Eddy and their associates purchased claims to acres and organized the Fort Scott Town Company. George was elected president of the town company and ordered a survey and named the streets after his friends, Bigler, Hendricks and others.
Kansas was a territory at the time not a state, and the issue of the day was whether Kansas would be free state or a slave state. He later purchased a saw mill, flour and woolen factory, foundry, machine shops and established a newspaper, The Daily Monitor.
George Crawford, a free-state man, was opposed to the plans of the pro-slavery men who sent many letters of warning to George to leave Kansas or face assassination. Crawford, William Gallaher, and Charles Dimon: Gentlemen, you are very respectfully invited to leave town in twenty-four hours, Friday afternoon, April 27, A few days later the pro-slavery men under the command of Capt.
Charles Hamilton of the militia attacked a local trading post taking 11 free-state men into a ravine and shooting them, killing five and wounding six. On Dec. Little, ex-deputy U. Marshall Campbell. John Little was standing next to George when Little was shot in the head, killing him almost instantly. Crawford, for the next three hours, was trapped in the room with his dead friend while the attack continued. Realizing there were women and children in danger, George stepped into the open doorway in the face of rifles all aimed at him.
Someone fired at Crawford but fortunately for him the rifle misfired. The men freed Rice and plundered the store. A warrant for the arrest of Brown and Montgomery was issued for the murder of John Little and the robbery of the store. Crawford and his anti-slavery stand helped him survive as the only witness of the murder of John Little. John Brown left Kansas in taking 12 freed slaves. He was hung on Dec. Montgomery led a raid on the coastal town of Darien, Ga. However, Col. Montgomery, wanting to show the Southerners what real war felt like and saying that he was an outlaw and not bound by rules of war, ordered his troops and the 54th Massachusetts Colored Volunteers under Col.
Shaw to load up all the furniture, supplies and other goods from the homes and town and when that was done they burned the entire town to the ground. Shaw, commander of the 54th and a subordinate to Montgomery, condemned the action. With the presidential election of where Stephen A. Douglas lost to Abraham Lincoln we find George a friend and supporter of Douglas.
When the Civil War broke out, Douglas gave his support to the Union and Lincoln asking his followers to follow and help the president. George Crawford as an anti-slavery man helped form the 2nd Kansas regiment and equipped many of the men of the different regiments before the federal government could make arrangement for expenses.
In , he was elected as the first state governor of Kansas by a two-thirds vote. However, the election was set aside by the Kansas Supreme Court because of a controversy as to when Kansas actually was admitted to the Union. While he did not serve as governor he was allowed to keep the title. On Nov.
By May , after 20 years of giving his work to machine shops, the flour mill, newspapers and all the hazardous risks of running large and varied businesses, the fire left him so far in debt that he no longer even owned a cemetery lot in Fort Scott. He also served as the second president of the Kansas State Historical Society.
Builders and dreamers never quit, and after the Meeker massacre and the Ute were to be moved and the land to be declared public lands, George turned his eyes to the West. With his half-brother, Allison White, and Henry E. Rood as investors, George formed a group to develop town-sites in the wilderness on the Western Slope of Colorado. George gathered a group of experienced men and came to Gunnison to wait until the scheduled land rush of Sept. A group of young men trying to get by the Army patrols made an early run for the land and on Aug.
They tried again and were caught and thought they were going to be put to death but were held in the fort until Sept. On or about the same time the Russell Brothers, J. Gordon, William Green and Mr. Forbush also entered the valley. The men staked their land and returned to Gunnison for provisions and reported to Gov.
Crawford who interviewed them at length. Mobley, M. Rush Warner, Colonel Morris and S. On a rainy Thursday, Sept. The next day Richard D. Mobley, George Crawford and others began to walk the area for a town-site. On Sept. George named some of the streets after his partners, Allison White and Henry E. The arid Grand Valley was a desert, but it was traversed by two major rivers.
Water from the Grand River later renamed the Colorado was soon brought to town and farms, via dams, canals and ditches. Grand Junction was incorporated in , and by Mesa County was established with Grand Junction as the county seat. This bamboo pattern Belleek teapot, a fine porcelain from Ireland, was a wedding present that traveled with them. George A. Elected governor of Kansas in in an election invalidated on technicalities, he did not serve.
Gutekunst Photo. Grand Mesa provided recreation from the earliest days. Scenic beauty, and abundant fishing and hunting were appreciated by the settlers. Summer homes and resorts began to be built, usually near cool lakes. Glade Park also was a summer favorite.
Winter sports were sledding and skating. Skiing came later. On Sept. They owned the land, and were distinct from the town government.
They surveyed streets and lots, promoted sales of the land they owned, and encouraged settlement. The town occupied a square mile, spanning from 1st to 12th Streets, and from North to South Avenues.
The plat shows the layout of the town. The first structure in town in was the Town Company office. A log cabin at 2nd and Ute, it was built from cottonwood trees growing near the river.
The residents were Mr. Mobley was the first postmaster. Literary societies, churches, lodges, bands and orchestras, and plays and musicals soon flourished. The frontier town began to be polished. Here is a trio of teachers, ambassadors of culture, in fashionable attire. Schooling for the children was an early priority. Nannie Blaine Underhill was the first teacher. The first school, a crude cabin of upright logs, soon was replaced by a better building of local brick.
Teacher Isa Caldwell is in the doorway. She began teaching in and taught all grades in the one room school. Trains were of paramount importance in the era before automobiles, trucks and airplanes. Grand Junction became a major division point of the railroad, with repair and maintenance shops. They experimented with a wide range of grains, vegetables and fruit, and nearly everything grew well.
0コメント