I grew up in a small Colorado town of about 800 people. My relatives settled there around 1892 or so, moving from Ballston Spa in upstate New York.

Yesterday I searched Colorado's Historical Newspapers online collection for mention of my family members in order to get an idea of what their lives were like. Back in those days every little place had community news columns in the local papers where it was the job of the town busybody to gather the information for the paper. In those days, it was newsworthy when a couple of guys went to the next town on business, and news that a wife visited her sister and mother for a couple of days, but is now back home. I just now realized I'm going to have to look somewhere else to find out the first names of the wives because it's always "Mrs. T.C. Bunyan" and "Mrs. W.C. Bunyan."

In one article I saw where Mrs. TC and my grandmother who was a young child at that time, went back to upstate New York to visit cousins with the last name of Chalmers. They must have liked those cousins because that name was used for my dad's middle name, and I have a second cousin also out here in Colorado who has it for a first name.


No, not the story about the Jilted Lover, it right below there with the yellow highlight.

I found out my great-grandmother had lovely roses, and one of my great-uncles sang at weddings and public concerts. At one event my great-aunt sang these songs: "My First Music Lesson" and "The Darkie's Prayer."

I saw one early 1900s news item from Texas in the local Colorado paper where two brothers "white men" were arrested for the murder of a 17 year old girl that 3 black men had been lynched for by a crowd of 500. Police followed tracks from the scene of the murder to the brothers' home. Initially they had arrested the black men, and the lynch mob pulled them out of the jail to kill them. There must have been some sense of outrage because it made the national news. There was a KKK group in our area, but THAT wasn't going to be talked about in the local papers. There was a settlement in the next county called Dearfield, an 'African-American Agricultural colony.'


According to the marker, in case you can't read it, they had great plans, but the town fell victim to the Dust Bowl and never recovered. The monument was donated by Anadarko Oil Company in 2010.