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EDWIN EUGENE DECOURSEY
1861-1932
Grandpa Ed was born January 24th 1861.1 It was the day Kansas was admitted to the Union. Since he was born in Leavenworth, he claimed ever after that he was the first boy born in the state of Kansas. He went to school in Leavenworth and worked around the farm until he was sixteen. He decided he wanted to go to the mines in Colorado as his father had done before him to California. When he was sixteen 2, his father gave him a team of horses and five hundred in gold pieces to give him a start. He hooked his team on a Conestoga and joined a wagon team headed for Colorado. It was a three-month journey. He headed for Leadville, the big city in Colorado. There he attempted to start a drayage company but found competition pretty tough and after a few months decided he had better move to Alma. He found the people more friendly, at least to him, and he soon had a drayage business. The railroad had just been completed to Como. He would haul goods and people to Como (fourteen miles away) and return some to Alma. Some three or four years later 3, Mrs. Sophie 4 Kilduff told him her two sisters would be on the train. One turned out to be Mary. Mary never returned to Dushore, Pennsylvania.
Life in Alma
Alma was founded by Irish immigrants and a company of Indian deserters who decided they had enough of the civil war. They named the big pass Hoosier Pass. It was strictly a mining camp. Ed and Mary settled with their Irish Catholic friends. For the Irish, the big occasion each month was the arrival of Father Robinson.5 He was stationed in Leadville. (Several books have been written about him for those who want to do more research.) For Ed and Mary, the arrival each summer was Grandpa Jim. He would come out from Leavenworth each summer . Another big occasion was a visit from Tom Kilduff.6 Tom and his partners the Baer Brothers, had the liquor franchise for Colorado. Tom lived in Glenwood Springs and maintained the top half-floor of the Colorado Hotel.7 He never married and was very active in Colorado politics. He lived a good life, and when he would come to Alma they all had to get out and catch trout, shoot chukkans and deer. These were great spreads at the St. Nicholas Hotel. Frank said he never had as great meals as they had in Colorado. It seems to be an Irish tradition we have all followed. Grandpa's drayage business did well and he opened a saloon and poker parlor. They melded well and he was soon taking on providing food, etc. for some miners boarding rooms. The whole family was in the business and all had chores; delivering food to the mines, meeting the railroad train, etc. One of the big occasions was a monthly letter from Uncle Frank or Will McCormick.8 They would read the letter over and over until the next one arrived. Grandpa was a great cook. He served a free lunch at the saloon and what was left was consumed at home so Grandma had no cooking chores. Grandma was the principal of the school. She also served in the nursing corps of the city. Many a day or night she and others would set out to care for a very sick person. The big day of the year was the Fourth of July. The boys were given an unlimited amount of stump powder. They would go out and blow up trees. Before anyone shudders I will tell them, they were smart. They picked the poorest trees they could find. They reasoned - come September they had to go out and saw the trees into fire logs. The big event each week was gathering at Hartsel Hot Springs for their Saturday bath. It was easier to get there in the winter when skis replaced wheels on the wagons and buggies.
A frequent visitor to Grandpa's saloon was an Irish immigrant named Felix McLaughlin.9 Felix was prospecting and located a few claims. One was the Morning Star. Grandpa staked Felix to his provisions and the two became fast friends and then business partners. They became equal partners in the mining company. Felix became even more when he moved, closed the mine down, and moved into Alma where he got a room for the winter. He soon began working around the saloon and helping around his partner's home. Felix would leave as soon as he could in the spring and take three or four men to help him open the mine. Grandpa was awfully busy in Alma as the mines operated full blast in the summer. His commissary businesses were going very well. He would sometimes take stock instead of his commissary fees. He was also Water Commissioner for Park County - a very big job. The mine would provide $5-6,000 a year, not an inconsiderable amount in those days. His saloon, drayage and commissary businesses were doing well. It was great for perhaps fifteen years and then silver collapsed. The end came in the election of 1896 when McKinley defeated Mr. Jennings Bryan. McKinley ran on a gold monetary program which sealed the future for silver. Felix decided he wanted to go back to Ireland.10 He sold or gave his half interest in the mines to Grandpa. In later days, Grandpa would get a letter from Felix in Ireland. For him, it was a great occasion.
The Ed DeCoursey's returned to Leavenworth in 1901. The boys went to St. Mary's College, Kansas. They would spend only the month of December in Leavenworth. Jim graduated in 1903 and Frank in 1905. Jim worked in Leavenworth for Harry for two years and Frank for one year. They decided to leave Leavenworth and with Will started the DeCoursey Creamery Company on April 1st, 1906 in Kansas City. A year or so later Ed and Mary moved to Kansas City. They bought a home on Tauromee St., a couple of doors from an Irish family named Donegan. Will had only two doors to go to see Regina.
Grandma Mary died about a year after they moved to Kansas City.
Grandpa would show his cooking ability on Sunday mornings after Mass when he would prepare pancakes and ham. He suffered a crippling stroke in Casa Grande, Arizona 11 where he spent his winters. He was incapacitated during the last three or four years.
Grandpa was a strong man. In the words of the Irish "He was not always right- but never wrong." He had strong opinions on everything. One, he was absolutely opposed to tobacco. When Jim, Frank, or Will wanted to smoke they had to go to the boiler room in the creamery to get away from his gaze. Another was to take a glass of whiskey - no Canada Dry or anything to spoil it.
I did not know my grandmother. All I ever heard of her in conversation was very reverent. After her death, butter was our large product. It was renamed "White Rose" butter.
1 Other records state Edwin�s birth date as 10 Oct 1858. Kansas achieved statehood on 29 Jan 1861.
2 Edwin left Kansas in abt. 1874 if born 1858, 1877 if born 1861. He is listed in both the 1875 and 1880 Kansas censuses, as well as the 1880 Colorado census. Evidence suggests he arrived in Colorado aroun 1879.
3 Census records indicate Mary was in Colorado in 1880.
4 Should be Fanny (Frances).
5 Father Henry Robinson was assigned Summit, Lake, and Chaffee counties in 1874. He built Annunciation Church in Leadville in the 1870's. Two of Mary McCormick's sisters, Anastacia and Ellen, worked as housekeepers for him.
6 Tom Kilduff was the youngest brother of Edward, husband of Fanny (McCormick) Kilduff. Edward and Fanny managed the St. Nicholas Hotel in Alma.
7 The Hotel Colorado in Glenwood Springs opened on 10 June 1893. I have found no evidence to support the claim that Tom Kilduff managed the top floor. The hotel is huge.
8 I do not know who this Will McCormick is. Mary did have a brother named William, but he died in 1874. Her father, James, died in 1883. I really wish those letters still existed!
9 Felix McLauglin is enumerated in the 1880 US Federal Census living in hotel in Fairplay, a town near Alma. He is single, 43 years old, working as a miner, and was born in Ireland. He is also listed in the 1900 and 1910 Alma censuses. Felix visited the DeCourseys in Kansas after they moved back there in 1901.
10 If Felix McLaughlin did go back to Ireland for good, he did so very late in life. He is enumerated in the 1910 Federal Census, living in Alma and still working as a miner at the age of 75. He does seem to have gone to Ireland for a visit in 1917, at the age of 82; he is listed on the passenger manifest of the S.S. New York travelling from Liverpool to New York, arriving 22 Oct 1917. He gives the address of the DeCoursey Creamery on Northrup Ave. in Kansas City as his U.S. address. In 1920 he is listed in the census, living in Alma, still working as a miner.
11 Son Edwin Joseph and his family lived there during the 1920�s.
