the Out West, the first permanent newspaper to be published in El Paso County. For years he maintained this paper on a very high plane, and sent copies of it broadcast over the world. He instituted an extensive advertising campaign, and news of the unique colony was spread throughout the eastern states. The early literature placed emphasis upon the climate, the mineral waters, the valley farming, the nearby timber, and the general attractiveness of this region. Agents were dispatched through a considerable portion of the middle west, telling of this a proposed colony arid of its peculiar possibilities. The very fact that the town was laid out on such generous lines, and above all, that the liquor clause had been inserted in the deeds to the land, was an invitation to the better class of people only. From the start, those who came here were of the class that is a credit to any community. Among the first arrivals were many who came for lung troubles and other ailments, and who recovering their health, were so charmed with the climate and the beautiful surroundings, that each and every one became an active advertising agent for Colorado Springs. General Palmer had had experience with other frontier towns, and the liquor clause was primarily not a moral, but a practical measure in the broadest sense of the word. As a result of it, the town never experienced that wild life that customarily goes with the early days of most western settlements. The wisdom of General Palmer guided it safely through that stage of western existence, and his wisdom has in this respect proven a valuable factor in determining the growth and the individuality of the city.

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From the beginning, General Palmer was thoroughly identified with the best interests of the community he had established. Mrs. Palmer herself taught the first school ever organized here. He founded Colorado College, set aside land for its campus and himself lifted the first spadeful of earth for the initial building. He made provision whereby a church of every denomination was to receive from the company a building site free of cost. The first buildings to be erected were the hotel for the accommodation of the public, and the offices of the Colorado Springs Company; and immediately after the arrival of the Rio Grande railroad, he established the general offices of the railroad company in this city. He acquired Manitou, and began improvements which in a short time made it known all over the world. The building of his own home in the mountain retreat at Glen Eyrie, made him a part of this region, and after he had finished his great work in the western part of tile United States, and in Mexico, it was to his home here that he came to spend the rest of his life. No matter what the cost, he never failed to act for the best interests of the town. At its inception, General Palmer was not a wealthy man, and he had to interest many of his friends in carrying the load. The company expended, as General Palmer himself has said, more than $200,000 in Colorado Springs and Manitou before the share holders had any return whatever from their investment, and thirteen years elapsed before the company paid a dividend. This of itself shows the broad-minded and liberal policy adopted in his dealings with the city. It shows his deep and abiding faith in the future. Essentially, General Palmer was a great upbuilder. The Rio Grande railroad, which he conceived, and in the conception of which had come the first suggestion of the town in the shadow of Pikes Peak has grown to be one of the most important systems in the west, and has, by its extension into the southern and western parts of the state, had more to do with the development of this vast empire of Colorado than any other single factor, thus confirming his prophetic insight into the future. The little town he located on a barren, sandy flat, with no resources except its healthful climate and attractive scenery, has become

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the beautiful town of homes, wealth and refinement-and it must have been a great source of satisfaction to General Palmer that he lived to see even his most optimistic vision more than fulfilled in the splendid community that has arisen where he planted the first stake. Often when this city was first established, the question was asked: “What is there that should warrant the building of a town at Colorado Springs?” That same question has been asked many times since, and all the time the town has grown steadily and substantially until today it is the third city, in point of population, in the state. In his early letters General Palmer answered the question by giving this as his conception of the Colorado Springs of the future: “The most attractive place for homes in the west a place for schools, colleges, literature, science, first-class newspapers and everything that the above imply.” The city was hewn close to the lines upon which it was conceived. General Palmer was truly the father of the town, not merely its originator and founder. To General Palmer, Colorado owes much, El Paso County still more and Colorado Springs most of all. Colorado Springs was the child of his brain and he followed it step by step until that time came when, because of his wise and careful guidance, it was able to stand alone. In the city of today, the city he crested, fostered and watched through all its youthful days, is the realization of his early prophecy. To the wisdom of his plans, to his clear insight into the future, to his genius as a creator and builder, is due today the present prosperity of this community, a prosperity that rests on as firm and secure a foundation as that of any city in the land. In truth, there are very few factors in the present-day prosperity of Colorado Springs and of El Paso County in which the influence of General Palmer has not been directly or indirectly felt. He will be remembered for many things, but none will shed greater luster on his name than the fact that he founded and builded here at the foot of America’s noblest mountain this beautiful city of homes.

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Resolutions by the Faculty of Colorado College At a meeting of the Faculty of Colorado College, the following resolutions were passed: By the death of General William Jackson Palmer, Colorado College has lost its best friend. At the time the city was founded his far-sighted wisdom saw the opportunity a college could have in Colorado Springs; his thoughtfulness provided for the institution before it came into being; from the beginning his practical sagacity directed its counsels and his lofty ideals determined its character. At every emergency in its development he came to its help, not only with the generous aid of his money, but with the unstinted gift of his time and his unfaltering interest and confidence. The college, with its already notable history and the character and record of the young men and women who have gone out from it, is one of the noblest of all monuments to his prophetic vision and his devotion to the good of those among whom he lived. The survivors of the 15th Pennsylvania Cavalry Regiment decided shortly after the death of their commander, to place a bronze tablet to his memory in Palmer Hall of Colorado College. On the 20th day of October, 1909, this was presented to the authorities of the College by Major Henry McAllister on behalf of the regiment, and received, in the name of the College, by President Slocum. The tablet is three feet by two and is placed in the wall of a main hall in the building. It bears the following inscription: In Loving Remembrance Of General William J. Palmer 15th Pennsylvania Cavalry By The Survivors Of The Regiment 1909

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The public was invited to join the college in the dedication exercises. Several of the old regiment were present and representatives of various veteran organizations and Soldiers’ Relief Societies. The College Hymn, “O God, our help in ages past,” was sung at the opening of the exercises and “My country! ’tis of thee,” at the close. Dean Edward S. Parsons led in the prayer of dedication. The addresses are given in full. Major McAllister’s Address I am sure that upon none save the immediate members of his family, did the death of General William J. Palmer fall with a greater weight of sorrow than upon his old comrades in arms of the Fifteenth Pennsylvania cavalry. Each one of the surviving members felt that he had sustained a severe personal bereavement. Each of them felt that the strongest link in the great chain of eternal order that connected him with a memorable and glorious past had been broken; each was brought face to face with a realizing sense of the stern certainty that in a few, a very few, years all of those who took an active part in the work of those tremendous days of 1861—65, when a man could live a lifetime every 24 hours, will see the last of earth. The members of General Palmer’s regiment never looked upon the General in the light in which he was viewed by those whose acquaintance with him originated after the war. They did not think of him as the capitalist, the great man of business, the philanthropist. To them he was still their dashing and gallant colonel. They pictured him in their minds during the last forty odd years as they saw him during the war at the head of their regiment, rushing along with unexampled celerity over the mountains, across the rivers and through the corn and cotton fields of ten great states. Owing to General Palmer’s prominence as a young man in Pennsylvania, when the war broke out, his high standing as an attaché of the Pennsylvania railroad and the private secretary of its president, he attracted to his command a body of young men who more nearly resembled the cavaliers who were led

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by Prince Rupert, than the praying, psalm-singing round-heads who followed Cromwell. They were, as a rule, very young men. They came largely from mercantile establishments—some were the sons of farmers, whilst a large number left the schools, colleges and universities of Pennsylvania to join the regiment. These young men had probably felt fewer of the restraints of civil life than most young men of that period. They were spoiled boys, as it were. To fit them to the procrustean bed of a military life was therefore no easy task. They naturally at first resented strict camp regulations and the discipline imposed upon them as unnecessary. They had joined the army to fight, and not unceasingly to drill and parade and to perform guard and fatigue duty. To meet such a condition no man was ever better equipped than General Palmer. A natural dignity of character and manner; unyielding firmness without a trace of truculence; the exaction of implicit obedience to every order; justice administered with unusual judgment, with absolute disregard of rank in the regiment or previous station in civil life; blindness to such youthful and harmless peccadilloes as did not impinge upon military efficiency, soon brought about the most perfect order and discipline in camp. In the field nothing was needed but a leader, and they had in General Palmer such a leader as few cavalry regiments ever had. A soldier fears timid, incompetent leadership, a costly and stupid blunder such as directed the charge of the 600 at Balaklava. General Palmer’s conduct as a soldier was marked by a prudent temerity. He believed and always acted upon the belief that a vigorous, unhesitating attack was conducive to the safety of his command. Many times his prisoners were surprised and mortified to find that they had been captured and their forces scattered by a body of men perhaps a third of theirs in number. General Palmer once parried a question touching the strength of his command put to him by a prominent Confederate general who had been captured together with nearly the whole of his command, giving as a reason that his prisoner’s feelings might be hurt at learning that his captor’s numbers were insignificant

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as compared with his and that it might discredit him in southern military circles. Despite General Palmer’s splendid record as a soldier in the Civil War, he was essentially a man of peace. He believed that war was a fragment of savagery inherited from remote ages. He told me in Philadelphia in 1862, and repeated the remark to me at Glen Eyrie a year before his death, that he strongly favored the purchase by the government of every slave in the south at twice or thrice their market value, if necessary, in order to avert war. When he became convinced that nothing but a dissolution of the Union and the formation of a new nation with slavery as its corner stone would satisfy southern statesmen, he despaired of avoiding war and joined the army. It was owing to his radical views in favor of peace that he was nominated as a candidate for the presidency of the United States in 1900 by a party whose views coincided with his. As a late incident showing his repugnance to war, I will state that a short time prior to his death, a number of General Palmer’s military friends in Colorado urged him to become a member of the military order of the Loyal Legion of the United States, an organization composed of commissioned officers who served with credit in the war for the preservation of the Union. The general expressed his entire willingness to join the organization, and all the preliminary papers were prepared. In order that he might fully understand the objects and aims of the organization, I sent with the papers a copy of the constitution of the order. He returned the latter next day with the statement that one clause sounded a little too warlike to be supported by a member of the Peace society and asked if the objectionable paragraph could be suspended as to him. Immediately after this he started on his last trip to England, and the matter was finally dropped. Friends, I have already trespassed too much upon your time, and have perhaps departed too far from the business that has called us together. But for my prolixity I take refuge behind the words of Burke: “Pardon the garrulity of age, which loves to diffuse itself in discourse of the departed great.” At my years

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we live in retrospect alone. Unfitted for vigorous life, we enjoy the best balm to all wounds, the consolation of friendship in those only whom we have lost forever. After General Palmer’s death the survivors of his regiment whose names are attached to this memorial tablet, after some thought as to what should best be done to give physical expression to their love and reverence for their dead colonel, concluded to prepare a tablet to his memory. There could be no controversy over the location. Where could there be a more suitable place than Palmer Hall—this fine building that bears his name—of Colorado College, for the foundation of which he cast the first spadeful of earth, and which has been the recipient of his many munificent gifts for its support and future growth, the practical evidence of his love and partial care; in the city of Colorado Springs which he founded and adorned; within sight and sound of the railroad constructed by his genius; within the shadow of the mountains whose resources, discovered and developed by him, have enriched a continent. I have just received the following message from the regimental organization in Philadelphia, which I take pleasure in reading: “PHILADELPHIA, PA., October 20, 1909.

“Major Henry McAllister:

“DEAR COMRADE—It seems fitting as you gather together, that some word should be spoken for those who are far away, but who are interested in your proceedings this day. “Forty years after the great conflict which called us together as an organization, William J. Palmer paid his greatest tribute to the men of his old command in the concluding paragraph of his ‘Introductory’ to the published history of the Fifteenth Pennsylvania cavalry, ‘That I am proud to have commanded and to have since retained the respect and confidence of such a body of men goes without saying.’ “The pent up feeling of that old regiment goes out today in the inscription upon the tablet you dedicate ‘In loving remembrance of General William J. Palmer.’ “We can not be with you on this occasion—very many things prevent a second march by the old regiment upon Colorado Springs, but as you conclude your ceremonies, you may look around and in

SLOCUM • 341 your fancy see the old command assembled and mark their nods of approval to this, the last tribute to our beloved commander. “Our ranks have thinned since those memorable days. “Very many of the boys who rode with us at Antietam, Stone River, Tullahoma, Chickamauga, Sequatchie, in our first Tennessee campaign at Dandridge, Mossy Creek, Sevierville, the Atlanta campaign, the capture of Hood’s pontoon train, the second east Tennessee campaign, and the pursuit of Jefferson Davis, have passed on to the other side and joined the great majority; and yet in all these years, remembering the lessons we learned in those early days, we have the most splendid and complete organization of any veteran regiment of the great war; a marked monument to our old commander and the genius of his faithful lieutenant, Colonel Betts. “In those early days we had not learned to fully appreciate the character of our colonel, but as time went by, and as the regiment developed under his careful training—his military genius, his wonderful knowledge and memory of men and things, and the perfect confidence the men had in his leadership and his great bravery, all showed to us that William J. Palmer was no ordinary man. “As time goes on and the remnants of the grand old army melt away, very much of that great struggle will have been forgotten. The deeds and heroism of particular regiments and men will have passed out of mind, and only the great and momentous events of that war will stand out before the coming generations—then this tablet will be ‘In loving remembrance to General William J. Palmer.’ “But until the last man of the old ‘Anderson cavalry’ shall have been ‘mustered out,’ and shall have answered to the reveille above, the memory of William J. Palmer, his valor, his patriotism, his unflinching devotion to duty, his care for the men of his command, and above all his great services to his country, will ever be kept alive, and then this tablet will stand ‘In loving remembrance of General William J. Palmer.’ “The services of General Palmer as a citizen, particularly to his adopted state and city, can be better told by others than by his old comrades, but Palmer as a soldier and as a man can not be better understood than by the perusal of those letters written to his uncle during his connection with the regiment, and one particular letter, dated February 12, 1865, should be painted in letters of gold and placed in the archives of Colorado College, where you are now unveiling the tablet to his memory. “The officers of our association, in submitting this tribute to the memory of General Palmer, feel that they are giving expression to

342 • TRIBUTES the sentiments of every survivor of our regiment, and that no words could be written that would place too high an estimate on the service he rendered his country in the great war of 1861 to 1865, as a cavalry commander of great ability and unswerving determination to do his best for the suppression of the rebellion and the preservation of the Union—the cause for which we all fought. SMITH D. COZENS, Vice President. JOHN F. CONAWAY, Secretary. THEOP. H. SMITH, Treasurer. CHARLES H . KIRK, Assistant Secretary. REV. W. H. GRAFF, Chaplain. “We extend our greeting, and heartfelt best wishes to all assembled at this unveiling. “Yours fraternally, “JOHN F. CONAWAY, Secretary.”

Mr. President, members of the faculty and students of Colorado College: As the mouthpiece, and in the name of the few members of General Palmer’s regiment who are present; in the name of the greater number who are not here, but whose thoughts flowing in from 35 states are about us at this moment, I present to Colorado College a tablet in memory of General William J. Palmer, with a list of all the surviving members of his regiment. We are not ignorant of the fact that the best monuments to his memory are the splendid and durable buildings which stand upon and adorn this campus; the city of which they are so important a part, and the hundreds of millions of wealth, the product of the peace he loved so well, flowing out of every pass and cañon in the wondrous mountains over the lines of railroad projected and built by him; but if a glance at this tablet should bring to the minds of the present and future students of Colorado College the name of him who so unselfishly aided them, through their alma mater, and arouse in them an ambition to take the greatest possible advantage of the opportunities he has placed before them to become good, intelligent and useful men and women, then this tablet will not have been placed here in vain.

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RESPONSE BY PRESIDENT SLOCUM. In behalf of the Board of Trustees, the Faculty and students of Colorado College, I thank the members of the Fifteenth Pennsylvania Cavalry for entrusting this institution with this memorial tablet. It is both sacred and pleasant to have placed on the walls of this building, which bears the name of “Palmer Hall,” this bronze which will ever remind those who pass this way of him whom we love and honor. In the years to come thousands of young men and women will read these words: “In loving remembrance of General William J. Palmer,” and think of our great and true friend who has gone and of you who have placed this inscription on these walls. It will make them think of the country which they too are to serve, and because of it they will be nobler, braver and more generous in word and deed. This flag which has veiled your tablet, is the one he gave when the regiment occupied the college residences, and during your stay here as his guests it floated over the college campus. It seems most fitting that it should greet us here today, recalling once again his loyalty to the highest interests of the country and his unfailing fidelity to those whom he loved. In the name of Colorado College we accept this trust and we hope that in all time to come this institution, which he founded, will cherish his memory in loving remembrance. Though these tributes express inadequately the honor and affection his fellow citizens have to General Palmer, it is a satisfaction to the authorities of the college to have them placed in permanent form.

Last Will & Testament of William J. Palmer Nov. 5th, 1908. I, William J. Palmer, of Glen Eyrie, near Colorado Springs, Colorado, being of sound and disposing memory, do make, publish and declare this my last Will and Testament, as follows:— 1. I hereby revoke all other Wills and Codicils by me heretofore made. 2. I direct my Executors hereinafter made, first to pay my lawful debts and funeral expenses. 3. I direct my Executors to purchase Annuities in favor of the following parties for their respective lives, securities that will yield them the income set opposite their names respectively, selling such of my securities as they may deem best with which to acquire such Annuities, to wit:— To my sister-in-law Emma H. Palmer, $60. per month. To Ida S. Weir, $50. per month. To Josephine P. Lippincott, $30. per month. To Martha S. Cowgill, in trust for my cousin William Cowgill, $25. per month. To Clara Palmer Bellows, $15. per month. To Mary E. Craig, $10 per month. To Gloria Hunt, daughter of the late Governor A. C. Hunt of Colorado, $20. per month. To Joseph P. Harper, $10. per month. 4. I direct my Executors to pay over to Cecile Jacobeit of Glen Eyrie, Colorado Springs, Securities which I may possess at the time of my decease of the value of $50,000. 5. I direct my Executors to pay over to Thomas J. Fischer of Colorado Springs, Securities which I may possess at the time of my decease of the value of $25,000. 6. I direct my Executors to pay over to Jesse J. Shea of Colorado Springs, Securities which I may possess at the time of my decease of the value of $5,000. • 344 •

7. I direct my Executors to pay over to Grace Field of Colorado Springs, Securities which I may possess at the time of my decease of the value of $5,000. 8. I direct my Executors to pay over to Eva R. Cooper of Colorado Springs, Securities which I may possess at the time of my decease of the value of $2,000. (Clause 9 omitted.) 10. I direct my Executors to pay over to Beatrice Every of Colorado Springs, Securities which I may possess at the time of my decease of the value of $20,000. 11. I direct my Executors to pay over to Gladys Young of Colorado Springs, Securities which I may possess at the time of my decease of the value of $100,000. 12. I direct my Executors to pay over to Gwendolin Young, now of Telluride, Securities which I may possess at the time of my decease of the value of $30,000. 13. I direct my Executors to pay over to Clark Mellen of Colorado Springs, Securities which I may posses at the time of my decease of the value of $50,000, in addition to releasing him from any indebtedness that he may now, November 1908, owe me. 14. I direct my Executors to pay over to each of the daughters of my uncle, the late Francis H. Jackson of Philadelphia, Securities which I may possess at the time of my decease of the value of $10,000. 15. I direct my Executors to pay over to my brother-in-law Nat. Mellen of New York, Securities which I may possess at the time of my decease of the value of $50,000. 16. I direct my Executors to pay over to Emma F. Jackson of Philadelphia, widow of my cousin John Jackson, Securities which I may possess at the time of my decease of the value of $5,000. 17. I give, devise and bequeath unto the daughters of my father-in-law, the late W.P. Mellen of Colorado Springs, as follows: Maud S. Van Oostveen of London, Securities which I may possess at the time of my decease of the value of $75,000. To Helen S. Flower of England, Securities which I may possess at the time of my decease of the value of $50,000. To Charlotte S. Sclater, Securities which I may possess at the time of my decease of the value of $50.000. To Daisy S. Sharman, Securities which I may possess at the time of my decease of the value of $50,000. • 345 •

346 • LAST WILL & TESTAMENT 18. To such servants as my daughters may select, Securities which I may possess at the time of my decease of the value of $5,000. 19. All the rest, remainder and residue of my estate, whether real, personal or mixed, whensoever or , or wheresoever, except such as I hereinafter bequeath to my executors, I give, devise and bequeath unto my daughters, Elsie Myers, Dorothy Palmer, Marjory Palmer equally, share and share alike. In case of the previous death of any of my daughters, leaving lawful issue them surviving, such issue shall represent the respective parent and take the share she would have taken if living at my death, share and share alike per stirpes and not per capita. 20. I hereby give, devise and bequeath unto each of the executors of this my last will and testament, securities of the value of as stated below: George Foster Peabody of Lake George, New York, $50,000. Chase Mellen of New York City, $50,000. George A. Krause of New York City, $50,000. In lieu of all legal fees as executors, but with the option of accepting such legal fees in place of these respective bequests, should the fees exceed the bequests. 21. In case any of the beneficiaries specified above (excepting those to whom I bequeath annuities), should not be living at the time of my decease, the securities set opposite his or her name shall be paid to his or her children and be divided among them equally, per stirpes and not per capita. 22. In case my Executors should deem it best to sell any of my estate, real, personal or mixed, I give and grant unto them full power to do so as they think best respectively, at public or private sale, at such time or times as they may deem most beneficial to my estate, provided that the final distribution shall not be unduly prolonged, and that the primal consideration shall be the welfare of the beneficiaries hereunder. 23. I direct my Executors to pay over to the several beneficiaries named herein such interest upon the securities or property to which they may be actually or approximately entitled hereunder, as will yield them in their opinion an income equivalent to what the respective securities or property may yield at, or shortly after, my decease. 24. I appoint George Foster Peabody of Lake George, New York, Chase Mellen of New York City and George A. Krause of New York City, Executors of this my last will and testament.

WILLIAM J. PALMER • 347 In Witness Whereof, I have hereunto set my hand and seal, this fifth day of November, 1908. WM. J. PALMER. (Seal.) with ribbon tied into all of the sheets American Consular service fee stamps $5 and $2. Cancelled, Consulate General U.S.A. London, November 5, 1908. Signed, sealed, published and declared by the testator in our presence and in the presence of each of us, as and to be his last will and testament, and we thereupon at his request and in his presence, and in the presence of each of us, have hereto subscribed our names as witness, the day and year above stated by the testator. RICHARD WESTACOTT, United States Vice Consul General, London, England.

CHRISTINA ELIZABETH LACY, “Wood Dalling,” St. Martha’s, Guildford, England. GEORGE BROMLEY, Colorado Springs, Colorado, U.S.A. Colorado Springs Gazette, March 23, 1909.

William Jackson Palmer, photographed in San Francisco by Tabor studio, and Queen Mellen Palmer, photographed by Vanderweyde studio, of London. Courtesy of Starsmore Center for Local History at the Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum.

“Can You Not Give Up Some?” Cast of Historical Characters (in order of appearance)

Narrators

(in person, alternating)

Catherine Collins & Rick W. Sturdevant General William Jackson Palmer (in multiple portrait puppets)

Stephen Collins

Mary Lincoln Mellen “Queen” Palmer (in multiple portrait puppets)

Katherine Scott Sturdevant Miss Rose Kingsley

(in a portrait puppet strangely resembling Susan B. Anthony)

Stephen Collins

Miss Elsie Palmer (portrayed live)

Miss Elise Collins (age 9) Puppet and set design and direction Stephen Collins & the ensemble a capella vocals Katherine Scott Sturdevant Backstage and properties management Miss Elise Collins

“Can You Not Give Up Some?” Stephen Collins & Katherine Scott Sturdevant The 2005 Pikes Peak Regional History Symposium concluded with this unique historical presentation through puppetry of the interactions between William Jackson Palmer and his wife, Queen, based on passages from the original writings of Palmer, Queen, and people of their world. The puppets are made from original head-and-shoulders photographs and portraits of the historical figures, electronically enlarged, printed on card stock, cut to make working mouths, and thus authentically representing the historical actors’ own faces at different stages of life. The puppet “stage” is black curtains hung from a structure of plastic pipes so that the puppets rise above the curtains. The backdrops of historical scenery are enlarged-and-mounted photographs hung behind and above the puppets. [Civil War William Jackson Palmer puppet (WJP) enters.] Narrator: The year is 1865. Brigadier General William Jackson Palmer, paragon and paradox, distinguished leader of Union soldiers and cavalry in the Civil War and Quaker in belief and conviction, seeks adventure and prosperity in the western frontier. He throws himself into railroading, following a life-long passion. He travels to and from England and learns all that he can about the science and economics of railroading. He is a man of idealism: WJP: The young American…starts out full of courage and hope . . . to acquire the cheap land, and build himself a home in the West. He leaves behind friends and kindred, resolved to achieve fortune and consequence, and then to return East to marry and carry his wife to the new land. He is enterprising and full of faith. He knows that his adopted State or Territory will soon become populous, and contain large cities and all the comforts and luxuries he has left in the East. He hastens to seize the rich soil, the forest of timber, the coal field, the iron, copper or lead mine, the fine water-power or the promising town-site, which have remained since creation untouched in that country of hope. [Civil War WJP puppet exits.] • 349 •

350 • “CAN YOU NOT GIVE UP SOME?” [1864 Queen-as-girl puppet enters.] Narrator: That same year, an independently minded girl of fifteen who lost her mother when she was only four years of age writes an essay detailing her thoughts on the place on women in society: Q: Anyone who despairs of the women of the present day, let him compare us with our grandmothers, and see if we, if thrown on our own resources are not more capable of supporting and making ourselves useful, than the young women of that day. Where was the Florence Nightingale of their time, to say nothing of the noble women of one’s own country, yes, even of our own city, who have found a noble object and filled an important place in this war. Neither do I agree . . . that women must marry to live, or that an intelligent man marries a woman for the sake of securing a good cook, seamstress, or nurse. More today than ever is a woman a companion for a man. Less today than ever is the term, “old maid” used as a term of reproach; for an agreeable intelligent maiden lady has a position of her own, and is gladly welcomed every where as an acquisition to society. While the vocation of wife and mother is the most beautiful to which a woman can be called, it is not necessarily the only one, that one need be either useless or wretched to whom that calling does not come. [1864 Queen-as-girl puppet exits.] [WJP-as-businessman and Queen as fiancée puppets enter.] Narrator: The year is 1869. General Palmer, on a business trip while supervising the construction of the Kansas-Pacific Railroad, meets William Proctor Mellen and his daughter, Queen. His reaction is remarkable though we do not know what he said exactly at that meeting. WJP: You shake my nerves and you rattle my brain. You break my will. Oh, what a thrill. Goodness gracious, great balls of fire. Narrator: However, we know that he did not say that. WJP: Well, she certainly is very pretty. [Queen as fiancée puppet exits.] Narrator: Within a month, William Palmer and Queen Mellen were engaged. Although William traveled frequently and Queen resided in Flushing, New York, and Washington, D.C., he regularly scheduled trips to see her as his letters and calling cards reflect. We can only speculate as to Queen’s reactions. WJP: It looks now as though I would be compelled to go East (sad

COLLINS & STURDEVANT • 351 fate!) much sooner than I supposed when I left you. If this should prove to be the case, shall I come and see you in Flushing—or will you be so busy with singing teachers, etc. that it would not be an agreeable interruption—as I have not had the pleasure of receiving a letter from you for some time. [Palmer as businessman puppet exits; Queen as bride puppet enters.] Q: Well if he just stayed still long enough, he might get a letter. . . . Narrator: Because of the general’s unpredictable travel and business schedule, she never entirely knew when he might show up. We can imagine her reactions to his calling cards. Q: Twenty minutes! Twenty minutes! Can you believe it?! Listen to this: “Miss Mellen—If I call in 20 minutes will you ride to the Capital? Yours respectfully.” If I didn’t love that man. . . . Narrator: At times she didn’t even have that luxury. Q: What?! Outside the door? Right now? Listen to this: “Miss Mellen, It is such a splendid afternoon. Won’t you take a ride to Arlington Heights. The carriage is at the door.” At the door! I feel like Juliet to his Romeo! Meet me on the balcony; meet me at the friar’s cell. Juliet, let’s go to Arlington Heights. . . . Narrator: At other times, he would not show up when he was eagerly anticipated and on one such occasion, we do know what Queen said. Sunday, May 30th, 1869: Q: My Dear Will . . . You may imagine my disappointment on the receipt of your note Saturday—still, I suppose I may as well get used to these sudden moves of yours and accept my fate with mild resignation—I had anticipated such a pleasant Sunday! However—I know it was right for you to go—and where duty interferes with pleasure, pleasure must always give way and I shall always try to make it easy, instead of difficult as I have done on two or three occasions, where you were so strong that I was ashamed of my weakness . . . [Queen as bride puppet exits; Palmer as businessman puppet enters.] Narrator: The distance between them also might have taken a toll on them, but if it did it was tempered with good humor. WJP: There is a very pretty young lady on the opposite seat at whom I steal a glance now and then to see whether or not she is still there. Is not that right? It would be too bad you know if she were to fall out of the window . . . and nobody know it in time to intercept her. I suppose by rights I ought to get acquainted with her—but such sad

352 • “CAN YOU NOT GIVE UP SOME?” consequences followed from an acquaintance formed once in a railroad car that I naturally hesitate to renew the experiment—although it is true this Missouri girl is not quite as charming as the other one, and there might not be the same dangers. [Palmer as businessman puppet exits; Queen as bride puppet enters.] Narrator: Her reactions to his humor are not known to us. What was she thinking? Q: My dearest Will, I hope you were at least a gentleman and offered your assistance to her as needed, particularly in opening her window as wide as it would go. . . . Narrator: As I said, we do not know what her reaction was. Q: All right, all right . . . it was just a thought. . . . Narrator: Will would often reflect on the power she had over him and his thoughts, tastes, and expectations. [Palmer as businessman puppet enters.] WJP: What a singular effect you have had—you must be a witch to do so surely upon all my thoughts and plans and expectations in life. What a fortunate circumstance if our tastes shall agree as well about most things. Where they do not, what shall be done? Will you conform to mine or shall I conform to yours? I know a better way than either. We will each learn to appreciate the taste of the other. . . . Goodbye darling, Will. Q: Oh, Will, I will always let my will conform to your will. I know well, Will, that my will will do well if it will well wield willingly to your will, if you will it, Will. If not, Will, then oh well. . . . [Queen as bride puppet exits.] Narrator: At times, her power to consume his thoughts and move his passion was clearly documented in his letters to her. WJP: Love me tender, love me true. . . . All my dreams fulfilled. . . . Narrator: Though this was clearly not one of them. WJP: For my darlin’ I love you . . . and I always will. . . . Narrator: Ahem! WJP: Oh, ahem. . . . August 8th, 1869: My Darling Queen . . . How I wish I had you sitting on my lap . . . with my arm around your waist. . . . [Queen as bride puppet enters.] Q: Oh, Will!

COLLINS & STURDEVANT • 353 WJP: . . . (to prevent you from losing your balance you know) . . . [I] might presume to take a kiss . . . Q: Goodness! WJP: —just to show you now much I love you . . . my fresh, charming, loving, honest-hearted little sweetheart! Q: Well! WJP: August 9, 1869 . . . I wonder if you will be just out of your bath again and open a door the least bit to give me a kiss, with your hair all in a tangle (as I love to have it, you know) or will you be all dressed and fixed up proper— Q: As if you need to ask! WJP: —and looking so great and complete that I will fear to touch you, Dear One I hope not! I hope you will belong to me hair and all— without reservations in consequence of dress, earrings, breastpin, or any other interfering element. Will you Darling? Q: Will, now is not the time to ask. I have the feeling that somehow we’re being watched . . . by about 160 people. . . . WJP: I am almost afraid of you when you are all dressed up—whereas when I catch you in my arms and treat you like my own child, I wonder if I don’t love you more—can you tell. [Palmer as businessman puppet exits.] Q: Will, I love you, too, my dearest. Now, go and have a long, cold shower. . . . [Queen as bride puppet exits.] Narrator: When William was traveling apart from his Queen, his letters reflected not only a western idealism, but also a vision of idyllic companionship and married life in the West. In one letter written from Denver on July 28, 1869, William reflected on the castle he was going to build for Queen near the Garden of the Gods, similar to a painting of a house in Dunkeld, Scotland, of which they were both so fond. [Palmer as businessman puppet enters.] WJP: The Castle should be on one of the bold pine-topped hills near the mountain foot, and the farm-houses in the smooth rounded valleys; how there should be fountains and lakes, and lovely drives and horseback trails through groves—all planned and planted by ourselves—so that “Dunkald” would grow up under our own eyes, the child of our fancy and creation.

354 • “CAN YOU NOT GIVE UP SOME?” Narrator: It was an idyllic vision which, of course, included a railroad. January 17th, 1870: WJP: I had a dream last evening while sitting in the gloaming at the car window. I mean a wide-awake dream. Shall I tell it to you? I thought how fine it would be to have a little railroad a few hundred miles in length, all under one’s own control with one’s friends, to have no contests and jealousies and differing policies, but to be able to carry out unimpeded and harmoniously one’s views in regard to what ought and ought not to be done. Narrator: It was a vision which included Queen at his side in their own private railway car. WJP: Then I would have a nice house-car made, just convenient for you and me, with perhaps a telegraph operator and secretary, to travel up and down when business demanded, and this car should contain every convenience of living while in motion . . . [Queen as bride puppet enters.] Q: [With a tiny hint of tired sarcasm] Up and down, and up and down, and up and down. . . . Narrator: It perhaps too idyllically envisioned a balance between the general’s work schedule and his home schedule. WJP: . . . everything would go along so smoothly that it would not be necessary to devote a very large proportion of the time to business. About five hours each day would suffice, with ample margin for going off when desired. Q: Dare I even dream it? [Queen as bride puppet exits.] Narrator: The vision also described a utopian civic life with libraries, lectures, schools, and bathhouses and complete harmony among families and workers and industrial leaders. WJP: . . . there should never be any strikes or hard feelings among the laborers toward the capitalists, for they would all be capitalists themselves in a small way, and be paid enough to enable them to save something, and those savings they should be furnished with opportunities of investing in and along the Road, so that all their interests should be the same as their employers’. [Palmer as businessman puppet exits.] Narrator: Queen’s precise reaction to Will’s vision has been the subject of

COLLINS & STURDEVANT • 355 much speculation. Did she embrace Will’s vision or did she simply submit to it begrudgingly? One of her staunchest critics, journalist Marshall Sprague, argued that Queen didn’t share his vision and also questions whether she felt a deep and abiding love for him. His views during the 1940s had a lasting, biased, and negative impact on how we view Queen. For Marshall Sprague, Queen was nothing more than an opportunist. Narrator: Other accounts and other historians, however, developed a different opinion. Queen was not an opportunist simply seeking Palmer’s promise of wealth, but a young woman thoroughly in love with the mature, thoughtful, and morally reflective general who shared a passion for Queen and the west they would build together. Though any correspondence Queen may have had with Will at the time is not known at this time, one letter Palmer sent to Queen two months before her first visit to Colorado openly confirms that she shared his enthusiasm for his westward vision and dream. [Palmer as businessman puppet enters.] WJP: February 4th, 1870: You do not know how glad I was to find that you believe in and sympathize with my “dream at the car window.” We will talk it over fully and have the finest sort of time when you come out, working it up in detail, but your letter has almost determined me. I have taken, indeed, a sort of preliminary step; it is so confidential yet that I hardly dare whisper it to myself, but I have laid the smallest first flooring in the way of, or rather looking to, an organization independent of the Kansas Pacific and all other parties except my personal friends, of the North and South railroad of which I have written to you . . . [Palmer as businessman puppet exits.] Narrator: Any attempt to fault Queen for having doubts about her upcoming future in the west must also recognize that Palmer himself also shared in some of that doubt. The general was forced to acknowledge in letters written on the 14th and 15th of May in 1870 that less than one month after her trip to Colorado, Indians had killed more than a dozen of Palmer’s men working on the Kansas-Pacific Railroad. [Palmer as businessman puppet enters.] WJP: To think how recently you and I rode over that same ground a few weeks ago in the moonlight and I came over it again but a few days ago with my gun out of order, as I ascertained when I undertook to shoot an antelope. How careless one becomes after a long exemption from hostilities [sigh]. . . . How I rejoice that you got through the country in safety. It makes me tremble though, sometimes, when I think of the risk.

356 • “CAN YOU NOT GIVE UP SOME?” [Palmer as businessman puppet exits.] Narrator: These letters indicate that Palmer and Queen both shared the vision and the concern over life in the frontier. One showed that Queen shared Palmer’s vision and the other showed that Palmer felt concern over the risks. There is not evidence that Queen ever felt more trepidation above and beyond that of her husband or trusted her general less. In fact, who might she trust as an escort more than a former cavalry general? [Queen as bride puppet enters.] Q: He looked dashing in his uniform. [Queen as bride puppet exits; WJP as businessman puppet enters.] WJP: I look dashing? Mental note: send uniform to the cleaners tomorrow. . . . Narrator: Palmer was sure that his upcoming marriage to Queen was ordained by God and he dotingly expressed his confidence to his Queen, his “dear child.” September 10th, 1870: WJP: My Queen. . . . You are mistaken my dear child in thinking that you will be excited when our marriage occurs—God has already joined us together and it will be nothing new when the minister announces it. [WJP as businessman puppet exits.] Narrator: Queen eagerly waited for the day when she would be married with complete love and devotion for her husband-to-be and protector. October 1870: [Queen as bride puppet enters.] Q: My beloved. . . . Only one page tonight, to tell you that I am well and that I love you with all my heart—It is late and I am very, very tired—God bless my Will and keep him always—my prayers are all yours—my soul itself lives but for you—dear Love Goodnight—your own little girl. [Queen as bride puppet exits.] Narrator: General William Jackson Palmer and Mary Lincoln Mellen Palmer were married on November 8, 1870 in Flushing, New York. On November 9, William and his wife Queen departed for England arriving eleven days later on the morning of November 20 in Liverpool. Will’s affection for his wife grew with each passing day. It is December, 1870. [WJP as businessman puppet enters.]

COLLINS & STURDEVANT • 357 WJP: [Queen] is very well and happy and becomes a favorite with everyone who meets her, as she ought to. She is a great contrast with the well-reserved English girls . . . and takes by storm, the hearts of the numerous friends we are making here . . . from the day I first met Queen, I have formed a higher opinion of her character the longer I knew her. And now I respect, admire and love her more than ever before. This is a different thing from love at first sight . . . like all really good things, her character and her heart gain by a more thorough acquaintance. [WJP as businessman puppet exits.] Narrator: Although her affection for Will was idyllic, Queen knew that their honeymoon was also an opportunity for her new husband to foster new business connections which would advance his entrepreneurial interests in railroading. Her diary entries for December foreshadow the life she will lead for the first ten years of her marriage. She wrote her entries curiously in the third person. [Queen as bride puppet enters.] Q: December 3, Saturday, Queen temporarily good, having a box of candy. December 5, Monday, Remained at home while Will went to keep some business engagements in the city. I sang all the morning. December 15, Thursday, Spent the evening playing bisique and singing. I was victorious in my game as usual. December 18, Sunday, Wrote letters, after which Will read to me Robertson’s sermon on “heaven.” Queen took nap. [WJP as businessman puppet enters.] WJP: And I might add that she took her nap after I finished reading the sermon. . . . [WJP as businessman puppet exits.] Q: December 25, Sunday, In the morning I found Kriss Kringle had really been to my stocking for I found a beautiful watch in it! I told Will to thank Santa Claus for me, if he should ever meet him, which he promised to do. [WJP as businessman puppet enters; Queen as bride puppet exits.] WJP: And I did. And I also asked the jolly ol’ soul about the possibility of running a rail line up from Cheyenne to the North Pole where I’d be happy to build a railway station just outside of town. . . . He said he’d get back to me.

358 • “CAN YOU NOT GIVE UP SOME?” Narrator: Upon returning from their honeymoon, Palmer left Queen in Flushing, New York, while he prepared a proper home for his young wife in Colorado. WJP: July 7th, 1871: [Dear Queen] Ask your father whether it would not be well for him to go to government second-hand store-house, Park Place, or elsewhere in New York to obtain some tents to use until the house is completed. It would be pleasanter and cheaper than hotel life, even if the hotel were completed in time, which is doubtful. . . . I suggest one hospital tent for dining-room, one wall tent and one shelter tent for kitchen and servants, three wall tents for sleeping. I send you the plan of house and dimensions by this mail. [WJP as businessman puppet exits.] Narrator: Queen must have looked forward daily to her letters from Will. [Queen as bride puppet enters.] Q: I do look forward to his letters of endearment. “July 10, 1871. . . . In order to extirpate the snakes in Glen Eyrie I have directed James to procure a sow and four pigs and turn them loose. . . .” Pigs? [WJP as businessman puppet enters.] WJP: Yes, pigs. They go for them snakes like a thousand bricks whenever they see one. [WJP as businessman puppet exits.] Q: Snakes? [Queen as bride puppet exits.] Narrator: Queen arrived at Glen Eyrie in October of 1871 with her father, stepmother, and six half-brothers and sisters while Will was away on business. They lived in temporary housing—tents, lofts, and a stable—until the house was completed early in the winter of the next year. In the meantime, Rose Kingsley, a friend that Queen had made on her honeymoon in England, arrived in Colorado Springs to visit her brother, Maurice. It is Rose who supplies us with the best idea of what life for Queen was like during the 1870s. Although we do not have a photo of Miss Kingsley at this time, completely unsubstantiated rumor overheard near the water cooler suggests that she may have looked like a well known suffragist of the time. Rose’s arrival captured the ambience of this new “Newport in the Rockies” yet to be. [Elise raises and hangs backdrop photograph of the “Log Cabin” depot, ca. 1871.] [Rose Kingsley puppet (strangely resembling Susan B. Anthony) enters.]

COLLINS & STURDEVANT • 359 RK: We pulled up at a log cabin by the side of the track, and from the door-way came a voice, saying ‘Dinner’s on the table.’ Out we all got, and I thought—Surely we can’t be going to dine in this place . . . [But in the dining room] I found, to my amazement, two large tables on one side, and four small on the other, with clean linen, smart waiters, and a first-rate dinner . . . I was in a state of complete bewilderment: but hunger soon got the better of surprise, and we were doing ample justice to oyster-soup and roast antelope when in came General and Mrs. P. It was pleasant to find well-known faces among so many new ones. [WJP as businessman puppet enters.] WJP: Pardon me, but you have any Grey Poupon? [WJP as businessman puppet exits.] [Elise raises and hangs backdrop photograph of Colorado Springs, ca. 1872.] Narrator: It is Rose Kingsley who records most frequently the activities of Queen Palmer. RK: Mrs. P. has undertaken to begin a school for the colonists’ children, and opened it this morning. I went up before she arrived, and found seven children all in great excitement about their teacher. . . . [Queen as bride puppet enters.] Q: I actually ended up with twenty children and they weren’t the only ones who were excited! [Queen as bride puppet exits.] [Elise lowers “Log Cabin” backdrop.] Narrator: In regard to the school, Rose found out rather quickly that she was no substitute for Queen when it came to dealing with the education of “young America.” RK: [With Queen detained in Denver] I have been trying a new occupation and have made a great failure in it. I have been keeping school for two days! I . . . found that some of the boys were evidently determined to try how naughty they could be. They threw things at the girls; refused to do their work. . . . I found that “young America” was a good deal too strong for the “English school marm”; and. . . . I was delighted when twelve o’clock came; and [I] sent my young tormentors home with a tremendous scolding. [Elise raises and hangs backdrop photograph of Glen Eyrie house, ca. 1872.]

360 • “CAN YOU NOT GIVE UP SOME?” Narrator: On one occasion during Rose’s stay she described a spirited Queen leading her up hill and over dale. RK: Mrs. P and I drove up to Manitou, up our lovely canon above Glen Eyrie, roaming up the canons, collecting seeds and stone. The day was so hot that we could not bear jackets over our gowns. After luncheon we walked down to the beaver dam, on the Fountain, and got some chips from the trees that the beavers have felled. Narrator: At times Queen’s adventures with Rose were considerably more arduous, an omen perhaps of things to come. RK: we scrambled up mountains until we stood panting at the top... the air is so rarified that it makes going up the slightest hill quite an effort. . . . takes one’s breath away . . . for five minutes after we reached the top I felt as if my chest had been scraped raw . . . Going down was much pleasanter. [Rose Kingsley puppet exits.] Narrator: Queen clearly tackled her new school with the same fervor she tackled the local geography. Rose describes a Queen wonderfully in her element raising money through a musical concert for the school’s reading room. Queen herself was one of several performers. We do not know what she sang on that occasion other than Verdi. [Queen as bride puppet enters.] Q: [Singing] The hills are alive . . . with the sound of music. . . . Narrator: However, we do know that it was not Rodgers and Hammerstein. Q: [Singing] Colorado Rocky Mountain High. . . . Narrator: Nor John Denver. Q: [Singing] R.E.S.P.E.C.T. . . . Find out what it means to me. . . . R.E.S.P.E.C.T— Narrator: And it was absolutely not Aretha Franklin. She most likely sung a favorite tune from the end of the Civil War. Q: [Singing sweetly] Beautiful dreamer, wake unto me, Starlight and dewdrops are waiting for thee; Sounds of the rude world, heard in the day, Lull’d by the moonlight have all pass’d away! Beautiful dreamer, queen of my song, List while I woo thee with soft melody; Gone are the cares of life’s busy throng,

COLLINS & STURDEVANT • 361 Beautiful dreamer, awake unto me! Beautiful dreamer, awake unto me! [from author Stephen Collins Foster, 1865, no relation to puppeteer Stephen Collins] [Queen as bride puppet exits.] Narrator: Rose Kingsley also tells us that Queen did travel with her husband on business. In fact, both Queen and Rose traveled extensively in Latin America with General Palmer which certainly suggests a sense of adventure. [Rose Kingsley puppet enters.] RK: [Arriving in Mexico,] Mrs. P and I were both armed; it was a queer sensation buckling on a revolver for the first time; but our pistol drill on board ship has taught us how to avoid shooting our companions [Queen as bride puppet enters.] Q: Much to all of our relief you can imagine. . . . RK: . . . and notwithstanding the laughter that greeted my first appearance with a full-sized Smith and Wesson on my belt, I mean to stick to it; and am already beginning to look on it as my best friend. Q: And what, pray tell, am I? [Queen and Rose puppets exit.] Narrator: The Palmers and Rose Kingsley would eventually go their separate ways. Queen left Colorado to visit relatives and also for the birth of her first daughter, Elsie, in New York in October of 1872, perhaps not surprising considering the still rustic nature of the medical establishment in Colorado Springs at the time and the abundant family support available in Flushing. The General and Queen resided in Glen Eyrie or in Colorado Springs on Cascade Avenue when tight finances warranted a less extravagant life throughout the 1870s. [Queen as mother in dressing gown enters.] Q: At times, the difficulties faced in the country financially by nearly everyone necessitated that we live a little more within our means. [Palmer cigar box lid portrait puppet enters.] WJP: In other words, we stopped ordering pizza three nights a week. [Palmer cigar box puppet exits.] Q: Will, that’s not true and you know it! [Queen as mother in dressing gown exits.]

362 • “CAN YOU NOT GIVE UP SOME?” Narrator: Her adventurous spirit, however, got her into trouble in 1880 when Queen took a trip to Leadville with her friend. It was the height of the Leadville Gold Rush. Though Leadville was riding high, it was too high for Queen. She experienced her first heart attack in Leadville during the midterm of her pregnancy with Dorothy who, miraculously, was delivered safely later that year on October 29. Dorothy was the only child to whom she would give birth in Colorado. [Queen as mother in dressing gown enters.] Q: Given my health and the altitude in Colorado I really couldn’t have another child in Colorado, could I? I needed a lower altitude, less dry air, and the security of more family. What if I should have another attack while Will was away on business? [Queen as mother in dressing gown exits.] [Elise lowers backdrops of Colorado Springs and Glen Eyrie.] Narrator: Though these were likely concerns of Queen, we do not know for certain what she felt; we do know, however, that she did move back to New York and then on to England by 1881 where she gave birth to her last child, Marjory. Though Will tried to visit her regularly, the distance certainly must have taken its toll. Visits between business trips undoubtedly decreased. The general was a successful capitalist building railway lines across the state of Colorado. His success and prestige would land him on the lid of a cigar box. [Palmer cigar box puppet enters. Elise and Stephen raise multi-part display of Palmer’s cigar box picture and imitation smoke.] WJP: You might say my career was . . . smoking. . . . Get it? Smoking? Narrator: Yes, we got it. WJP: Yep, I’m on fire. Narrator: Yes, I suppose so. But since you brought it up we might as well mention the times you had your cigar behind your back and accidentally set your clothes on fire. WJP: What? What’s that smell? Is something burning? Ahh! [Palmer cigar box puppet exits.] Narrator: Even the general, however, with all of the pressures of achievement bearing down on him, could not ignore the toll that distance and success placed on his love affair with Queenie and his children. [Elise lowers cigar box display and raises and hangs backdrop photograph of Losely Manor house.]

COLLINS & STURDEVANT • 363 Narrator: A letter written to Queen on January 2 of 1882 from the steamer Arizona documents the strain. [Palmer cigar box puppet enters.] WJP: My Darling Queenie. . . . My little family is the oasis the only green spot to which my mind can turn without distress and disappointment. The gentle Elsie on her pony—the eager little Dorothy and the innocent sleeper in the cradle and you my dear wife whom I have so often cruelly distressed and whose affections I allowed to be estranged because I was hard and cold and blind and stupid and wretchedly wrong altogether and reckless. What a heaven would life seem now if with vigorous health one had nothing to do but to start without a penny to make a home for this beloved flock! Narrator: Still, the general did find the time to try to run his family as well as find fault with the name that Queenie had picked for their youngest daughter. WJP: New York, January 14, 1882, My Dear Queenie . . . I hope Dorothy will continue in well doing and finally become a sound sleeper even if she has to be as stupid as Helen. Have you found a better name than Marjory yet for the wee one? Dorothy was such a complete success that perhaps we can get something to fit the baby better. Have you got hold of the book of girls’ names yet? I am so glad that Elsie keeps up with her rides. They will do her a world of good. It will not do for her to explore with her escort however. I suppose you feel quite sure of him and that he does not talk with her. [Palmer cigar box puppet exits; Queen as mother in dressing gown enters.] Q: Honestly, how on earth are we supposed to pick a name while Will is traveling around Latin America? I like Marjory and so does the baby. But listen to this letter written two months after the last one! Mexico City, March 22, 1882: “My Dear Queenie . . . And how are the little cherubs? How much talkee can Dorothy achieve by this time? The baby is still nameless I suppose?” Nameless? [Palmer cigar box puppet enters; Queen as mother in dressing gown exits.] WJP: I know . . . it was worth a shot. . . .

364 • “CAN YOU NOT GIVE UP SOME?” [Palmer cigar box puppet exits.] Narrator: Still, the distance could do little to bring them closer. Queen would try to bring her family back together for many years. A letter written in the late 1880s or early 90s bears sad witness to her melancholy. [Queen as mother in dressing gown enters.] And now My dear Will, about my health and prospect of being able to live in America. I gave you the opinion of the three physicians who know my trouble best when I wrote to you a few months ago—and nothing has happened since to change their opinion…. If the children were older, I should not hesitate to try—notwithstanding their opinions for I might do well enough and if I did not it would not make so much difference. But as it is I want to see them grow up—if possible—and don’t want to add to the ordinary risks we all run. But I will not let you be so homeless anymore. If you cannot come to us, Elsie must make a home for you there. You know how decidedly fond of you she is. Is it quite impossible for you to come to England with only an occasional visit to America? Can you not give up some of your responsibilities then—and with a smaller income in consequence—be happy with your little family here? I should look for a house a little larger than this—in a beautiful part of the country—where we could all be so happy together—and then—after a few years that I ought to remain here—we might all be able to go back to our own Glen Eyrie, for the doctors say that after these years if I get well enough I will be better than I have been since that attack of bronchitis in New York which left me worth only about half as much as before. Do consider this Will—it would be a . . . change for you too that would probably do you good. If you say so I could look about and find a little house and be all ready for you when you came next. [Queen as mother in dressing gown exits.] Narrator: Queen so feared her premature death, that she began secret farewell letters to her daughters in 1886. She placed special responsibility on Elsie. [Queen as mother in dressing gown enters.] Q: Elsie, You know how much we have talked about your being the little mother of the other two. Think of that now—my first born— my precious daughter . . . never forget that Motherling is near you . . . make them brave and good—kind and true—as you will be. . . . Mother is resting (you know how tired she often was . . .) [Queen as mother in dressing gown exits.]

COLLINS & STURDEVANT • 365 Narrator: Queen’s condition ebbed and flowed in these years and with every day she rested in the therapeutic climate, she lengthened her life. As promised, she sent Elsie to travel with her father back to Glen Eyrie in 1894. But Elsie returned to her mother by September. At Christmastime, Queen was so weak that she did not want her girls to see her. They wrote notes to each other from room to room and floor to floor, as though far away. On Christmas day, Elsie wrote: [Enter Elise Collins, in front of puppet stage, in costume as Elsie Palmer.] Elsie: [reading] Good morning, my own darling Motherling. I can write you—now—though I can’t talk to you because it tires you. It was a splendid stocking! And the dress doesn’t need a single alteration. I wonder if you think we are not having a happy Xmas—because we are—dearest Motherling—and we feel your presence with us every second. It’s wonderful how you do that! And all your little thoughts for people’s pleasure—come showering downstairs to everyone: and are kept close all the time—almost as if you were there. The present is not quite finished—as I think you will like it better with a certain trimming I have for it. Your own Elsie. [Exit Elise as Elsie.] Narrator: Elsie cabled her father. General Palmer traveled by train to New York and the first available steamship to England, but to no avail. Distance, business, and heart disease finally separated Will and Queen in her fortyfourth year of life on December 27, 1894. Will arrived shortly after her death. [Elise lowers manor house backdrop.] Narrator: General Palmer took his girls back to Glen Eyrie, and lived there as a community icon until his death in 1909. One day Elsie mysteriously received an unexplained package from England. Someone had found and sent her Queen’s watch. In 1910, after Will’s death, another package came to Colorado Springs. Queen’s ashes, disinterred from an English grave, found their rest near Will’s grave. The End

366 • “CAN YOU NOT GIVE UP SOME?” Stephen Collins is Professor of Communication at Pikes Peak Community College. His teaching specializations include historical rhetoric, interpersonal and group communication, and resource interpretation. He is a master puppeteer with fifteen years of experience in directing puppet teams and ministries, from scriptwriting through performance and design, including award-winning presentations. Katherine Scott Sturdevant is Professor of History at Pikes Peak Community College. Her teaching specializations include Western, women’s, environmental, ethnic, Colorado, and Pikes Peak regional history. She is a well-known local and national speaker, an expert oral history interviewer, the author of two books on the scholarly approach to family history, and has won local, state, and national awards for teaching excellence. A Note on Sources All of the historically accurate passages quoting the Palmers or Rose Kingsley are from primary documents in local archives or antiquarian published writings by the Palmers or Kingsley. The sources include their own unpublished letters as well as Queen’s school essays and honeymoon diary. The published primary sources included William Jackson Palmer’s 1874 booklet, The Westward March of Emigration in the United States; considered in its bearing upon the near future of Colorado and New Mexico, Rose Kingsley’s South by West; or Winter in the Rocky Mountains and Spring in Mexico, and Frances M. Wolcott’s Heritage of Years: Kaleidoscopic Memories. 1851-1889. Published sources that helped locate original passages included Celeste Black’s Queen of Glen Eyrie: The Story of Mary Lincoln Mellen Palmer, Wife of General William Palmer; John S. Fisher’s A Builder of the West: A Biography of General William Jackson Palmer; and Manly and Eleanor Ormes’s The Book of Colorado Springs. The published source, Marshall Sprague’s Newport in the Rockies, offered an earlier, now-controversial interpretation of the Palmer-Queen relationship and thus was the springboard for this puppet presentation’s return to the original sources for an accurate representation. For the photographs that became the puppets and backdrops, and for access to the primary documents that became the script, the authors wish to thank Tim Blevins and Chris Nicholl from Special Collections of the Pikes Peak Library District; Leah Witherow and Kelly Murphy of the Starsmore Center for Local History at the Colorado

COLLINS & STURDEVANT • 367 Springs Pioneers Museum; Jessy Randall of Special Collections at the Colorado College Tutt Library; and Vic Stone, Palmer aficionado, who obtained the engagement picture of Queen Palmer through an amazing discovery on eBay. For a better understanding of the minutiae of Palmer family life, relationships, letters, photographs, and chronology, we thank Delores Gustafson. The source for the comical lines that are obviously fictional is the mind of Stephen Collins.

One of the puppets representing Palmer shows how Stephen Collins made them from enlarging original portraits and photographs, printing them on heavy cardstock, and creating a movable mouth. This one is from a “General Palmer” cigar box lid. Photograph by Stephen Collins.

Otto Mears Silver Filigree Railroad Pass Nineteenth Century railroad passes normally were made of card from bankers’ paper. This, however, was not good enough for Colorado railroad owner and promoter Otto Mears. Flushed with success and wealth from his silver mining and transportation operations out of Silverton, Colorado, he decided to reward the great and the good with his eye-catching artifacts made in silver, including; a stamped, solid-silver issue of 1889, a watch fob type in 1890, and, shown here, the exquisite and delicate silver filigree of 1892 issued to William Jackson Palmer. Just under six hundred of the silver filigree passes were ordered from Mr. M. Spitz, manufacturer of Mexican Filigree Jewellery, located on the south side of the Plaza in Santa Fe, New Mexico. The work was carried out by local artisans. This pass was issued by the Rio Grande Southern & Silverton Railroad Companies, each measuring 2.75 inches long by 1.5 inches high. All are thought to be engraved with the name of the recipient and a sequential number. Today, only one hundred of these are known to have survived. They are rare and highly collectable. The recipients of the Mears passes were largely important people: government officials; including U.S. senators; Colorado governors; Colorado legislators, mayors and judges. Also included were railroad officials, Colorado bankers and businessmen—especially those who shipped large quantities of freight and ore, such as owners of mines and mills. The Mears family and friends were not neglected either. There is a great deal of mystery associated with Pass #45, issued to General William J. Palmer. This came to light for the first time in 2005. It was offered for sale at an auction in England, but all enquiries failed to establish the name of the seller. Prior to this, it was generally accepted that Palmer, an important man and a contemporary of Mears, was most likely issued one. However, no record of Palmer having received a pass was found—until now. The repeal of the Sherman Silver Act, which resulted in the panic of 1893, brought an end for Mears’ railroad enterprise when debts brought about the loss of control of his Rio Grande Southern Railroad. From the collection of Victor J. Stone.

General William J. Palmer & the Early Denver & Rio Grande Railway: An Annotated Select Bibliography Victor J. Stone The archives of the fledgling Rio Grande Modeling & Historical Society includes an impressive list of some two hundred plus books and magazine articles, most published in the last quarter century, about the Denver & Rio Grande Railway (D&RG), its heirs, successors and assigns. The list was compiled to satisfy the unquenchable thirst of the train modeling community for photographs and detailed prototype information. However, in the first half of the 20th century, the emphasis was, perhaps, more likely to be related to more serious academic study. Most of the published works on the corporate history of the D&RG, and its founder William Jackson Palmer, originated during this period. Many of these are rare, out-of-print titles, largely unseen for many years. To correct this situation, the objective of this writer is to highlight a number of the more important of these inextricably linked subjects. The books are represented here, not in any order of importance, but loosely in sequence with General Palmer’s life and illustrious career, which is detailed here: Brevet brigadier-general of cavalry, U.S. Army (1864—1865); Congressional Medal of Honor (earned 1865, awarded 1894); treasurer and managing director, Kansas Pacific Railway (1865—1870); organizer and president, Denver & Rio Grande Railway [Colorado] (1870—1883); founder of Colorado Springs, Colorado (1871); organizer and president, Colorado Coal & Iron Company (1880—1884); organizer and president, Mexican National Railway (1880—1887); organizer and president, Denver & Rio Grande Western Railway [Utah] (1881—1889); president, Rio Grande Western Railway (1889—1901). Fisher, John S. A Builder of the West: The Life of General William Jackson Palmer. Caldwell, Idaho: The Caxton Printers, 1939. Republished by Ayer Company Publishers Inc., in 1981. • 369 •

370 • ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY

William J. Palmer was born September 17, 1836, at Kinsale, Delaware. He died, aged 72, at Colorado Springs, Colorado, on March 13, 1909. During his lifetime the General, reportedly shy of personal publicity, would not have granted permission for any authorized biography. Even so, it is surprising that there has been but this single volume published some thirty years after his death. The book was written with the full assistance and cooperation of General Palmer’s family and of the many who were close to him in his business and private life. With access to Palmer’s letters and personal papers, the story is told where possible using his own words. With such a full life it is not surprising that his significant railroad achievements are contained within just two chapters in the book. However, the bonus is an added chapter of the General’s exploits and achievements in Mexico, a period largely neglected by historians. It was written by Chase Mellen, the General’s brotherin-law, with the assistance of George Foster Peabody, Palmer’s banker, confidant and friend. The book is an intimate and very personal account of Palmer’s life, family and achievements. It is recommended as an excellent introduction to the subject and should whet the appetite of those interested in discovering more about particular aspects of his extraordinary career. Clothier, Isaac H., comp. Letter’s, 1853—1868: Gen’l Wm. J. Palmer. Philadelphia: privately published, 1906. Young William J. Palmer was born and raised in a Quaker family in the most important city in America of that time: Philadelphia. In his teenage years his ideas and interests on important issues of the day coincided with another young man—Isaac H. Clothier. So developed a friendship that was to last throughout their lives. Published in very limited numbers some three years before General Palmer’s death, this volume is rare indeed and can be found at Pikes Peak Library District, Colorado Springs, Colorado, but otherwise most likely only available for study in major literary depositaries in the West. Here Clothier explains the purpose of his contribution in his introductory notes: It was my privilege during our youth and early manhood, to maintain with him a correspondence, of which his letters in this volume form a portion. That they have been highly valued is evidenced by their careful preservation

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for so many years, and it is believed that the limited circle of his friends and mine, to whom this little volume may come will coincide the judgment that the letters are worthy of preservation and of being gathered now into a volume for private circulation. Written as a very young man to another very young man, they indicate a maturity of observation and thought quite remarkable. The bulk of the letters were written during the period of the Civil War. Of more interest here, perhaps, is young William’s entry into the world of work, in 1853, aged 17 years. Palmer writes to Clothier: I am a member at present of an engineering corps, engaged in surveying, locating and leveling the line of the Hempfield Railroad. Washington, Pa; where I am now stationed, is a country village with between 5 and 10,000 inhabitants. It is situated in a rough hilly country West of the Allegheny mountains, about 30 miles from Wheeling, Va; the one terminus of our road, and 40 from Greensburg, the other terminus. I am in the field nearly all the time, from early in the morning till late in the evening, tramping over hills and across valleys, through woods and through fields of grain. Nothing stops us— for a railroad line must be a straight one—a locomotive is not proficient in turning corners. So a locating party travels in a bee line—it cannot avoid a hill or go round a pond or choose its own walking. It must tramp over the one and ford the other and walk by the points of the compass. We sometimes get pretty rough fare to—we stop once in a while at a roadside Inn where they pack the whole corps—engineers, rodmen and axemen in the same sleeping apartment—and that one apartment none the best. While we are stationed in Washington, however, we have pretty nice times with that respect. Each one has a room to himself and we manage to get along pretty comfortably at the Railroad House, though the bedbugs are as plenty and as wild as the rattlesnakes in the bayous. Three men were to influence Palmer’s early interest and career in railroads. First was Charles Ellett, the distinguished


engineer who first employed him on the Hempfield Railroad. While working with Ellett, Palmer attracted the attention of John Edgar Thomson of the Pennsylvania Central, himself a prominent Quaker. In the summer of 1855, at the suggestion of his uncle, F. H. Jackson, president of the Westmoreland Coal Company, Palmer sailed to England to study railroads and coal mining for a six month period, funding his working trip by writing $4 articles for the Pottsfield, Pennsylvania, Miner’s Journal. While in England Palmer received a letter from the editor of the Journal telling him that Mr. Thomson wanted him to make himself “acquainted with the best method of burning raw coal in locomotives,” a practice new in America at that time. Palmer’s research and reporting rapidly elevated him to the status of an expert in this field. He made good use of his time, tramping the country, visiting mines, mills and railroads. He attended lectures, visited scientific societies and brushed shoulders with eminent British railway engineers of the period, including Robert Stevenson and Isambard Kingdom Brunel. The previously mentioned biography by John Fisher carries a detailed account of this visit. William returned to America in 1856, briefly joining his uncle at the Westmoreland Coal Company. However, within a year, aged 21 years, he renewed his earlier association with J. Edgar Thomson of the Pennsylvania Railroad. Appointed confidential secretary to Thomson, a position he held for the next four years, he gained valuable railroad experience at the highest level under his great mentor. At the beginning of 1860 the talk was of expanding the railroad westward, along the 35th parallel, and Palmer published his Report of Experiments with Coal Burning Locomotives. By 1861, however, the Civil War conflict was looming and William, with his friend, Isaac Clothier, were drawn to the conflict through their support of the Republican Party, the Union and the anti-slavery movement. Palmer would soon be serving the Union as a soldier. Kirk, Charles H., ed. History of the Fifteenth Pennsylvania Volunteer Cavalry. Philadelphia: Society of the Fifteenth Pennsylvania Cavalry, 1906. This monumental tome of nearly eight hundred pages is the standard work on the history of Palmer’s regiment, with Palmer himself writing the introduction to the book. This was more than fitting as it was he, in the summer of 1861, who was

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responsible for raising and equipping, at his own expense, the one hundred strong company of cavalry known as the Anderson Troop. Appointed immediately to the rank of captain, within a year he was ordered to recruit a battalion of four hundred men. However, within ten days, he had organized a full regiment of twelve hundred. By the end of the war in 1865, and still less than 30 years of age, Palmer had risen to the rank of brevet brigadier general. This is a true regimental work, written by surviving members with verification by official documents of the period. It includes the traditional chronological history and muster rolls of both the initial Anderson Troop and the full regiment. Here are the campaigns of Shiloh, Antietam, Chickamauga and the rest. It is an interesting and easy to read account of the most difficult, violent and dangerous period of William Palmer’s life. After the regiment was mustered out in June 1865, despite much encouragement to remain in the military, General Palmer decided to resign his commission and resume his career with the Kansas Pacific Railroad. Sixteen former members of the regiment would follow, and join him in future railroad building projects in Colorado. Bell, William A. New Tracks in North America: A Journal of Travel and Adventure Whilst Engaged in the Survey for a Southern Railroad to the Pacific Ocean in 1867—1868. London: Chapman and Hall, 1870. Published in two volumes. This work was republished by Horn and Wallace in Albuquerque, New Mexico, in 1965. Here is the interesting and very readable account of the Kansas Pacific Survey, lead by General Palmer, to determine the best southern routes for a railway to the Pacific coast, between the 32nd and 35th parallels, through Kansas, Colorado, New Mexico, Arizona and southern California. The author of the book, William A. Bell, some six years the General’s junior, was a young English doctor with a taste for adventure. Bell joined the survey party and vividly records the experiences of nine months of excitement, danger and hardship. It includes Indian battles, lost trails, desert heat and sub-zero snow storms on mountain passes as the parties cover nearly five thousand miles in the largely unexplored and uncharted Southwest to San Francisco, returning to Kansas by way of Salt Lake City, Cheyenne and Denver. In 1868 General Palmer published his Report on Surveys


across the Continent, in which he recommended that the road should adopt the 35th parallel route to San Francisco. Dr. Bell recalled the experience in 1920, commenting, On that survey we shared the same tent for many months and over the camp fire we discussed his plans. The Kansas Pacific Company had then reached Salina, Kansas, and, from his knowledge of the country, General Palmer endeavored to persuade his co-directors to change the route they had then determined on, to reach Denver by the Smoky Hill route,—the way the road now follows,—and instead of doing this to follow up the Arkansas to Pueblo, and thence north to Denver, thus occupying the valley of the Arkansas as well as the mountain base from Pueblo to Denver. General Palmer’s project was this; if he could not persuade his directors to follow up the Arkansas, he would build a road of his own from Denver southward indefinitely along the mountain base, of such character as to reach the mines in the mountains through the canyons abutting on the plains as rapidly as they were discovered, and so tap the sources of business ahead of all other competitors. Enthusiastic, tireless, and with highly influential connections both in the U.S.A. and England, Dr. Bell, nicknamed Willie, found a kindred spirit in the General and the two soon formed a relationship destined to mold a considerable portion of Rocky Mountain and Southwestern economic history. Anderson, George L. General William J. Palmer: A Decade of Colorado Railroad Building 1870-1880. Colorado Springs, Colo.: Colorado College, October 1936, General Series #209. This book was also available for a period through the Pacific Railway Journal under the title of Denver & Rio Grande Railroad. By 1963, with presumably continued interest in the work, it was republished with a new title—Kansas West—by Golden West Books, a subsidiary of Pacific Railroad Publications in San Marino, California. This work was conceived as a tribute to General Palmer by Colorado College, Colorado Springs, to celebrate the centenary of their founder and benefactor’s birth in 1836. On the Board of Trustees at the college were a number of important people already

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with personal connections with the General; Chase Mellen, George Foster Peabody and George Krause, all mentioned previously as contributors to John Fisher’s biography. However, the hard work was assigned to another board member, George L. Anderson, of their Department of History. The result of Anderson’s widely respected effort is the first of a number of significant scholarly histories of the Denver & Rio Grande Railway to be highlighted. Anderson concentrates here on the first decade of the D&RG, seemingly without any assistance given by the Denver and Rio Grande Western Railroad (D&RGW). As a bonus, he commences with his account of General Palmer’s final project in charge of construction of the Kansas Pacific Railway’s extension to Denver and of his association with Colorado’s second territorial governor, John Evans, in the construction of the Denver Pacific road that would connect Denver to the Union Pacific at Cheyenne. We also see General Palmer, disillusioned with the Kansas Pacific’s failure to act on his Pacific Survey and other recommendations, develop and implement his is own plan—and our favorite road came into being. Fittingly, perhaps, it was Anderson who was asked to write the introduction to the 1965 reprinted version of Willie Bell’s New Tracks in North America, commenting, One cannot help but being deeply impressed by this account of the Southwest written a scant century ago. The concept of transcontinental train service had captured the minds of post Civil War America, and the desire to be first to establish a rail service was in the mind of many an Eastern financier. His [Bell’s] account of the civilization then existing along the Rio Grande is one of the best I have ever read. Highlighted now are three more scholarly works by academics but, unlike Anderson, all of these researchers received considerable assistance from the management and corporate records of the Denver & Rio Grande, but the first mentioned here, Oliver Brayer, had to create the record first! Brayer, Herbert O. William Blackmore: Early Financing of the Denver & Rio Grande Railway and Ancillary Land Companies 1871—1878. Denver: Bradford-Robinson, 1949.


This book was the second of a two volume, signed & numbered, boxed set. The first volume was entitled William Blackmore: The Spanish-Mexican Land Grants. The complete set was sold under the collective title of William Blackmore, Entrepreneur. The set was sold as a limited edition of just five hundred copies and is an expensive purchase today. However, such was the popularity of the Denver & Rio Grande Railway that the publisher ran additional copies of the second volume as a stand-alone edition, marking it internally as the Denver & Rio Grande Western Railroad Edition. The story revolves around William Blackmore, English lawyer and entrepreneur, who was an important player in raising some of the finances for the development of the early D&RG. Heading a syndicate of rich and powerful Europeans based in London, England, Blackmore at one time held title to more than one million acres in northern New Mexico and southern Colorado. In this second volume of Oliver Brayer’s work, we are introduced to William Blackmore’s contribution to the founding and financing of the Denver & Rio Grande Railway and its ancillary land development companies. As a result of his interest in the Costilla Estate, Blackmore was responsible for marketing the newly organized Denver & Rio Grande Railway’s first mortgage bonds in 1870—1871. During the rest of his life he was a member of the many railroadsponsored land pools founded by General Palmer to promote the colony settlements of Colorado Springs and Pueblo, in addition to the railroad extensions and townsite developments at Cañon City, El Moro, Trinidad, Alamosa, La Veta and a score of other settlements. But here we see Blackmore playing a secondary role to General Palmer and his immediate promotional pool. Brayer picks up the story of General Palmer’s Pacific Coast Survey, the experience gained in construction of the Kansas Pacific’s Denver extension and the contribution played by former friends and associates from his military past. Palmer founds his NorthSouth road and the Palmer/Bell roller coaster begins. Here, then, is the detailed story of the circumstances arising during the formation of the D&RG Railway in 1869—1870 and how the road, and the land development companies that funded it were conceived and organized. As the story unfolds we see the clash of motives and objectives as General Palmer and his American associates clash with Blackmore and his investment group. It is

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a fascinating and remarkable piece of work. Much of the detail here is not available in any other publication. Sad to say, it all ends in tragedy for Blackmore, as he commits suicide when his American investments, including the D&RG, turn sour. Brayer’s contribution to recording D&RG history is more than interesting—it was actually vital. Before completing the above-mentioned project, he arranged a meeting with the D&RGW director of public relations, George Dodge, to outline his work and request access to any very early company records they might have. Sadly, Dodge reported that much of the older records of the company had been lost or destroyed. The discussion, however, led to other matters and concluded with the fact that a definitive history of the railroad had yet to be written—and the D&RGW was anxious for this to materialize. This was music to Brayer’s ears as he thought he was the man to accomplish the task. Within weeks, he had met with Trustee Henry Swan for further discussion. As a result, on November 21, 1941, Swan announced, “The Trustees have established a plan to collect and file for preservation the many historical records of the Rio Grande, and this work will be under the direction of Mr. Oliver O. Brayer, Archivist.” Brayer held this position between 1941 and 1943, and the fine archive of material he located and organized came into being. Much of the archive exists today in the office of State Archives and Public Records, Denver. However, for reasons unknown, Oliver Brayer did not write the definitive history of the D&RGW and another twenty years would pass for this to be realized. Wilson, O. Meredith. The Denver & Rio Grande Project, 1870—1901: A History of the First Thirty Years of the Denver and Rio Grande Railroad. Salt Lake City: Howe Brothers, 1982. Meredith Wilson was certainly not a railroad man, more a professional academic, which might explain the forty-year gap between completing his Ph.D. dissertation in 1942 and finally remembering to get it published in 1982! And thank goodness he did. Wilson had picked up on a suggestion by a university tutor, “That he hoped some day a scholar would gain access to corporate records and be able to write a story of growth from the inside.” So Wilson did. It was his and our good fortune that as a youngster he had been a neighbor of Judge Wilson McCarthy, then a trustee of the road responsible for D&RGW


operations. Requesting an audience with McCarthy, he found the Judge impressed with the idea. McCarthy not only granted approval to the project, he arranged an executive pass so Wilson could ride freely on company trains and have access to officials on most divisions. He also introduced him to Chief Engineer Arthur Ridgway, who became Wilson’s prime point of contact, guide and mentor. Wilson’s story, he claims, was therefore constructed almost completely from correspondence, contracts, surveys, construction records and operating reports from the chief engineers’ files, that then comprised all the internal records of the Denver & Rio Grande. It was the first such study made with the full cooperation of the road. But there’s always a snag! In this case, Wilson got wind of Herbert Brayer’s appointment as archivist to the D&RGW, so the race was on to complete his research before any documents were relocated. Significantly, the foreword to the book is written by Robert G. Athern, whose own contribution is up next, who enthusiastically comments that, Meredith Wilson’s classic story of the odds at which financiers and engineers struggled remains the basic work, one that helps to explain the early economic history of Colorado and its neighbors. Other writers who followed him, including this one, have helped themselves liberally to his research, his keen insights, and his clearly written prose. This is a seminal study of an important phase of western transportation. It will continue to stand as a model of railroad construction history. Athern, Robert G. Rebel of the Rockies: The Denver & Rio Grande Western Railroad. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1962. Such was the popularity of this volume that it was reprinted in soft cover format by the University of Nebraska Press in 1977. The new publisher saw fit to reverse the title of the work to become The Denver & Rio Grande Western Railroad: Rebel of the Rockies. This work contains the most detailed bibliography of the D&RG[W] to date. At last we can turn to the most definitive history of the road to date. Compiled by Robert G. Athern, a well-known and respected professor of history at the University of Colorado at Denver, our story begins in 1956. Athern records that the

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D&RGW Railroad approached the university to find somebody suitable, and willing, to write the definitive history of the road. Robert Athern was both. Athern’s interest in railroads was well known, indeed he had already published a number of articles about the D&RGW and other Colorado railroads over the years in magazine articles for the Colorado Historical Society and its namesake in Utah—and these would form part of his narrative. Through the summers of the following years, commencing in 1956, Athern devoted his time exclusively to the road, fully paid, completing the book in 1962. As with the earlier efforts of Wilson and Brayer, Athern was afforded full cooperation and assistance by the road to complete his task. Writing to an associate in 1957 Athern comments, Yes, I’m engaged in a full length story of the railroad, from General Palmer’s days right down to the plans of their young and active president, Mr. Aydelott. And from the president on down, the injunction has been “tell the story.” It is a rare thing indeed for the historian to run into something as good as this. Near the end of the book, Athern summarizes, In the autumn of 1960 the Rio Grande passed its ninetieth birthday. During the nine decades since the incorporation that October day in 1870, it had experienced financial growing pains, lived through five receiverships, and fought off the incursions of larger roads which, in one case, had resulted in temporary captivity and, in another, in bankruptcy. It had been mauled in a struggle between local interests and those who lived in far off lands as New York, had fluctuated between periods of brilliant leadership and years of incompetency, and had felt the caress of prideful words alternated by bitter tonguelashings from the westerners it served. Whatever its condition, whether that of financial despair or confident prosperity, the heartbeat of the railroad pulsed with the hope of eventual emancipation and independence of corporate action. Since the day of General Palmer, this had been the thought of those who lived with the road, of those who saw the land and its main artery of commerce as reciprocal parts of a growing economy.


Turpin, Jeanette. General William J. Palmer: Founder of Colorado Springs, Builder of the Denver & Rio Grande. Colorado Springs, Colo.: Dentan Printing Co., 1924. This rare “tribute” book is seemingly impossible to locate on the open market, not surprisingly perhaps, because the name of the author, date of publication and identification of the publisher are not indicated in the book. The only reference to the author is the initials at the end of the foreword—“J. T.” But she can now be identified as Jeanette Turpin, whose remarkable tribute to General Palmer is a compilation of the words of those who knew, admired and loved him. Included here are extracts from two of the best History of Colorado books; by Frank Hall and Wilbur F. Stone; Tributes to the Late William J. Palmer from his Fellow Citizens in Colorado Springs, edited by Mary Slocum and reprinted in this book; William Jackson Palmer, National Cyclopedia of American Biography; An Official Account of Development of the D.&R.G. Railroad, by Dr. William A. Bell; and much more. Peabody, George Foster. William Jackson Palmer: Pathfinder and Builder, A Compilation of addresses at Presentations of Bronze Bas Relief’s and Equestrian Statue Commemorating his Life and Work. Boston: privately printed by Thomas Todd Company, 1931. In the period between 1929 and 1930 there were a number of ceremonies held in five locations in the U.S.A. and Mexico in connection with the unveiling of memorial tablets and an equestrian statue, to recognize the extraordinary life and career of General William Jackson Palmer. The tributes were proposed, organized and funded by the General’s old friend and business associate, George Foster Peabody. In the summer of 1927, Peabody commissioned the noted American sculptor, Evelyn Beatrice Batchelder, to design a bronze bas-relief of the General, destined for display at the Union Depot in Denver. The dedication took place on February 12, 1929. Subsequent to this, a number of copies of the tablet were made and, in further dedication ceremonies, installed in the following locations: Tablet at Palmer Hall, Colorado College, Colorado Springs on March 12, 1929; Tablet at Palmer Hall, Hampton Institute, Virginia on May 27, 1929; Tablet at Union Depot, Salt Lake City on May 28, 1929; Equestrian Statue adjacent Colorado College, Colorado Springs on September 1, 1929; Tablet at Colonia Station, Mexico City, Mexico on September 10, 1930.

STONE • 381

Next time you’re in Denver, Salt Lake City or Colorado Springs, do stop by and pay your respects to the great man. No doubt he would appreciate the thought.

The citations on the tablet read: Union Cavalry General, pioneer railroad builder, prophet of Colorado’s greatness. He mapped the routes of three transcontinental railways, supervised the building of the first road to Denver, organized and constructed the Denver and Rio Grande Railroad, stimulated the State’s industries, cherished its beauties, founded Colorado Springs, fostered Colorado College, and served our Sister Republic of Mexico with sympathy and wisdom in developing its national railways. This memorial placed by a business associate honored by his confidence and friendship.

Additional Sources

Anderson, George L. General William Jackson Palmer: Man of Vision. Colorado Springs, Colo.: Colorado College, 1960. ______ . He Conquers the Rockies: General Palmer, An Empire Builder. Colorado College Publication, General Series 216, Studies Series No. 25; Westward the Course of Empire, One of four Lectures on America’s Frontier, Colorado Springs, March 1938. Ayer, Eleanor H. Famous Colorado Men. The Colorado Chronicles, No. 1. Frederick, Colo.: Jende-Hagan Bookcorp, 1980.

382 • ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY Bailey, Ralph Edgar. Fight for Royal Gorge. New York: W. Morrow, 1968. Black, Celeste. Queen of Glen Eyrie: The Story of Mary Lincoln Mellen Palmer, Wife of General William Palmer. Colorado Springs, Colo.: Black Bear Pub., 1999. Fishel, Edwin C. The Secret War for the Union: The Untold Story of Military Intelligence in the Civil War. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1996. Howbert, Irving. Memories of a Lifetime in the Pike’s Peak Region. Colorado Springs, Colo.: Old Colorado City Historical Society, 2007. Johnson, Emily Brown. The White House Ranch. Colorado Springs, Colo., 1972. Kitch, John I. Woodmen Valley: Stage Stop to Suburb. Palmer Lake, Colo.: Filter Press, 1970. Lipsey, John J. General Palmer’s Half-Brother-in-Law, Chase Mellen: His Colorado Adventures, 1871-1881. Colorado Springs, Colo.: Priv. Print. by J. J. Lipsey, Western Books, 1958. Logan, Paul Stewart. “Building the Narrow Gauge from Denver to Pueblo,” The Colorado Magazine 8, (November 1931). This is an extract from one chapter of the M.A. degree thesis below. ______ . “The History of the Denver & Rio Grande Railway 18711881.” M.A. Thesis, University of Colorado, 1931. Lohse, Joyce B. General William Palmer: Railroad Pioneer. Now You Know Bio Series, Palmer Lake, Colo.: Filter Press, 2009. McCarthy, Wilson. General Wm. Jackson Palmer, 1836-1909, and the D. & R.G.W. Railroad!. New York: Newcomen Society in North America, 1954. Palmer, William Jackson. Report of Surveys Across the Continent, in 1867-’68, on the Thirty-Fifth and Thirty-Second Parallels, for a Route Extending the Kansas Pacific Railway to the Pacific Ocean at San Francisco and San Diego. Philadelphia: W. B. Selheimer, printer, 1869. [Palmer, William Jackson.] The Westward March of Emigration in the United States; Considered in its Bearing Upon the Near Future of Colorado and New Mexico. March, 1874. Lancaster, Pa.: Inquirer Print and Pub. Co., 1874. Palmer, William Jackson, and Lorenzo M. Johnson. The War of the Gauges: For the Narrow-Gauge Railway, Gen. Wm J. Palmer (As Told to Samuel Bowles in 1871): for the Standard-Gauge Railway. Colorado Springs, Colo.: J. J. Lipsey, Western Books, 1961. Ruhtenberg, Polly King, and Dorothy E. Smith. Henry McAllister: Colorado Pioneer. Freeman, S. Dak.: Pine Hill Press, 1972.

STONE • 383 Storey, Brit Allan. “William Jackson Palmer: Promoter.” The Colorado Magazine 43, (Winter 1966). ______ . “William Jackson Palmer: A Biography.” M.A. Thesis, University of Kentucky, 1969; Ann Arbor, Mich.: University Microfilms, 1969. Van Diest, Edmund C. A Brochure—General William J. Palmer: An Address. [Colorado Springs, Colo.]: Your First-Reminder, Dentan Printing, 1942. Watson, Robert D. The Pike’s Peak Pioneers 100 Years, 1871—1971: Or, Who’s Got the Corner Stone? Colorado Springs, Colo.: Lithographic Press, 1971. Wilcox, Rhoda Davis. The Man on the Iron Horse. Colorado Springs, Colo.: Dentan Printing, 1959. Wray, Henry Russell. A Unique Western City. Also printed in El Paso County Democrat. Pioneer edition. Colorado Springs, Colo., 1908.

Archives Collections at Pikes Peak Library District

Colorado Springs Company, Records, 1866—1977. MSS 0073. Wanetta W. Draper, Scrapbook. CU 84. John J. Lipsey, “How to Behave When Fatally Injured.” CU 39.103. ______ . “Mansion of a Magnate.” MSS 0075 SC. William Jackson Palmer, Correspondence, 1875—1877. MSS 0265. ______ . Letter, 1905. CU 10. Marshall Sprague, “Healers in Pikes Peak History.” CU 34.43. Philip Battell Stewart, “Hunting with T. R. Roosevelt and Early Life of Gen. Palmer.” CU 34.46.

Victor J. Stone was born in London, England in 1940. A retired property manager with the ITT and IBM corporations, he is an author and railroad historian with a particular interest in the history of the early Denver & Rio Grande Railway and its founder, William Jackson Palmer. Stone is the author of Taking Stock: Narrow Gauge Stock Cars of the Denver & Rio Grande 1873— 1968, published by Creedstone Publications in 1991. His serious interest in William Palmer developed after meeting Denver historian Jackson C. Thode in 1986. He and Thode negotiated and transferred the U.K. Palmer Family Photographic Archive that was gifted to the Tutt Library, Colorado College, Colorado Springs. Jackson Thode died in 2002.

The original Colorado Springs Public Library building, located at 21 West Kiowa Street, opened to the public on March 13, 1905. The 13,500 square-foot building was constructed on land donated by William Jackson Palmer and was funded by a $60,000 gift from Andrew Carnegie. The 1905 Carnegie Library was the main library facility until 1968, when Penrose Public Library opened next door. The 1905 Carnegie Library was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1996, and was restored with grants from the Colorado Historical Society, El Pomar Foundation and other generous foundations and donors. The 1905 Carnegie Library houses Special Collections, and includes regional history, genealogy, archives, photographs and the El Pomar Nonprofit Resource Center. Photo ca. 1905. From Special Collections, Pikes Peak Library District.

INDEX 15th Pennsylvania Volunteer Cavalry, 56 bronze tablet dedicated, 336–343 photo of, 381 captured Jefferson Davis’ wagon train, 48 capture Gen. Hylon B. Lyon, 50 formed, 47 Palmer’s Medal of Honor and, 43 reunion of, 64, 234–235, 282, 306 medal, 53 photo, 54 1905 Carnegie Library, 384 photo of, 384 7th Cavalry: Medal of Honor, 45 “An Abiding Bond: The Friend� ship Between Major Henry McAllister & General Wil� liam Jackson Palmer,” by Barbara Gately, 55–67 Abolitionism: Palmer and, 23, 339 Acacia Park, 192, 218 Agriculture. See Farming Ainsworth, F. C. (col.), awards Medal of Honor, 50 Alamo Square, 192, 218 Alcohol, 206, 229–230 abstinence, 46 liquor clause, 333 sale forbidden, 157 American Iron & Steel Associa� tion: McAllister working for, 58, 60 America the Beautiful Park, 194 Anderson, George L., 267

“General William J. Palmer, Anti-Imperialist, 18951905,” 247–271 General William J. Palmer, described, 374–375 Anderson, Robert (gen.), 46–47 Anderson Troop, 46–47, 56. See also 15th Pennsylvania Volunteer Cavalry Antelope, 143 Anthracite. See Coal Antlers Hotel, 192 destroyed, 192 photo of, 192, 198 Antlers Park, 192, 196, 203 Arboriculture. See also Trees journal of ISA, 203 Aspen Manor, 222 Atchison, Topeka, & Santa Fe Railroad, 103–104, 121, 123, 146, 169 Royal Gorge, 63, 104 settlement with D&RG, 106 welcomed by Pueblo, 121–122 Athern, Robert G., Rebel of the Rockies, 7 described, 378–379 Atlantic & Pacific Railroad, 121–122, 146, 168 Austin, Ann, 29 Austin, Henry, 217 Austin Bluffs, 196–197, 217, 309 Curtis Coal Mines, 197 Automobile: Palmer and, 206, 294, 302, 307–310 electric car, 303, 308 Stanley Steamer, 282–283 photo of, 313 Bache, Alexander, 32

• 385 •

386 • INDEX Bandits, 130 Palmer and, 121 Bass, Jesse, 276, 289 Palmer’s orders to shoot horse, 278–279 photo of, 277 Bass, Lyman K., 92, 103, 108, 109 Battle of the Little Bighorn, 44 Beach, Melancthon, description of wildlife, 215 Bear Creek, 197 Beets, sugar, 152 Bell, Cara Georgina Whitmore Scovell, 102, 107 photo of, 98 Bell, William A., 103, 110, 123, 127–128, 322 “The Denver & Rio Grande Railroad: An Address Given to the Employees, January 28, 1920,” 99–111 New Tracks in North America described, 373–374 photographer for Union Pac., 114–115 photo of, 98 Bellows, Clara Palmer, 344 Bernalillo (N.Mex): vineyards, 153 Bertolotti, Dorothy, 229 Betts, Charles M. (lt. col.), 341 photo of, 46 Big Foot’s village: attack on, 45–46 Bird, Isabella, desc. Colo. Springs, 200 Birds: Palmer and, 222 Birnbaum, Charles, quoted, 209 Black, Celeste, Queen of Glen Eyrie, 10 Blackmore, William, 120

Blair, John (land. arch.), 216–219 parks in Canada, 218 Sanitary Fair, 217 Blair Athol, 213, 236, 307–308 Boer War, 93 Boomtowns, 186–187 Borst, W. W., 109, 129–130 Bowman, Claude, photo of, 313 Boys’ High School (Philadelphia, Pa.), 13. See also Central High School (Philadelphia, Pa.) Brayer, Herbert O., William Blackmore: Early Financing, described, 375–377 Briarhurst Manor Estate, 107, 218 Bridges: oldest on Colo., 218 Bueler, Gladys, 8 Buffalo, 143 A Builder of the West, by John S. Fisher, 7 described, 369–370 Burghard, Eugene W., 231 Burlington & Missouri Railroad, 147 California: coal, 164–165 described, 144–145, 163–165 population, 167 railroad, 146 California Gulch, 123 Cameron, Robert A. (gen.), 188–189 desc. Colo. Springs, 216 Camp Creek, 218, 221, 223, 239 “’Can You Not Give Up Some?,’” by Stephen Collins & Katherine Scott Sturdevant, 349–367 Collins, Stephen, “’Can You Not Give Up

INDEX • 387 Some?,’” 349–367 Cañon City & San Juan Railroad, 123 Cañon City (Colo.), 119, 124–125 coal fields near, 121 Canovas, Antonio (prim. min. of Spain), 260 Capitalism, 175–176 Car. See Automobile Carr, Dorothy, 234 Cassett, A. J., 108 Castle Concrete, 213 Cattle, 159, 331. See also Live� stock, raising Central Colorado Improvement Co., 101 Central High School (Philadel� phia, Pa.), 32 Central Pacific Railroad, 113, 145, 175 Central Park: influence on Monument Valley Park, 201–202, 205 Chamber’s Ranch, 293 Chambers family, 222 Cheese: British eating of, 20 Cheyenne Cañon, 203 Cheyenne Indians: Battle of the Little Bighorn, 44 Chicago & Northwestern Rail� road Co., 109 Christmas parties: hosted by Palmer, 306 Cimarron (N.Mex.), 122 Cimarron Pass, 121 City Beautiful movement, 193 Civic League, 193 Civil War: Medal of Honor, 44 Clark, Stephen, 227 Clarke, Charlotte, 85 Clarke, Ellen, 86

Clarke, Nathan (lt.), 85 Clayton-Bulwer treaty, 249 Cleveland, Grover (pres.), 248, 250–252, 257, 258–259, 260 Venezuela boundary, 253 Clothier, Isaac H., Letters, 1853—1868: Gen’l Wm. J. Palmer described, 370–372 Clothing, women’s, 83–84 Coal, 152, 197 Calif., 165 Colo., 171 deposits into N.Mex., 120 fields, 121 market, 166 Palmer’s study of, 16–17, 22, 114 Rocky Mountains, 165 Santa Fe, near, 166 Cochran, Alexander, 213, 231, 244 Cody, William F. “Buffalo Bill,” Medal of Honor, 45 College Park, 196 Collins, Catherine, narrator of play, 348–367 Collins, Elsie, play assistance, 348–367 portrays Elsie Palmer, 365 Collins, Stephen, 9, 366 “’Can You Not Give Up Some?,’” 349–367 puppet performance, 348–367 Colonia Station (Mexico City): bronze tablet, 380 Colonization: benefits, 157 Colorado Springs, 157 utopian settlements and, 187 “Colorado College State of the Rockies Report,” quoted, 208

388 • INDEX Colorado: area of, 178 coal mines, 171 colonization, 157 crop production, 161–163 described, 143, 156–157, 164, 172, 176 farming, 148, 151 live stock, raising, 159 mines & mining, 151, 172–173 natural resources, 147–148 population, 146, 167, 170 productivity, 180–182 resort potential, 149–150 smelting & reduction, 152 wheat, 162–163 wool, 159 Colorado & Cripple Creek Dis� trict Short Line, 116, 196 Colorado & New Mexico Rail� road, 121 Colorado City (Colo.), 116–117, 119, 187, 197, 230, 330, 332 Colorado Coal & Iron Co., 101, 103 Colorado College, 192, 205, 334 estab., 63–64 girls visit Glen Eyrie, 283–284 museum at, 94 Palmer Hall of Science dedicated, 320 photo of, 320 Perkins Hall, 323 resolutions by faculty, 336–337 school of forestry, 224 Colorado Fuel & Iron Co., 103 Colorado Fuel Co., 103 Colorado Improvement Co., 119 Colorado Midland Railway, 116 Colorado School for the Deaf and the Blind, 192 Glen Eyrie visit, 282 Colorado Springs & Manitou

Railway, 120 Colorado Springs (Colo.), 5, 101, 334–335. See also Fountain Colony 25th anniversary of, 185, 191 Birdseye view, 184 climate, 150 colonization, 157 described, 199–200, 216 El Paso Canal, 202 estab., 188, 190 forbids sale of liquor, 157 improvements, 62, 190 investors, 60 McAllister’s initial impress. of, 61 not remote, 158 Palmer’s original idea for, 189 Palmer’s vision of, 60, 185–195 parks, 191–193, 199–211 population, 170, 185, 190, 196 chart of, 184 precipitation, 222 resort, 171 health, 333 suburban development, 185–186 town site, 190 Colorado Springs Century Chest, 227 Colorado Springs Co., 190, 217, 334 Curtis Coal Mines, 197 Financial Panic of 1873, 62–63 first stake driven, 119 McAllister dir. of, 61 Villa La Fonte, 119–120 Colorado Springs Hotel, 190 Colorado Springs Pioneers Mu� seum: Palmer’s Medal of Honor and, 43 Colton, William F., 109

INDEX • 389 Comly, John, Quaker schism and, 31 Commerce: U.S. and the West, 137–183 Communes. See Colonization Communism. See Marx, Karl Concord coaches (stage), 139 Congressional Medal of Honor. See Medal of Honor “Connections West: William Jackson Palmer & His Railroad Routing Rival� ries,” by E. M. “Mel” McFarland, 113–135 Cooper, Eva R., 345 Cowgill, Martha S., 344 Cowgill, William, 344 Cragmoor Sanitarium, 192 Craig, Mary E., 344 Crampton, Frank, 186 Crawford, John, 232 Crested Butte (Colo.), 101–102 Cripple Creek Mining District, 196 described, 186 Crop production. See Farming Colo., 161–163 Crowell, B. F., 120 Cuba, 259–260, 263 Curtis Coal Mines, 197 Custer, George Armstrong, 44 Davis, Jefferson (pres. of Conf.), pursued, 58 wagon train captured, 48 Dawson, James, 228 Del Norte (Colo.): population, 170–171 The Denver & Rio Grande Project, by Meredith O. Wilson described, 377–378 Denver & New Orlean Railroad, 128

Denver & Rio Grande Railroad, 99–111, 118, 170, 334 Arkansas River route, 124 AT&SF and, 104, 122–125 settlement with, 106 bibliog., annotated, 369–383 depot, 192 financed, 105–106 first locomotive, 118–119 illust., 183 map, 132–135 McAllister’s involv. in, 63 narrow gauge steam engine, photo of, 112 proposed routes, 119 “The Denver & Rio Grande Rail� road: An Address Given to the Employees, January 28, 1920,” by William A. Bell, 99–111 Denver & Rio Grande Western Railroad, 108, 110, 130 Denver (Colo.), 186 Denver, South Park & Pacific Railroad, 128 Denver, Texas & Gulf Railroad, 128 Denver Pacific Railroad, 100, 126, 146, 169 Department of Parks and Recre� ation, 206 DeRemer, James R., 123–124, 127–128, 129 Diablo (horse), 4 Diaz, Profirio (pres. of Mex.), 258 Dickens, Charles description of Eden cited, 148 DiFelice, Katie, 232 Diseases, 148–149 Dodge, D. C. (col.), 109, 321–322, 323 Dorchester Park, 203 Drinkwater, John, 221

390 • INDEX Dunn, Ed, 230 Durango (Colo.), 101, 130 Durango Land & Coal Co., 101 Eaton, Walter, 230 Economy: Colorado, 171–172 estimated productivity, 180– 182 U.S., 137 annual production, 180 mining and manufacturing, 180–181 Electric power & light, 197 Ellsworth, L. C., 105 El Moro, 122–123, 124 El Paso Canal, 190, 202, 203, 204 use described, 227 El Paso County, 335 El Paso County Horticultural Society, 227 Emigration: farmers, 151 to Rockies, 151 to West, 137–183 reasons for, 141 Empire Contract Company, 121 Evans, John (gov.), 127, 128, 130 Evergreen Cemetery, 218 Every, Beatrice, 345 Experimental Garden, 196 Fair Hill Burial Ground, 26 Farming, 148, 150. See also Crop production Glen Eyrie, 222 irrigation limitations, 158 Miss. Valley, 150 Fast Food Nation (book & film): Colorado Springs and, 185 Fatty Rice’s Place, 229–230 Field, Grace, 345 Finlay, George, 204 Fishel, Edwin, The Secret War for the Union, 7

Fisher, John S., A Builder of the West, 7 cited, 191, 234–235, 310, 312 described, 369–370 Fisher, Mary, 29 Fisher, Thomas J., 321–322, 344 Flags: capture of, 44 Floods: at Glen Eyrie, 215, 220 Memorial Day flood, 207 Monument Valley Park photo of, 207 Flower, Helen S. Mellen, 346 photo of, 82 Flying W Ranch, 213 Fohn, Carl, 228, 242 Rose Arbor photo of, 227 Food: British, 17–20 Forest King (horse), 277 Forest of Fontainebleau: Palmer describes, 201 Fountain (Colo.), 331 Fountain Colony, 188–189. See also Colorado Springs, Colo. first stake driven, 119 McAllister dir. of, 61 Fox, George, Society of Friends, 28 Fremont, John C., 113–135 French, Chester, 4 Friendship: Palmer and McAllister, 55–67 Friends School, 13 Fruit: Glen Eyrie, 223, 234 growing, 153 Rio Grande Valley, 173 Garden & Glen Electric Road, 230

INDEX • 391 Garden City (resort), 230 Gardening, 227 Garden of the Gods, 83, 190, 197, 218 described, 215 illust., 183 “The Gardens of Glen Eyrie,” by Donald McGilchrist, 213– 245 Gardiner, Charles Fox (doctor), care of Palmer, 295, 300–301 Gardner, Mark L., 9, 51 “One of the Most Gallant Men of the Army: William Jack� son Palmer & the Medal of Honor,” 43–53 Garland, Hamlin, description of Glen Eyrie, 219–220 illust. from Her Mountain Lover, 284 recollections, 284–285 Garner, A. B. (maj.), 255 photo of, 46 Gately, Barbara, 9, 66 “An Abiding Bond: The Friendship Between Major Henry McAllister & General William Jackson Palmer,” 55–67 Gathchell, H. T. F. (doctor), 204 Geddis, Peter, 108 General William J. Palmer, by George L. Anderson described, 374–375 by Jeanette Turpin described, 380 “General William J. Palmer, Anti-Imperialist, 18951905,” by George L. Anderson, 247–271 “General William J. Palmer and

the Early Denver & Rio Grande Railway: An An� notated Select Bibliogra� phy,” by Victor J. Stone, 369–383 “General William Jackson Palmer & His Vision for Colorado Springs,” by Matt Mayberry, 185–195 “General William Jackson Palm� er & the Mellen & Clarke Families,” by Delores Gustafson, 83–97 “General William Jackson Palmer’s Riding Accident, Palliative Care & Death, 1906 to 1909,” by Lynn A. Gilfillan-Morton, 291–319 German Colonization Company, 187–188 failure of, 188 Germantown (Pa.): Palmer home, photo, 32 Gilfillan-Morton, Lynn A., 9, 316 “General William Jackson Palmer’s Riding Accident, Palliative Care & Death, 1906 to 1909,” 291–319 Gilluly, J. W., 108, 109 Glen Eyrie, 70–71, 88, 213–245, 334 buildings, 228 Castle, 229 photo of, 212 construction of, 62 dairy, 234 described, 213–214, 219–220 Eagle’s Nest, 229 farming, 222 floods, 215, 220 fruit trees, 223, 234 Gardener’s House

392 • INDEX photo of, 226 gardens after Palmer’s death, 230 Gateway Rocks, 230 geology, 214 greenhouses, 225–226 Burghard family, 231 photo of, 226 guests, 234 International Building, 232 irrigation, 220–221 John Blair, 216 Palmer and, 85 Pink House, 231–232 planting, 228, 233 power plant, 233 Rose Arbor photo of, 227 Rustic Cottage, 231 soil, 222 tourists at, 229 wildlife, 215 Glen Eyrie Garden Society, 232 Glen Eyrie Mountain Colony, 230 Gold production, 196 Gold standard, 251–252 Gorham Manufacturing Co., 4 Gould, Jay, 126–127 D&RG and, 109, 110, 128, 130 photo of, 127 Granada (Colo.), 121 Grand View Point, 309 Grant, Julia Dent, 107 Grant, Ulysses S. (gen.), 107 cited, 144 Grasshopper plagues, 223. See also Rocky Mountain Locusts Graziers. See Livestock, raising Great Britain: and eating of cheese, 20 food of, 17–20

Palmer’s travels in, 14–25 Palmer on customs, 17–18 U.S. relations, 249 Great Danes: Palmer’s, 219, 239 photo of, 219 Great Plains: good soil, 143 Greeley, Horace, irrigation, on, 160–161 quoted, 140 Greene, F., 321–322 Greenwood, Grace, describes Glen Eyrie, 214–215 Greenwood, William H. (col.), 109, 114, 118–119 killed, 130 Gregg, James B. (rev.), 326–330 Gustafson, Delores, 9, 96 “General William Jackson Palmer & the Mellen & Clarke Families,” 83–97 Hagerman, Percy, quoted, 281 Hallett, Samuel, 113 Hankins, Susan, 232 Harper, Joseph P., 344 Haskell, Thomas Nelson (rev.): Colorado College and, 63–64 Health, 83–84 Colo. climate benefits, 149 Held, Anna, 70, 75 Held, Helene, 75 Hempfield Railroad: Palmer employed by, 13, 113 Hennenhofer, Gustav A., 207 Herkomer, Hubert von, painting of Palmer, 290 Her Mountain Lover, by Hamlin Garland illust. from, 284 Hicks, Elias (Quaker min.), 29–30 photo of, 30

INDEX • 393 Hicksite Quaker religion. See also Quaker, Hicksite Palmer’s upbringing and, 13–14 vice and, 20 Hillbright Corp., 231 Hinchman, Charles S. (comdr.), 46 Historic Preservation Alliance, 209 Historiography: William J. and Queen Palmer, 5–11 History of the Fifteenth Pennsylvania Volunteer Cavalry, ed. by Charles H. Kirk described, 372–373 Holbrook, Henry Randolph, 114, 115, 116, 119, 121, 123, 125, 129, 130 Holliday, John Henry “Doc,” 129 Horses: Palmer’s, 4, 277, 293 Howbert, Irving, 116, 120 Palmer’s funeral address, 330–335 Hughes, Andrew, 109 Hunt, Alexander Cameron (gov.), 101, 109 Hunt, Edward, 236 Hunt, Gloria, 344 Hunter, A. V., 120 Idaho Springs (Colo.), 171 Illinois, 141 Immigration, 261 to U.S., 137 Imperialism: Palmer and, 247–271 Improvement companies, 178–179 Indian corn, 150 Indians, 145, 168 Indian Territory, 122

International Society of Arbori� culture, 225 Palmer co-founds, 203 Iron ore, 152 Irrigation, 143, 157, 159–161, 190 Glen Eyrie, 220–221, 223 Horace Greeley on, 160–161 improvement companies, 178–179 limitations, 158 required in Colo. & N.Mex., 148 Jackson, Emma F., 345 Jackson, Francis H., 15, 345 Jackson, Helen, 8 photo of, 11 Jackson, Helen Hunt, 236 desc. Colo. Springs, 200 desc. Glen Eyrie, 213 Jackson, John, 345 Jackson, William. S., 108, 109, 118 Jackson, William Henry (pho� tog.), 238 Jacobeit, Cecile, 344 Jeffery, Edward T., 108 Jewett, Patty, 227 Jingoism, 248, 251 Johnston, John W. (quart. mstr.), photo of, 46 Juárez, Benito (pres. of Mex.), 102 Kansas City (Mo.), 142 Kansas Pacific Railroad, 116, 127, 139, 145, 146, 168–169, 189 coal used, 171 Gould and, 126 Palmer director of, 115 Smoky Hill route, 99 survey for, 99–100 Keifer, Ginny, cited, 227 Kingman, Lewis, 116, 117–118, 123–125, 129

394 • INDEX Kingsley, Rose, 102 desc. Colo. Springs, 199 portrayed by Stephen Collins, 358–361 Kirk, Charles H., Letters, 1853—1868: Gen’l Wm. J. Palmer described, 372–373 Kramer, G. W., 109 Krause, George A., 230, 346, 347 Krueger telegram, 259 La Junta (Colo.), 125 Lakota Indians: Battle of the Little Bighorn, 44 Wounded Knee, 45–46 Lamborn, Charles B., 103, 109 “Last Will & Testament,” of William Jackson Palmer, 344–347 La Veta Pass (Colo.), 122 La Veta Town Company, 90 Leadville (Colo.), 104, 107 Leadville Silver Rush, 123 League of Women Voters, 206 Leavenworth & Denver Rail� road, 147 Leavenworth, Pawnee & West� ern Railroad, 113 Leavitt, Charles Walford (land� scape eng.), 203–204, 205–206 Letters, 1853—1868: Gen’l Wm. J. Palmer, by Isaac H. Clothier described, 370–372 “Letter to the Citizens of Colora� do Springs of the Twenty First Century,” by William Jackson Palmer, 196–197 Lincoln, Abraham (pres.), 43 Lincoln, Mary Clarke, 86 Lippincott, Josephine P., 344

Lipsey, John, cited, 293, 308 Liquor. See Alcohol Livestock, raising, 152–153, 158–159, 331 Local history, 247 Lohse, Joyce B., 24 “Young Palmer Travels Abroad,” 13–25 Loma (Colo.): population, 170–171 Lord Salisbury, 250, 252–253, 256, 258 Lovejoy, Frederick, 108 Lowell, James Russell, quoted, 328–329 Loyal Legion of the United States, 339 Lyon, Hylon B. (brig. gen.), captured, 50, 338–339 MacLaren & Thomas, 82 MacLaren, Thomas (arch.), 95 Mahogany Club of Colorado Springs, 252, 260 Maine Commission, 263 Major Domo (unique rock for� mation), 245 Manco del Burro: coal discovered, 120 Manitou Experimental Forest, 224–225 Manitou House, 120 Manitou Park, 224, 310 Manitou Park Station. See Mani� tou Park Manitou Springs (Colo.), 119– 120, 171, 217, 331, 334 illust., 183 The Man on the Iron Horse, by Rhoda Wilcox, 7 Manufacturing, 152 Colo., 172 Marcy, Randolph (capt.),

INDEX • 395 describes wildlife, 215 Market Revolution: impacts of, 29 Martin, Glen Eyrie, 311 cited, 293 Palmer’s driver, 280, 307–309 Palmer’s shipboard injury, 312 Martin Chuzzlewit, by Charles Dickens cited, 148 Marx, Karl, colonies and, 188 Masterson, Bat, 129 Maxwell, Lucien D., 115, 118 Maxwell Land Grant, 115 for railroad development, 117, 120 mapping of, 118 Maxwell Land Grant & Railway Co.: board, 117, 121 Mayberry, Matt, 9, 194 “General William Jackson Palmer & His Vision for Colorado Springs,” 185–195 McAllister, Elizabeth Cooper, marriage to Henry, 58 photo of, 59 McAllister, Henry (maj.), 55–67, 336 business, 64 dir. of Colorado Springs Com� pany, 61 dir. of Fountain Colony, 61 impressions of Colorado Springs, 61 involved with D&RG, 63, 118 marriage to Elizabeth Cooper, 58 on Palmer, 65–66 Palmer’s funeral address, 337 photo of, 57

pres. of National Land and Improvement Co., 60 seeks investors, 60 vision of Colorado Springs, 65 working for American Iron and Steel Association, 58, 60 wounded, 57 McAllister House, 61 McClure, Alexander K., Palmer’s Medal of Honor, 48–49 McCoy, W. M., cited, 165 McFarland, E. M. “Mel,” 9, 131 “Connections West: William Jackson Palmer & His Railroad Routing Rival� ries,” 113–135 McGilchrist, Donald, 235 “The Gardens of Glen Eyrie,” 213–245 McKinley, William (pres.), 263 McMurtrie, John A., 104, 109, 119, 123 McReynolds, Robert, 230 Mears, Otto, 368 filigree railroad pass, 368 photo of, 368 Meat: market, 150 Medal of Honor, 43–53 abuses, 45 act authorizing, 43–44 law regarding, 49 Legion formed, 45 Palmer and, 43–53 awarded, 50 petition denied, 48 photo of, 53 spying and, 49 standards for awarding, 44 Medications: Palmer’s, 304–305

396 • INDEX Meeker, Nathan, 188 Mellen, Belle Clarke, 85–86 death of, 85, 89 marriage to William, 85 Mellen, Chase, 346, 347 Mellen, Clark, 345 Mellen, Ellen Clarke, marriage to William, 86 photo of, 86 Mellen, Nathan, 345 Mellen, William P., 85–86, 89, 116–117 marriage to Belle Clarke, 85 marriage to Ellen Clarke, 86 Mellen family: photo of, 88 Memorial Day flood, 207 Mesa Reservoirs, 221 Mesa Road Park, 196 Mexican Central Railroad, 100, 129 Mexican Filigree Jewellery, 368 Mexican National Railroad, 110, 121 Palmer and, 60–61 Mexico: former territory, 144 Palmer traveling in, 102, 121 Meyer, August, 104 Meyer, L. H., 108 Miner’s Journal: Palmer correspondent for, 13 Mineral deposits, 143–144 Miners’ strike, 103 Mining: Colo., 172–173 Mississippi River, 138 Mississippi Valley, 138 colonization & health, 148 farming, 150 population, 179 Missouri, Kansas, & Texas Rail� way, 127

Mitchell, Silas Weir (doctor), care of Palmer, 298–299, 300–301 Moffat, David H., 108 Monroe Doctrine, 250 Davis Resolutions, 256 Palmer on, 252–258 The Montezuma (railroad eng.), 119 Monument Creek, 196, 203, 204, 207, 209, 332 photo of, 198 Monument Valley Park, 196–197, 201–204, 228, 243, 333 Central Park influence, 201– 202, 204 flood, 207 photo of, 207 Friends of, 209 geologic column, 204 photo of, 205 photo of, 198 sale attempted, 206–207 The Moor (horse), 277 Moran, Thomas (artist), Mount of the Holy Cross, 107 Morgan family, of Wales, 17–19 Morley, William Raymond, 117–118, 119, 120–121, 122–126 killed, 130 Mormons, in Utah, 145 Morrison, Lillian Burnham, recollections, 280 Morton, J. Sterling, 203 Mountain spa: Manitou Springs, 120 Mount of the Holy Cross (paint� ing): by Thomas Moran, 107 “’My Darling Queenie . . .’ A Love Story,”

INDEX • 397 by Chris Nicholl, 69–81 Myers, Elsie Palmer, 218, 346 birth of, 75 marriage to Leo, 95 photo of, 272 portrayed by Elsie Collins, 365 recollections of father, 274 wedding, 283 Myers, Elsie Queen, photo of, 92, 272 Myers, Leopold H., 321–322, 323 marriage to Elsie, 95 Narrow gauge, 175, 177 Palmer and, 119, 120, 126 Nationalism, 248 National Land & Improv. Co.: McAllister pres. of, 60 The Navigators, 214, 232, 317 Nettleton, Edwin S. (col.), 188–189, 217 Nevada: described, 146 mining, 175 pop. & product., 181 smelting, 166 New Deal, 207 New Mexico: area of, 178 described, 143, 164, 176 farming, 148, 151 live stock, raising, 159 mapping of, 117–118 mines, 151 natural resources, 147–148 population, 167 productivity, 180–182 Spanish Land Grants, 178 Newport in the Rockies, by Marshall Sprague, 7 Queen described, 75–76 mistaken, 76 New Tracks in North America, by William A. Bell

described, 373–374 Nicholl, Chris, 1, 79 “’My Darling Queenie . . .’ A Love Story,” 69–81 “William Jackson Palmer: Liv� ing While Dying,” 273–289 Nichols, Purley, 309–310 Nolan grant, 101 Nomad (Palmer’s train car), 93–94 North & South Construction Co., 118 North Pacific Railroad, 169 Nurses: Palmer’s, 303 Oklahoma Syndicate, 230–231 Old Colorado City (Colo.). See Colorado City (Colo.) Olney, Richard (sec. of state), 249, 250–251, 257 Omaha Union Pacific Railroad, 113 “One of the Most Gallant Men of the Army: William Jack� son Palmer and the Medal of Honor,” by Mark L. Gardner, 43–53 Orchard House, 83, 95, 229 photo of, 82 Ordelheide, Florenz, recollections, 281, 285 Orman Brothers Const. Co., 119 Oro (Colo.). See Leadville (Colo.) Osgood, J. C., 103 Otero, Miguel, 117 Otis, William A., 293–294 Otto, Calvin P., 1 “Our Father Who Art in the In� tersection, Or, Where Does William Jackson Palmer Belong?,” by Katherine Scott Sturdevant, 5–11

398 • INDEX Out West (newspaper), 333 Palmer, Dorothy, 93–94, 95, 218, 302, 346 birth of, 75 photo of, 92 Palmer, Emma H., 344 Palmer, Jonathan, 31 children of, 26 Germantown home of, photo, 32 photo of, 12 Palmer, Mary Lincoln “Queen” Mellen, activities of, 71–72 appeal to William, 77 birth of, 86 Colorado Springs and, 71, 75, 76 courtship, 77, 87, 117 death of, 64, 78, 93, 218 described, 70, 71–72, 74 described by Sprague, 75–76 mistaken, 76 described by William, 87 gifts from, 72 health of, 77, 84–85, 90 heart attack, 75 historiography, 5–11 impressions of, 6 marriage to William, 59, 71, 87 photo of, 68, 73, 88, 348 portrayed by Katherine Stur� devant, 350–364 romance with William, 69–81 play about, 349–367 siblings, 87 teacher, 72, 74 travels, 75, 78 women’s history and, 10 Palmer, Matilda Jackson, 31 children of, 26 Germantown home of, photo, 32

marriage, on, 78–79 photo of, 12, 26 Palmer, William Jackson, 1–2 15th Pennsylvania Volunteer Cavalry and, 47–53 reunion, 282, 306 abolitionism and, 23, 339 accident on horseback, 277– 278, 292–294, 321 orders horse to be shot, 278 accomplishments of, 9, 70 anti-imperialist views, 247–271 automobile and, 206, 273, 294, 302, 307–308 electric car, 279, 303 Stanley Steamer, 280, 283 photo of, 313 avoidance of ostentation, 234 birds, 222 birth of, 31 brevet rank of brig. gen., 47–48 British customs, 17–18 business car, photo of, 131 business troubles, 78 captured and imprisoned, 47 career, 369 cavalry, 46 Christmas party, 234–235 Civil War service, 27–28, 337–342 Colorado Springs, original idea for, 189 Colorado Springs, residence, 75 concern for others, 280 conduct as a soldier, 338 conservation, 233 correspondent for Miner’s Journal, 13 courtship, 77, 87, 117 cremated, 286, 321 Cuba, 264–265 death of, 66, 78, 95, 286, 312– 314, 321

INDEX • 399 Denver & Rio Grande Railroad, 99–111, 113–135 depression, 305–306, 310–311 dogs, 282 “Dream Railroad,” 59, 118 education of, 31 employed by Hempfield Rail� road, 13 engineering, 15–16 experimentation & innovation, 233 exposure to vices, 19–20 falls from horse, 276, 291 Forest of Fontainebleau, de� scribed, 201 founder of Colo. Springs, 5–6 funeral, 286–287, 321–323 games with children, 275 Germantown home of, photo, 32 gifts from, 93, 191–192, 283 donation of parks, 203 flowers, 226 Monument Valley Park, 203 school of forestry, 224 health, 277 Hicksite Quaker religion, 13–14 historiography, 5–11 horseman, 275–277 hospitality, 234 imprisoned, 56 influences on, 200 observations, 200–201 injured on ship, 283–284, 312 Kansas Pacific Railroad dir., 115 “Last Will & Testament,” 344–347 “Letter to the citizens of Colorado Springs of the Twenty First Century,” 196–197 life as a quadriplegic, 299–300

love of life, 273–289 love of nature, 274 love of trees, 224–225 forest reserve, 225 marriage to Queen, 59, 71, 87 Maxwell Land Grant & Rail� way Co., 117 McAllister on, 65–66 Medal of Honor, 43–53 awarded, 50 petition returned, 48 photo of, 53 medical care of, 94–95, 291–319 medications, 304–305 Mellen & Clarke Families, 83–97 Mexican National Railway, 60–61 Mexico, trouble traveling, 102, 121 Monroe Doctrine, views of, 252–258 mustered out, 48 narrow gauge, 119, 120 “New West” concept, 137–183 nurses who cared for, 303 outdoor pursuits, 275 painting of, 290 paralyzed, 94, 273, 278, 293–294 exploits, 280, 285–286 injury described, 294–296 Palmer on, 284–285 parties, 281 described, 282 holiday, 283 patient after accident, 294–295 Pennsylvania Central, 113 persona of, 189 photo of, 3, 12, 37, 42, 88, 97, 136, 272, 348 portrayed by Stephen Collins, 350–362 puppet, photo of, 367

400 • INDEX pursuit of Jefferson Davis, 58 Quaker faith, 27–41, 322 quantity & standards, 233 Queen’s death and, 64, 218 Queen described by, 87 Red Hill, Ala., 50 Rio Grande Southern pass, photo of, 368 romance with Queen, 69–81 play about, 349–367 spying, 47, 48–49 statue of, 6, 10 photo, 11 study of coal, 16–17 style of management, 278 teen-aged, 13–25 travels, 75, 76, 78 complexity, 75 Great Britain, 14–25 tour of Western Europe, 283 tributes, 321–343 U.S. foreign policy, 247–271 Union Pacific ED, 113 surveys, 115 Venezuela boundary, 253 visionary, 9 vision for Colorado Springs, 60, 65, 185–195, 200 waterbed, 301, 302 “The Westward March of Emigration in the United States, As Affecting the Future of Colorado and New Mexico,” 137–183 x-rays of spine, 297 Palmer Day, 209 Palmer Hall, Hampton Institute: bronze tablet, 380 Palmer Hall of Science: bronze tablet, 380 dedicated, 336–343, 340 photo of, 381 dedicated, 320

photo of, 320 Palmer Park, 192, 203, 309 Panic of 1873, 237 Colorado Springs Co., 61–62 Panic of 1893, 368 Parks: design, 201–203 Parks Commission, 206 Parsons, Edward S., 323 Pasteur, Louis, 233 Peabody, George Foster, 262, 346, 347 William Jackson Palmer: Pathfinder and Builder, described, 380 Peace Society, 339 Pennsylvania: pop. & product., 180–181 wheat, 162 Pennsylvania Central Railroad: Palmer employed by, 113–114 Pennsylvania Railroad, 140 Perkins, Charles, 230 Perry, John D., 99 Pershing, Howell T. (doctor), care of Palmer, 295–296, 300–301, 315 Palmer’s death, 313–314 Peters, W. J., Palmer’s alias as prisoner, 47 Phantom Curve: illust., 183 Pike, Zebulon Montgomery, describes region, 199 Pike National Forest, 224 Pikes Peak: illust., 183 Pikes Peak Regional History Symposium, 1, 9 Pile, William A., 117 Pinchot, Gifford, 225, 233 Pittsburgh, Fort Wayne & Chi� cago Railroad, 139

INDEX • 401 Platt, William Alexander, tribute to Palmer, 328 Poetry: mining, 15 Polution, 233 Population: Colo. & N.Mex., 167, 170 Colorado Springs, 196, 197 chart of, 184 Mississippi Valley, 179 U.S., 137–138 emigration and, 147 Populism, 248 Postlethwaite, W. W., 321–322 Potter, Nathan, 4 Powers, Charles T. (doctor), care of Palmer, 295–297, 300, 315 Powers Boulevard, 193 Pratt, John, 117 Precipitation: Colo. & N.Mex., 148 Colorado Springs, 222 Pacific coast, 143 Pueblo & Arkansas Val. RR, 121 Pueblo (Colo.), 101 Palmer and, 121–122 population, 170 Puppets. See “’Can You Not Give Up Some?’” Quakers: Hicksite principles of, 27, 29–30 schism, 29–30 Orthodox, 30 Queen’s Canyon, 307 Queen of Glen Eyrie, by Celeste Black, 10 “A Question of Conscience: Wil� liam Jackson Palmer and His Quaker Faith,” by Leah Davis Witherow, 27–41

Racisim, 261 Railroads: cost of, 171, 174–175 earnings, 180 financed, 101, 105–106, 140 gauge, 100–101 land companies were formed, 101 Mears pass, 368 mileage, 179 mining and, 175 Palmer on, 59 tracks in the city, 193 Western, 173–174 Westward emigration, 138–140 Railroad strike, 103 Raton Pass, 118, 122 projected routes, 122 Rebel of the Rockies, by Robert G. Athern, 7 described, 378–379 Red Hill (Ala.): and Palmer’s Medal of Honor, 43, 50 Reid, Herbert, 221–222, 240 quoted, 233 Reiff, J. C. (adj.), photo of, 46 Resorts: Colorado Springs, 171 Reyea, Charles M., illust. by, 284 Rice-Jones, Judith, 9, 210 “William Jackson Palmer Park Builder,” 199–211 Rio Grande Modeling & Histori� cal Society, 369 Rio Grande Southern & Silverton Railroad Co.: passes, 368 Rio Grande Valley: wine & fruit growing, 153, 173

402 • INDEX Risley, Hanson A., 103, 104–105, 108, 109 Ristine, George, 109 Roads: cost of, 155 Robinson, Albert Alonzo, 121, 124 Robinson, Charles Mulford, City Beautiful movement, 193 quoted, 208 Rockford (Ill.): described, 216 Rock Ledge Ranch, 83, 222 photo of Orchard House, 82 Rockwood Canyon: photo at, 112 Rocky Mountain Locusts, 237 Rocky Mountains, 142–145 coal, 165 described, 154 emigration to, 151 natural resources, 151 Roosevelt, Theodore (pres.), 266 Medal of Honor and, 45 Rosecrans, William S. (gen.), 102 Rosemont, 207 Royal Gorge, 124–125 dispute over, 63 Royal Gorge War, 104, 125–126 AT&SF ordered to stop oper., 128 AT&SF wins lease, 127 D&RG and the DSP&P, 128– 129 settlement, 106 stand off, 127–128 Supreme Court decisions, 104–105 Treaty of Boston, 129 Sand Creek Massacre, 128 San Juan Railway Co., 105 illust., 183 San Luis Valley, 122, 130

Schlosser, Eric, Fast Food Nation (book & film), 185 Schoolboy (horse), 293 Schuyler, Howard (capt.), 114 Sclater, Charlotte Mellen (Lottie), 83, 88–94, 346 Boer War, 93 divorced, 83–84, 91–93 marriage to Ernest Stephenson, 89–90 marriage to William Sclater, 93 photo of, 82 Sclater, Helen, 82 Sclater, Philip Lutley, 93 Sclater, William L., 83, 322 Colo. Coll. museum, 94 marriage to Charlotte, 93 residence, photo of, 82 Scott, Thomas A., 114 Scott, William L., 108 Sharman, Daisy S. Mellen, marriage to Robert Wolterbeck, 92 Sharman, Marguerite (Daisy) S. Mellen, 346 photo of, 82 Shea, Jesse J., 345 Shepard, Edward M., 257, 262 Sherman, William T. (gen.), 145 Sherman Silver Act, 368 Shooks Run, 193–194, 331 Sierra Madre. See Rocky Moun� tains Slocum, Mary G., ed., “Tributes to the Late Wil� liam J. Palmer From His Fellow Citizens In Colo� rado Springs,” 321–343 Slocum, William F., 321–322 Palmer’s funeral address, 324–326 Smoky Hill Trail, 113, 115

INDEX • 403 Society of Friends. See also Quak� ers American, 29–30 egalitarian views of, 28–29 founded, 28 market revolution and, 29 Palmer family and, 31 Philadelphia, Pa., 29, 31 Sonora Railroad, 130 South Pueblo Iron Works, 103 Spain: U.S. relations, 260, 261 Spanish Land Grants: N.Mex., 178 Sprague, Henry E., 103 Sprague, Marshall, Newport in the Rockies, 7–8 Springs, mineral, 171 Springs Area Beautiful Assoc., 206 Spying, 49 Palmer, 47, 48–49 St. Joseph & Denver Railroad, 147 St. Mary’s Catholic Church: photo of, 198 Stanley Steamer, 280 Starr, M. Allen (doctor): care of Palmer, 300–301 Statues: William J. Palmer, 6 moving, 6–7, 10 photo, 4, 11 Stephenson, Cyril, 90 Stephenson, Ernest P., 90 divorced, 83, 91–93 marriage to Charlotte, 89 Stone, Victor J., “General William J. Palmer and the Early Denver & Rio Grande Railway: An Annotated Select Bibliog� raphy,” 369–383

Stowe, Harriet Beecher (author), 21 Strake, George, 231–232 Strieby, William E. (chem. prof.), 204 Sturdevant, Katherine Scott, 11, 366 “’Can You Not Give Up Some?,’” 349–367 “Our Father Who Art in the In� tersection, Or, Where Does William Jackson Palmer Belong?,” 5–11 puppet performance, 348–367 Sturdevant, Rick W., narrator of play, 348–367 Suburban development: Colorado Springs, 185–186, 194 Swan, Will (doctor), care of Palmer, 273, 294–295, 300–301, 304–305, 315 Tabor, Horace Austin Warner, 104 Taft, Arthur N. (rev.), 322–323 Taos (N.Mex.): illust., 183 Taylor, Hannis, quoted, 260 Teaching: Queen and, 72, 74 Terry, Alfred (brig. gen.), 44 Texas Pacific Railroad, 146, 168, 169 The Secret War for the Union, by Edwin Fishel, 7 Thomson, J. Edgar, 23, 113, 114, 139–140 Timber, 331 Tourism, 154 Colo. & N.Mex., 180 Glen Eyrie, 229 Trails, 331–332

404 • INDEX Trails, Open Space and Parks ordinance (TOPS), 194 Transcontinental Railroad, 113, 116 Transportation, 139–140, 146, 180 costs, 176–177 Trees: beetles, 225 Glen Eyrie, 228, 233 Palmer’s love of, 224–225 “Tributes to the Late William J. Palmer From His Fel� low Citizens In Colorado Springs,” ed. by Mary G. Slocum, 321–343 Trinidad (Colo.), 115, 125 coal fields near, 121 population, 170 Tuberculosis, 95 Turpin, Jeanette, General William J. Palmer described, 380 Tuscarora (ship), 14 U.S. foreign policy: Palmer and, 247–271 U.S.S. Maine (ship), 262, 264. See also Maine Commission Uncle Tom’s Cabin, by Harriet Beecher Stowe, 21 Union Colony, 188 Union Contract Company, 118 Union Depot, Salt Lake City (Utah): bronze tablet, 380 Union Pacific, Eastern Division, 114. See also Kansas Pacific Railroad Palmer joins, 113–114 Palmer surveys, 115 Union Pacific Railroad, 100, 113, 145, 169, 175 Gould and, 126

United States: Great Britain relations, 249 Spain relations, 260, 261 University of Colorado at Colo� rado Springs, 192 Utah: described, 146 Utah Central Railroad, 177 Utah Fuel Co., 109 Ute Pass, 332 Utopian settlements. See Coloni� zation Van Briggle, Anne, 206 Van Briggle, Artus, 206 Van Diest, Edmond C., 4, 204, 225, 321–322 Glen Eyrie, 230, 233 Van Oostveen, Maud Mellen, 94–95, 346 daughters, photo of, 97 photo of, 82 Venezuela: boundary dispute, 248, 249–253 Villa La Fonte, 119 Wagner, Avis, 232 Wagner, Dave, 232 Wagner, William (maj.), 109 photo of, 46 Waterbed: Palmer’s, 301, 302 Watt, Henry C. (doctor), and Marjory Palmer, 95 care of Palmer, 301–302, 304, 315 Watt, Marjory Palmer, 218, 346 birth of, 75, 90–91 Henry Watt and, 95 photo of, 92 tuberculosis and, 95 Watts, John S., 117 Wealth & prosperity: Colo. public, 171–172 “New West,” 137–183

INDEX • 405 Weir, Ida S., 344 Weitbrec, R. F., 105, 109 “The Westward March of Emigration in the United States, Considered in its Bearing Upon the Near Future of Colorado & New Mexico,” by William Jackson Palmer, 137–183 Wheat, 150 Colorado, 162–163 Pennsylvania, 162 White House. See Orchard House Whiting, Lilian, 231 Wilcox, Rhoda Davis, cited, 311 The Man on the Iron Horse, 7 Wilder, J. A. (doctor), 313 William Blackmore: Early Financing, by Herbert O. Brayer described, 375–377 “William Jackson Palmer: Living While Dying,” by Chris Nicholl, 273–289 William Jackson Palmer: Pathfinder and Builder, by George Foster Peabody described, 380 “William Jackson Palmer Park Builder,” by Judith Rice-Jones, 199–211 Williams, Lester (doctor), 297, 316 Williams Canyon, 308 Willow Creek Park, 203 Wilson, O. Meredith, The Denver & Rio Grande Project described, 377–378 Wine & brandy: consumption, 154

production, 153–154 Rio Grande Valley, 173 Witherow, Leah Davis, 39 “A Question of Conscience: William Jackson Palmer and His Quaker Faith,” 27–41 Wolcott, Edward 0., 256–257 Wolcott, Francis, Palmer’s orders to shoot horse, 278–279 quoted, 276, 279 Wolterbeck, Robert, marriage to Daisy Mellen, 92 Women’s history: Queen Palmer, 10 Wool: raised in Cal., 158 raised in Colo., 152, 159 Wootton, “Uncle Dick,” 118, 122–123 Wounded Knee, 45–46 The WPA Guide to 1930s Colorado, quoted, 207 Wright, Edward, account of Queen, 71–72, 74 Wright, Sunny, verses, 230 Wulsten, Carl, 187–188 X-rays: of Palmer’s spine, 297 Yellow journalism, 262–263 Young, Gladys, 345 Young, Gwendolin, 345 “Young Palmer Travels Abroad,” by Joyce B. Lohse, 13–25 Yount, David, quoted, 28 Zane Street School, 13

“His imagination created an empire with its cities, its homes, its factories, its educational foundations, where others saw only an arid plain stretching up to barren mountains. With prophetic insight he acted where others hesitated. By what he did we can know his character and those intellectual qualities which ranked him among America’s foremost men.” William F. Slocum, March 18, 1909


ISBN 978-1-56735-261-0

90000 >

Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum

LLLbookCover23Feb2009.indd 1

Legends, Labors & Loves of W.J. Palmer

“The life of General William J. Palmer has been one of the most potent factors of the four decades in the upbuilding of the city of Colorado Springs, the state of Colorado, and the entire west.… Of his remarkable genius, of his charity and philanthropy, of his many benefactions to city and state, of the courage that [he] achieved on the battleﬁeld, and in the struggles of the pioneer west, of his splendid character, of his manhood and his broad humanity . . . there is due to him an everlasting debt of gratitude from the community which owes its very existence and its present-day prosperity to him, and to him almost exclusively.” Irving Howbert, March 18, 1909

Legends, Labors & Loves

of

William Jackson Palmer


9 781567 352610

2/23/2009 8:44:29 AM

Legends, Labors & Loves William Jackson Palmer, 1836—1909

Origami Myths & Legends

Chinese Myths & Legends

Diana Palmer - Rawhide & Lace

The labors of Hercules

The Labors of Hercules

Labors of Imagination

Texas Indian Myths & Legends

Loves Music Loves To Dance

Loves Me, Loves Me Knot

Loves music, loves to dance

Loves Me, Loves Me Not

Loves Music, Loves to Dance

Loves Music, Loves to Dance

Loves Me, Loves Me Knot

Legends

Legends

Legends

Loves Me, Loves Me Knot

Loves Me, Loves Me Knot

Loves Music, Loves To Dance

Legends

Legends

The labors of Hercules

The labors of Hercules

The labors of Hercules

Loves Redemption

Loves Challenges

Loves Choice

Lila's Loves

Helen Jackson

Legends, Labors & Loves William Jackson Palmer, 1836—1909

Origami Myths & Legends

Chinese Myths & Legends

Diana Palmer - Rawhide & Lace

The labors of Hercules

The Labors of Hercules

Labors of Imagination

Texas Indian Myths & Legends

Loves Music Loves To Dance

Loves Me, Loves Me Knot

Loves music, loves to dance

Loves Me, Loves Me Not

Loves Music, Loves to Dance

Loves Music, Loves to Dance

Loves Me, Loves Me Knot

Legends

Legends

Legends

Loves Me, Loves Me Knot

Loves Me, Loves Me Knot

Loves Music, Loves To Dance

Legends

Legends

The labors of Hercules

The labors of Hercules

The labors of Hercules

Loves Redemption

Loves Challenges

Loves Choice

Lila's Loves

Helen Jackson

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