Time Machine: 80 years ago, Eagle County’s last Civil War veteran dies at age 100
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100 years ago
April 9, 1926
The town of Eagle mayor and trustee candidates that the Ku Klux Klan was hoping to put into office lost their bids for election, the Eagle Valley Enterprise reported.
The Enterprise reported that the Ku Klux Klan sought to defeat Gus Meyer for mayor and R. E. Belding for trustee, and distributed a ticket on the Monday before the Tuesday election, telling voters to support Otis Ping for mayor. The klan also told voters to support trustee candidates H. D. Hudson and Henry Baer, who had already declared their intention to run earlier at a caucus (along with Belding), and new candidate F. W. Barber, who the klan hoped voters would select over Belding.
Meyer beat Ping 93 to 79, and Belding beat barber 108 to 80.
“The largest vote ever polled at a municipal election in Eagle was cast Tuesday in a red hot straight out klan and anti-klan fight, the klan losing out on both candidates whom they were supporting,” the Eagle Valley Enterprise reported. “One hundred and eighty-eight ballots were cast.”
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90 years ago
April 10, 1936
The town of Minturn elected female candidates for mayor and town board, the Eagle Valley Enterprise reported.
“One of the real hot election fights in the county was in Minturn, where Mrs. Katherine Mack, one of the towns most progressive women was pitted against D. D. Williams for mayor,” the Enterprise reported. “Nearly 200 votes were polled and the election waxed hot all day, but when the ballots were counted Mrs. Mack was found to have snowed her opponent under overwhelmingly and was elected.”
In the vote for trustee, “the electorate also favored another woman, Mrs. Nellie Young being elected to one of the seats on the town board.” Young received 138 votes, the third-most among more than a dozen candidates.
80 years ago
April 5, 1946
Eagle County’s oldest citizen and last living Civil War veteran, George A. Coburn, passed away at the Minturn home of his granddaughter, Mrs. E. H. Edlund, the Eagle Valley Enterprise reported.
Coburn was 100 years old and had enjoyed a big birthday party a few months earlier in Minturn, the Enterprise reported.
“Mr. Coburn was born in Westfield, Vt., Dec. 18, 1845,” the Enterprise reported. “When the war broke out between the States, he joined with the 9th Vermont infantry and served for three years with the Union army. He was with Grant’s army in the last big battle of the war, marching into Richmond when Lee’s army collapsed and that last stronghold of the confederates was taken by Grant’s army.”
Coburn was the last living member of Abraham Lincoln Post, Grand Army of the Republic, of Denver, the Enterprise reported.
“He has made his home with Mr. and Mrs. Edlund for the past 20 years, and it has been only the past few months that he has not been able to get out each day for a walk about town and to greet his friends,” the Enterprise reported. “Death was caused by the infirmities of old age — the human body just couldn’t take any more years.”
70 years ago
April 5, 1956
Deer hunting numbers in Eagle County had returned to average in 1955 after a banner year in 1954, the Eagle Valley Enterprise reported.
The 1954 hunting season saw 7,805 deer taken in Eagle County, while in 1955 that number was back down to 4,053, much closer to the county’s 10-year average of 4,956, the Eagle Valley Enterprise reported.
Better deer hunting the year before had been attributed to the Colorado legislature’s action in appropriating more than $4 million to the Colorado Game and Fish department for the 1954-55 fiscal year, enabling the department to enlarge its big game management program through the acquisition of critical winter range for big game animals.
Eagle County, in the 1954 hunting season, ranked second in the state in the total number of deer taken, with Rio Blanco County topping the list.
60 years ago
April 8, 1966
Architect Fitzhugh Scott created and presented a model of his idea for an interfaith chapel in Vail, the Vail Trail reported.
Scott had been commissioned to finalize the actual working drawing, as well, the Trail reported.
“The Vail Religious Foundation is almost ready to announce a fundraising campaign and it is hoped that actual construction of Vail’s Interfaith Chapel will soon be a reality,” the Trail reported.
50 years ago
April 9, 1976
Work to construct an expansion of the Vail Interfaith Chapel could soon begin as a fundraising effort had passed the halfway mark, the Vail Trail reported.
“With an additional $20,000, the board of the Vail Religious Foundation feels that construction can be started this summer,” the Trail reported.
The Interfaith Chapel was constructed in 1969 as a single church building built to serve all religious groups, quickly outgrowing its 300-person space. The expansion would add an additional 100 seats, the Trail reported.
Rails to Vail? Competing visions collide in debate over Colorado passenger rail revival
Colorado passenger rail advocacy groups are on very different sides of the tracks when it comes reviving passenger rail service through Eagle County, even as the rest of the state’s rail community was extremely focused on big news from the Front Range on Monday.
