Chapter Three

My love for Harveywasdead, but I hated to think of the disgrace of divorce. That ignominy would kill Papa and Mama!

I had hoped that when Father Doe reached Central, matters would straighten out. The family moved just at the time that alone and destitute, I was having the humiliating, heart-rending experience of giving birth to a dead baby, attended only by a negro mid-wife. If the baby had lived, maybe my story would have been entirely different; but without that bond, I could not live down the calumnies that Mrs. Doe believed.

Father Doe opened a mining office in Central in 1879 and Harvey turned up again from wherever he had been to live with his parents. I suspected that he had spent the time in Oshkosh since Mrs. Doe proved more bitter about me than she had been before we were married, probably influenced by Harvey’s lies. Father Doe came to see me several times and gave me money. He liked and felt sorry for me and tried to offset the contention of his wife that I had disgraced the Doe name.

I thought it was Harvey who had disgraced the Doe name by deserting me when I was pregnant; but for everyone’s sake, that autumn of 1879, Harvey and I patched up our quarrel and tried to make a go of it again. A few months later, I thought I saw him go into a bagnio and I immediately ran across the street to demand: “Who’s disgracing the Doe name now?” He said he was just collecting a bill ... that he would never be unfaithful.... But I wasn’t sure....

The elder Does decided to move to Idaho Springs, inasmuch as Central was declining and there seemed to be no way of straightening out Harvey. For the next five years until he died in 1884, Father Doe was one of the pillars of the town. In 1880, he was elected to the legislature and in 1881, he was chosen Speaker of the House. He was president of the Idaho Springs bank and owned two houses, one for revenue. The large bargeboard trimmed frame house in which they lived was the scene of many a social function written up in the Clear CreekMiner. But after 1880, Father Doe refused to support Harvey or pay his debts.

Harvey and I moved to Denver where he ineffectively looked for work. I sold the last of my furniture and clothes to keep us alive. After we were divorced, he drifted off. Evan Morgan said he saw him in Gunnison in 1881 and at the time of Father Doe’s death, he was in Antonito, Colorado, with Flora, one of his sisters. After the estate was settled, Mrs. Doe moved back to Oshkosh and Harvey went with her. There, and in Milwaukee, he lived out his life, running a cigar store and acting as a hotel detective, and fulfilling the epithet used about him at the Shoo-Fly, “Mama’s Boy.”

I could not forget nor forgive the painful, galling humiliation of having to have our baby alone in a mining camp. Save for Jake Sandelowsky I had been without friends, without money, and was disgraced, since my husband’s absence was talked about everywhere. Harvey’s failure to attend to these primary needs for his own wife and child I could not forgive—my heart was emptied of his image for years.

“I think maybe you’re right,” I told Jake before the second break withHarvey. “I’ve been here in Central City for over two years, and very unhappy ones. I think a change would do me good.”

Jake sent me over to Leadville on a visit to see what it was like in December, 1879. At the time, although he had moved to Leadville already, he was back in Blackhawk to talk business with Sam Pelton. I traveled by the Colorado Central narrow gauge from Blackhawk to the Forks and then up to Georgetown. From there I went by stagecoach, over lofty Argentine Pass, through Ten Mile Canyon and into the “Cloud City.” The stage coach ride was fifty-six miles and the fare, ten dollars. In Leadville I stayed at the then fashionable Clarendon Hotel, built by W. H. Bush, formerly manager of the Teller House in Central City. It was on Harrison Avenue, right next door to the newly opened Tabor Opera House.

Everyone was talking about Tabor and his gifts to Leadville when they weren’t exclaiming about the silver discoveries on Fryer and Breece Hills. The air was full of the wildest conversation and buzzing excitement everywhere you turned, and the camp itself made Central look like a one-horse town.

“Oh, I’m sure something marvelous will happen to me here!” I exclaimed as I surveyed busy Harrison Avenue down its four-block length to the juncture with Chestnut Street.

Concord stages, belated because of the recent heavy snows, were rolling into camp hauled by six-horse teams. Huge freight vans, lumbering prairie schooners and all sorts of buggies and wheeled vehicles were toiling up and down the street, separated from the boardwalk by parallel mounds of snow piled in the gutter three and four feet deep. Everywhere was noisy activity, even lot jumping and cabin-jumping, since the population that year had grown from 1,200 to 16,000!

The boardwalks on each side of the street were filled with a seething mass of humanity that had sprung from every quarter of the globe and from every walk of life. Stalwart teamsters jostled bankers from Chicago. Heavy-hooted grimy miners, fresh from underground workings, shared a walk with debonair salesmen from Boston. The gambler and bunco-steerer strolled arm in arm with their freshest victim picked up in a hotel lobby.

I had bought “The Tourist Guide to Colorado and Leadville,” written by Cass Carpenter in May of that year. The pamphlet said that at the time of writing Leadville had “19 hotels, 41 lodging houses, 82 drinking saloons, 38 restaurants, 13 wholesale liquor houses ... 10 lumber yards, 7 smelting and reduction works, 2 sampling works for testing ores, 12 blacksmith shops, 6 livery stables, 6 jewelry stores, 3 undertakers and 21 gambling houses where all sorts of games are played as openly as the Sunday School sermon is conducted.”

As I now regarded the town, this description seemed to me to be already outdated and the camp to be three times as built up as the guide said.

H. A. W. Tabor, who had been elected Leadville’s first mayor and first postmaster, had also organized its first bank. The building stood at the corner of Harrison Avenue and Chestnut, a two-story structure with the design of a huge silver dollar in the gable. The First National Bank, the Merchants and Mechanics Bank and the Carbonate National had also been built. Tabor had already erected a building to house the Tabor Hose Co. (for which he had given the hosecarriage) and the equipment of the Tabor Light Cavalry, which he had also organized. Two newspaper offices were already built and a third was preparing to start publishing in January.

“What do you think of our camp?” a stranger said to me somewhat later, accosting me in the lobby of the Clarendon.

I no longer resented the efforts of men to pick me up. Two years in Colorado mining camps had taught me some of the carefree friendliness of the atmosphere. I knew now it wasn’t considered an insult.

“Oh, it’s wonderful!” I answered, “and has such a beautiful setting.”

“Yes, those are marvelous peaks over there, Massive and Elbert—it’s a stunning country. I’ve never seen anything like Colorado. I’m from the South. The man I bunked with was from Missouri. He was scared of the wildness and casual shootings we have around here—so he took one look at that sign over there and beat it home to Missouri to raise some.”

I peered across the street. A feed and supply store had a high false front on which was painted in big letters, HAY $40 A TON.

The idea tickled me and I laughed out loud. As I laughed, a great weight fell from my shoulders. It seemed as if it had been a long time since I had really laughed, almost as if my gayety had been boxed in by the ugly gulches of Blackhawk and crushed in the cramped space of Central. But here the whole atmosphere was wide and different!

The man sat down in a rocking chair beside me in the lobby and was soon entertaining me with the many colorful stories of the camp, of the wild nights where everyone whooped it up till dawn, in the saloons, in the variety theatres, in the gambling houses, in the dance halls, in the bagnios and in the streets, milling from door to door.

He also told me of the unusual characters of the town, all the way from the popular Tabor who was Leadville’s leading citizen down to “the waffle woman” who could be seen any night regularly at twelve o’clock going from saloon to saloon and from dance house to gambling and other dens selling hot waffles. He had stopped her once and spoken to her. She had replied in a cultured voice:

“My best trade is between two and three in the morning after the theatres are out. It is not pleasant being out so late among so rough a class as is found on the streets after midnight and about the saloons. I have led a pleasanter life. Should I tell you who I am and what I have been, you would not believe me....”

His tales fascinated me. But his stories of Tabor and Augusta, Tabor’s severe New England wife with whom he was not getting along, interested me more than any others. Tabor, he said, could be seen almost any evening he was in camp in the lobby or across the street in the Board of Trade which was the gambling house and saloon that got most of the after-theatre trade from the Tabor Opera House, opened a month before in November. Tabor was a splendid poker player and was fond of gambling of all sorts. Since he had made so much money in the last two years, he had started playing roulette for enormous stakes.

“Every night?” I asked. “What does Mrs. Tabor do?”

“Don’t know—she’s down in Denver. But he’s gone pretty wild lately. Shedon’t like it and I guess nags him terrible. So he just stays out of her way. He likes his liquor and women, too, and naturally that don’t set so good with her. Wouldn’t with any wife. But he spends a lot of time on the move nowadays.”

“What’s he doing in Denver?”

“Oh, he and his right hand man, Bill Bush, are making real estate investments mostly. He’s building the Tabor block at 16th and Larimer Streets—costing two hundred thousand dollars—of stone quarried in Ohio. Expects it to be finished in March. And he bought the Henry P. Brown house on Broadway last winter for a residence. Paid $40,000 for it.”

“He must be a very great man.”

“Some says he is and some says he isn’t. I’ve played poker with him a time or two and he’s right smart at that game. But some of the folks around here say he’s too fond of show and throwin’ his money around. I reckon the Republican politicians trimmed him a heap of money a year ago before they gave him the lieutenant governorship!”

“My, I would love to meet him,” I remarked, thinking that never had a description of any man so captured my imagination. “How old is he?”

“Must be right close to fifty. He was one of the early prospectors out here—came in an ox-wagon across the plains in ’59. Mrs. Tabor was the first woman in the Jackson Diggings. That’s where Idaho Springs is now. He had a claim jumped at Payne’s Bar and never done anything about it. An awful easy-going sort of fellow.”

Our conversation ran along like this for some time and was continued again in the afternoon. That evening my new friend suggested he take me next door to the Opera House where Jack Langrishe’s stock company, brought from New York a month ago, was playing “Two Orphans.” He seemed such a pleasant companion and so well-informed on this particular camp and mining in general that I accepted his suggestion with alacrity.

“Thank you very much. I should be delighted and won’t you let me introduce myself? I’m Mrs. Doe.”

“Not the famous beauty of Central! Most of us miners have already heard about you.”

He then introduced himself. But since he is still alive I won’t give him away after all these years. We always remained good friends, although on a rather formal basis and never called each other by our first names. In the course of the evening, I asked his opinion about the quartz lodes of Nevadaville, still having in mind that something could be done with Harvey’s mine.

“Most of my Colorado mining’s been done down in La Plata and San Juan counties. I wouldn’t be much help. But my advice to you is to hang on to it and maybe work it on shares with some man in the spring when the snow breaks.”

“A new vista for me!” was my reaction. I had always thought of myself as a married woman but now I began to think in terms of a career—I didn’t know what. Jake Sands (as he now called himself in order to shorten his name) wanted me to go into business with him when he opened his new clothing store. But in this glamorous, adventurous world it seemed as if that would be too tamea life for a girl whose exotic name had already spread from one mining camp to another.

(I don’t mind saying that I was flattered at my new friend’s having heard of me—and I am sure that if I hadn’t already fallen in love with Leadville, this tribute alone would have persuaded me to change camps.)

When I returned to Central, my mind was made up. I had gone away with a bruised soul, confused and hurt and undecided. My church did not sanction divorce and it was a dreadful wrench to face what such a step would mean.

But the romance of Colorado mining had caught me forever in its mesh—I would never be happy again away from these mountains and away from the gay, tantalizing feeling that tomorrow anything might happen. And did!

Jake Sands was very pleased to see me returning in such good spirits. He helped me from the train at Blackhawk, a smile in the corners of his dark, handsome eyes.

“You look your bright self again. What have you decided—are you going to follow me and desert the Little Kingdom of Gilpin?”

“I think I am, Jake. But wait until I see what mail I have from home and what about Harvey. Then we’ll decide.”

Christmas letters and gifts had come from all my family, a lovely handsome mohair jacket from Mama, but no word from Harvey in Denver. During the holiday season, I wanted to feel charitable and kind so I put off making any plans. Jake and I celebrated together with his friends at the Shoo-Fly and we had enough jollity and parties to forget my unpleasant domestic situation. I knew that Jake’s interest in me was more than just sympathy but he did not broach any word or demand any favors. He was consideration, itself.

When the New Year had passed, I went to Idaho Springs to see the elder Does. Then I went to Denver to find Harvey and tell him I wanted a divorce. He was drinking and we quarrelled again. In response to my request, he said he thought in some ways our marriage had been a mistake. Perhaps if his mother and I hadn’t had such religious and other differences, we might have worked it out together. But as it was, couldn’t we try again? And he would make me a gift of our Troy Lode mine in which I still believed. Shortly after, he gave me the deed on the back of which he had written in a firm, legible hand:

“I, W. H. Doe, Jr., give up all my rights and title to my claims in the above said property to my wife, Mrs. W. H. Doe, formerly Lizzie B. McCourt of Oshkosh, Wis.(Signed) W. H. Doe, Jr.Jan. 29, 1880.”

I still wanted a divorce in my heart and, during the winter, inquired about the possibilities of getting one in Arapahoe County. My intention was to sue on the grounds of non-support. But Harvey kept nagging me and, on the night of March 2, wanted to make up. By then, I was so exasperated with his shilly-shallying and so impatient to be free so I could go to Leadville, that I said every cruel thing I could think of. We had a frightful quarrel and he shouted that to spite me, this time he really was going to a sporting house.

“You wouldn’t dare!” I snorted. “You aren’t that much of a man.”

He turned on his heel and rushed out of our tiny rooms. I hurried on to the street after him and, at the same time as following Harvey, looked for a policeman. As luck would have it, I found one, Edward Newman, just around the corner. We saw Harvey go into Lizzie Preston’s at 1943 Market and we followed him in. There, we got the evidence that I needed for a quick divorce. The decree was granted March 19 and I was ready for a fresh start.

Meanwhile, Jake had been living in Leadville. The night before his going, he had said to me:

“Baby, I have not been without ulterior motive these past months in trying to get you to move on. I hope you will come to Leadville and our friendship can go on the same as ever. That’s the place for a girl like you! We might even think of marriage.”

I was not in love with Jake, nor did I think I ever should be. But he had been the grandest friend a girl could hope for. I pressed his hand and said with an affectionate smile:

“Perhaps. We’ll see.”

By the time I reached Leadville, Jake was well established in his clothing business at 312 Harrison Avenue, which was the left-hand front store in the Tabor Opera House. They called this store Sands, Pelton & Co. Jake arranged for me to stay at a boarding house while he lived at 303 Harrison Avenue across the street from his business.

But I suppose once a gambler, always a gambler. Jake never indulged in excessive gambling but the spirit of it was in his blood. He loved to spend an evening, after a hard day’s work in the store, satisfying this taste. Instead of the lone Shoo-Fly, there were plenty of places he could go—by now—between forty and sixty alight every night, if you counted the side houses as well as the licensed places.

Pap Wyman’s was the most notorious. It stood at State and Harrison. I had been told that every man in camp went there to see the sights, if not to enter into all the activities which under one roof combined liquor-selling, gambling, dancing and woman’s oldest profession. The girls wore short skirts with bare arms and shoulders and besides being eager to dance, would encourage men to join them in the “green rooms,” a custom taken over from the variety theatres. These were small wine rooms where for every bottle of champagne that a man ordered, the girl’s card was punched for a dollar commission.

Frequently, late at night or early in the morning, a “madam” and her retinue of girls from one of the “parlor” houses would swoop into Wyman’s to join in the festivities. The dance hall girls were said to envy these “ladies” very much. Their expensive dresses and opulent jewelry, especially as displayed on the madam who was usually a jolly coarse peroxide blonde of forty or fifty, were far beyond their attainments. To be truthful, these sporting women were the aristocracy of the camp since nice married women whose husbands had not found bonanzas, spent the day in backbreaking work at washtubs or over hot stoves and were too tired in the evening to do anything but sleep.

One night Jake had gone over to Wyman’s to gamble and I was left to entertain myself. Feeling hungry toward the middle of the evening and beingfond of oysters, I crossed Harrison Avenue to the old Saddle Rock Cafe which stood a block down from the Clarendon hotel and Tabor Opera house. When I entered and was shown to a table, the place was rather quiet.

“Intermission yet at the Opera House?” the waiter asked.

“Oh, I don’t know,” I replied. “I’m not attending tonight. I’ve already seen this bill ... ‘The Marble Heart’.”

“Guess not,” he said. “We always get a lively bunch in here then.”

I was well aware of this fact. It was one of the reasons I had come. The motley cosmopolitan and rough-neck crowds of Leadville had never ceased to delight me. I could sit for hours in a hotel lobby or a restaurant and ask for no further entertainment than to watch the people.

Just as I finished ordering, the cafe started to fill up and coming in the entrance, I recognized Mr. Tabor with his theatre manager, Bill Bush.

The Silver King!

His tall back had been pointed out to me on the street and in the Clarendon hotel lobby by Jake but I had never before seen him face to face. Both men glanced directly at me where I sat alone at my table, and I saw Mr. Tabor turn toward Mr. Bush to say something. My heart skipped a beat and my oyster fork trembled in my hand.

“The great man of Colorado is talking about me!” ran the thought, vaulting and jubilant, through my mind.

Bush and Tabor were winding up a number of their Leadville affairs, I knew from the papers, because they had leased the Windsor Hotel on Larimer Street in Denver and were planning on opening it as soon as they had completed furnishing the building, probably in June. Tabor’s Leadville paper, The Herald, kept the camp well informed of their doings and as I was always an avid reader of every item that bore the Tabor name, I felt almost as if I already knew him.

He was over six feet tall with large regular features and a drooping moustache. Dark in coloring, at this time his hair had begun to recede a bit on his forehead and was turning grey at the temples. Always very well and conspicuously dressed, his personality seemed to fill any room he stepped into. His generosity and hospitality immediately attracted a crowd about him and he would start buying drinks and cracking jokes with everyone.

“That’s the kind of man I could love,” I thought to myself as I bent over my oysters. “A man who loves life and lives to the full!”

At that moment, the waiter tapped me on the shoulder and handed me a note. Scrawled on the back of a theatre program in a refined hand ran the message:

“Won’t you join us at our table?William H. Bush.”

The blood rushed into my face and I felt hot and cold. Mr. Bush had been proprietor of the Teller House until a little over a year ago and I had met him with Father Doe when he had taken Harvey and me there for meals. Mr. Bush probably knew my whole humiliating story....

Glancing up, my eyes met Mr. Tabor’s piercing dark ones across the intervening tables and I knew in an instant that I was falling in love. Love at firstsight. Love that was to last fifty-five years without a single unfaithful thought. Almost in a trance, I gathered up my braided gabardine coat and carriage boots to move over to their table.

“Governor Tabor, meet Mrs. Doe who’s come from Central to live in Leadville.”

I put my hand in Mr. Tabor’s large one and it seemed to me as if I never wanted to withdraw it. What was he thinking at that moment, I wondered? Was he feeling the electric magnetism in the touch of my hand as I was in his? Or was I just another one of the women that Augusta Tabor would carp about?

“Sit down, Mrs. Doe, and order anything you want on the menu. No point in going back to the show when we can sit here and entertain as pretty a young woman as you, is there Bill? Here’s a little lady we’ll have to get to know.”

Leadville, the Saddle Rock Cafe, and the gay, boisterous mining and promoting crowd about me all swam dizzily away from my consciousness as I dropped down in a chair between the great silver king, Horace Tabor, and his manager, Bill Bush. I was in love! That was all I knew.

I was in love with a married man. I, a divorced woman, whose future with Jake was merely a nebulous suggestion. Yet here I was, beside the man I had dreamed of for so long—

“Surely, Bill, we should have champagne on this auspicious occasion?” Mr. Tabor went on.

The evening passed in one of those heavenly hazes in which afterward you want to remember every word, every glance, every happening, yet nothing remains but a roseate glow. We stayed there at the table, laughing and talking and drinking. Mostly we gossiped about people in Central City that Mr. Tabor and I knew of in common—Judge Belford, George Randolph and so on—or else about the operating conditions at the various mines there that I had heard talked about.

But there was one person whose name I never spoke—Jacob Sands. I wondered how much Bill Bush knew—or what he thought he knew. But nothing of this was hinted by either of us.

When the performance across Harrison Avenue at the Tabor Opera House was finished, Bill Bush excused himself, saying:

“I have some accounts to go over before I turn in—see you in the morning, Governor.”

Then the greatest man in Colorado leaned toward me and said:

“Now tell me about yourself.”

I gasped and began in little gurgles, but it was very easy talking to him.Little by little, I told him the whole story of my life as I have recounted it here—the high hopes of my marriage, my great reverence and love of the Colorado mountains, my excitement over the mining world, and finally, since his piercing eyes were not piercing when they looked at me, but soft and mellow and understanding, I told him, rather tearfully about Harvey and Jake, and why I was in Leadville.

“So you don’t want to marry Jake Sands—but think you ought to because of the money he’s spent helping you out?”

“Yes.”

“Well, I tell you what. I’ve got plenty of money, more’n I know what to do with. Let me give you enough to pay this fellow back and carry you along for a while, Something’s bound to turn up.”

This dazzling offer resounded in my ears like the explosion of dynamite.

“Why, Governor Tabor, I couldn’t let you do that!”

“Why not? Look on it as a grubstake. I’ve grubstaked hundreds of people in my day. Most of ’em came to nothing but some of ’em turned out lucky. I’m a great believer in the Tabor Luck—and this just might be another lucky grubstake for me. No telling.”

“But I never met you before this evening!”

“What’s that got to do with it? I never saw Hook or Rische before one morning they walked in the old Tabor store and asked me for a grubstake. And then they found the Little Pittsburgh. Meant millions for me!”

“But this grubstake can’t mean millions—I’ll never be able to repay it to you—”

“Not in money, perhaps. But I’m not looking for money anymore. I want other things out of life, too. You take this grubstake and forget it.”

He took a pencil from his pocket and wrote out a draft for five thousand dollars.

“You give this to Bill Bush in the morning and he’ll see that you’re all fixed up.”

As I stared at the sum on the slip of paper, I couldn’t believe my eyes. I gulped and glanced up, awe-struck.

“You’ll need some clothes and things, too,” he explained in a sort of an aside, and then turning to the waiter, called out “Another bottle of champagne, here!”

The merriest night of my life was on. Nobody in Leadville in those days went to bed until nearly dawn. I had been supposed to meet Jake at midnight in the lobby of the Clarendon for a late supper, but in the giddy exhilaration of the evening, I had forgotten all about it. It was way past midnight, now. There was nothing to do—Jake had been a marvelous friend, so marvelous that I never could think of him again without a little twinge of conscience—but I was in love! You can’t explain it—yet if you are in love, nothing else seems important. Everything else but your state of heart is out of focus. I would never have met Horace Tabor if it hadn’t been for Jake. Yet at that moment, I never wanted to see Jake Sands again.

And I seldom did. Although we often crossed on the streets of Leadville briefly, until he moved to Aspen in 1888, we were only casual friends. In Aspen,I was later told, he opened another store, married, and bought a house that still stands.

The next morning, after a conference with Bill Bush and Horace Tabor, they decided the best thing to do was to write him an explanatory letter.

“But, Governor Tabor,” I said, “Don’t you think I ought to see him? He’s been such a good friend—I think I ought to talk to him. It would be kinder.”

“No, I don’t think so. His feelings are bound to be hurt in any case. The quicker, the easier for him in the long run—you can tell him that in your letter. He’s a tenant of mine and a nice fellow. Later on, after you’ve written the letter, we will ask him to dinner some night.”

I pondered a long time over the writing of it, and stressed how deeply appreciative I was. I said I had decided not to marry him and I enclosed a thousand dollars which was more than enough to pay off my indebtedness. Even the enclosure of the money I tried to make especially kind.

“Now, Bill, you take this around personally and square Mrs. Doe off right with him,” Horace Tabor said. “We don’t want to have any hurt feelings around that last. We all want to be friends.”

He leaned over and patted my hand in reassurance of my act. But I needed no reassurance once the act was accomplished. My heart was dancing wildly!

History books will tell you the story of my love affair after that. Jake refused the money but did accept the gift of a diamond ring. Tabor moved me from the small room that I had into a suite at the Clarendon, and we became sweethearts.

For me, it was like suddenly walking into the door of heaven. This great man was the idol of whom I had dreamed and whom I had hoped Harvey Doe might copy. In those bleak months in Central City, I had avidly searched out reports of his accomplishments in the newspapers and memorized every word.

After the bonanza strike in the Little Pittsburgh, everything Tabor touched had turned to sparkling silver and untold riches. By the end of 1879, the total yield from the consolidated company was four million dollars and Tabor had sold his interest in this group of mines for a million dollars.

Late in the year before, in partnership with Marshall Field of Chicago, he bought the Chrysolite along with some auxiliary claims. Not long after, these mines had yielded three million dollars and Tabor eventually sold out his share for a million and a half. At the time, they told a story around Leadville about the Chrysolite that was written up in verse and printed on a broadside. They said that “Chicken Bill” Lovell, a clever swindler, had “high-graded” some ore from the Pittsburgh and “salted” the Chrysolite, then a barren hole, owned by Lovell. When Lovell showed his spurious mine to Tabor, the new silver king bought the holding for nine hundred dollars and shortly after put a crew to work. The miners discovered the deception and asked Tabor what to do.

“Keep on sinking,” was his command.

Ten feet more and they broke into a three million treasure chest of carbonate ore!

It was also in 1879 that he had bought the Matchless for over a hundred and seventeen thousand dollars and had purchased a half interest in the First National Bank in Denver. During the last year, he started expanding his investments far and wide—towards an iron mine on Breece Hill, gold mines in the San Juans, silver mines in Aspen, placer mines in Park county, smelters, irrigating canals, toll roads, railroads, copper land in Texas, grazing lands in Southern Colorado, a huge land concession in Honduras, and real estate in Leadville, Denver and Chicago.

LIZZIE M’COURT’S GIRLHOOD HOME IN OSHKOSHBaby Doe was a fat adolescent of sixteen years when this photo was taken in Oshkosh in 1871. She is standing on the verandah, first figure on the left, surrounded by all the members of her family except Mark who was not born until the next year. Her mother and father are standing beside Willard, held on the rocking horse. Her favorite little sister, Claudia, is seated on the steps, and Philip and Peter are standing at the right. Mr. George Cameron, her father’s partner, is posed in the buggy. This fine house, 20 Division Street, burned in 1874.

LIZZIE M’COURT’S GIRLHOOD HOME IN OSHKOSH

Baby Doe was a fat adolescent of sixteen years when this photo was taken in Oshkosh in 1871. She is standing on the verandah, first figure on the left, surrounded by all the members of her family except Mark who was not born until the next year. Her mother and father are standing beside Willard, held on the rocking horse. Her favorite little sister, Claudia, is seated on the steps, and Philip and Peter are standing at the right. Mr. George Cameron, her father’s partner, is posed in the buggy. This fine house, 20 Division Street, burned in 1874.

MRS. HARVEY DOEThe Oshkosh Times reported that the wedding of Lizzie McCourt and Harvey Doe at St. Peter’s was so crowded that people were standing outside. This photo was taken by A. E. Rinehart in Denver in 1880 at 1637 Larimer Street after their marriage had failed and Baby Doe wanted a divorce.

MRS. HARVEY DOE

The Oshkosh Times reported that the wedding of Lizzie McCourt and Harvey Doe at St. Peter’s was so crowded that people were standing outside. This photo was taken by A. E. Rinehart in Denver in 1880 at 1637 Larimer Street after their marriage had failed and Baby Doe wanted a divorce.

CLEAN-UP AFTER A FLASH FLOOD IN BLACKHAWKAfter Harvey Doe messed up the management of his father’s Fourth of July mine at Central City, the young couple took rooms in the brick building above the white circled windows. The trains to Central City chugged over the trestle almost at their bedside. The building, unused, still stands; also Jacob Sands’ store, which is just off the photo to the left.

CLEAN-UP AFTER A FLASH FLOOD IN BLACKHAWK

After Harvey Doe messed up the management of his father’s Fourth of July mine at Central City, the young couple took rooms in the brick building above the white circled windows. The trains to Central City chugged over the trestle almost at their bedside. The building, unused, still stands; also Jacob Sands’ store, which is just off the photo to the left.

HARVEY DOETaken in the late 1890s, this photo came from his step-son, Sam Kingsley of San Diego. Harvey married a widow with three children in 1893. At the time he was a cigar maker in Oshkosh. Later he became a hotel detective in Milwaukee. He died in 1921 and lies there with Ida Doe.

HARVEY DOE

Taken in the late 1890s, this photo came from his step-son, Sam Kingsley of San Diego. Harvey married a widow with three children in 1893. At the time he was a cigar maker in Oshkosh. Later he became a hotel detective in Milwaukee. He died in 1921 and lies there with Ida Doe.

LIZZIE MOVED TO LEADVILLE’S CLARENDON HOTELThe Clarendon was built on Harrison Avenue in 1879 by William Bush. Soon after, Tabor built the opera house to the left and the two were connected by a catwalk from the top floor. Tabor had rooms and offices upstairs in the opera house and could pass quickly and privately across to Baby Doe’s suite. Jacob Sands’ store was the one with white awnings downstairs in Tabor’s building. Could the caped figure be Lizzie?

LIZZIE MOVED TO LEADVILLE’S CLARENDON HOTEL

The Clarendon was built on Harrison Avenue in 1879 by William Bush. Soon after, Tabor built the opera house to the left and the two were connected by a catwalk from the top floor. Tabor had rooms and offices upstairs in the opera house and could pass quickly and privately across to Baby Doe’s suite. Jacob Sands’ store was the one with white awnings downstairs in Tabor’s building. Could the caped figure be Lizzie?

NEW SWEETHEARTThis photo was taken in Leadville in 1880 and was Tabor’s favorite. He had a frame made for it of the finest minted silver from the Matchless mine and kept the photo on his dressing table. In the ’90s, he borrowed money on his treasure to buy groceries, but died before it was redeemed.

NEW SWEETHEART

This photo was taken in Leadville in 1880 and was Tabor’s favorite. He had a frame made for it of the finest minted silver from the Matchless mine and kept the photo on his dressing table. In the ’90s, he borrowed money on his treasure to buy groceries, but died before it was redeemed.

AUGUSTA

BABY DOE

HORACETHE TABOR TRIANGLEWhen Tabor was forty-seven years old, he struck it rich. He wanted to have a good time, give parties, gain public office, and live in the grand manner. Augusta, his austere New England wife, disapproved; but when gay, smiling Baby Doe applauded a triangle was expertly drawn.

HORACETHE TABOR TRIANGLE

When Tabor was forty-seven years old, he struck it rich. He wanted to have a good time, give parties, gain public office, and live in the grand manner. Augusta, his austere New England wife, disapproved; but when gay, smiling Baby Doe applauded a triangle was expertly drawn.

THE WINDSOR HOTEL IN DENVERThe most elegant hostelry of the Rocky Mountain region opened its doors in June, 1880, furnished and run by Tabor and Bush. Very soon its red plush lobby was the gathering place of all the elite and it was not long afterward that Tabor decided to install Baby Doe in one of its suites. She moved from Leadville and took up life close to her lover. Except for the porte-cocheres, the Windsor looked the same until 1958.

THE WINDSOR HOTEL IN DENVER

The most elegant hostelry of the Rocky Mountain region opened its doors in June, 1880, furnished and run by Tabor and Bush. Very soon its red plush lobby was the gathering place of all the elite and it was not long afterward that Tabor decided to install Baby Doe in one of its suites. She moved from Leadville and took up life close to her lover. Except for the porte-cocheres, the Windsor looked the same until 1958.

GOLD CHAIRSCentral City’s Teller House is now the proud owner of these chairs and jewel box that once belonged in Baby Doe’s suite at the Windsor. Her diamond necklace contained stones that were said to be Isabella’s and was imported from Spain, costing $75,000.

GOLD CHAIRS

Central City’s Teller House is now the proud owner of these chairs and jewel box that once belonged in Baby Doe’s suite at the Windsor. Her diamond necklace contained stones that were said to be Isabella’s and was imported from Spain, costing $75,000.

THE TABOR GRAND THEATRE ON OPENING DAYIn September, 1881, Denver had grown to a city of over thirty-five thousand population and it welcomed this handsome and lavish addition to its business buildings with a deep gratitude and much publicity.

THE TABOR GRAND THEATRE ON OPENING DAY

In September, 1881, Denver had grown to a city of over thirty-five thousand population and it welcomed this handsome and lavish addition to its business buildings with a deep gratitude and much publicity.

DENVER’S GIFT TO TABORA ceremony took place the opening night, presenting this watch-fob to Tabor. It represents an ore bucket of nuggets, leading by gold ladders up to the Tabor Store at Oro, the Tabor Block, and last to the Tabor Grand Theatre; the whole depicting the recipient’s climb to fame and fortune. On the reverse side, were the date, monograms in enamel and legends, “Presented by the citizens of Denver to H. A. W. Tabor” and “Labor Omnia Vincet.” After Baby Doe was found dead, this gold ornament appeared among her things, rolled up in rags. Although she had sold most of her jewels to fulfill Tabor’s wish that she hang on to the Matchless, she saved the talisman.

DENVER’S GIFT TO TABOR

A ceremony took place the opening night, presenting this watch-fob to Tabor. It represents an ore bucket of nuggets, leading by gold ladders up to the Tabor Store at Oro, the Tabor Block, and last to the Tabor Grand Theatre; the whole depicting the recipient’s climb to fame and fortune. On the reverse side, were the date, monograms in enamel and legends, “Presented by the citizens of Denver to H. A. W. Tabor” and “Labor Omnia Vincet.” After Baby Doe was found dead, this gold ornament appeared among her things, rolled up in rags. Although she had sold most of her jewels to fulfill Tabor’s wish that she hang on to the Matchless, she saved the talisman.

GRANDEURCherry wood from Japan and mahogany from Honduras made the interior of the Tabor subject matter for copious columns of newsprint. The shimmering, expensive crystal chandelier has not yet been hung in this photo; nor the chairs yet placed in the ornate boxes. On opening night they were filled with the cream of Denver society, and reporters’ pencils were busy recording the bustles and bangles that made each gown chic or very distinctive.

GRANDEUR

Cherry wood from Japan and mahogany from Honduras made the interior of the Tabor subject matter for copious columns of newsprint. The shimmering, expensive crystal chandelier has not yet been hung in this photo; nor the chairs yet placed in the ornate boxes. On opening night they were filled with the cream of Denver society, and reporters’ pencils were busy recording the bustles and bangles that made each gown chic or very distinctive.

SCANDALBox A was empty on the opening night because Augusta was not invited by her husband. Tongues wagged freely about a Dresden figure, heavily veiled, at the rear. After Baby Doe married Tabor, the box was always decorated with white lilies when she was to be present. The box also bore a large silver plaque, inscribed with the name TABOR.

SCANDAL

Box A was empty on the opening night because Augusta was not invited by her husband. Tongues wagged freely about a Dresden figure, heavily veiled, at the rear. After Baby Doe married Tabor, the box was always decorated with white lilies when she was to be present. The box also bore a large silver plaque, inscribed with the name TABOR.

GLAMOROUS WEDDINGWhen Baby Doe married Tabor, March, 1883, no expense was spared to make the occasion memorable. A room of the Willard Hotel in Washington, D. C., was decorated for supper. The centerpiece was six feet high—a wedding bell of white roses, surmounted by a heart of red roses and pierced by an arrow of violets, shot from a Cupid’s bow of heliotrope. Other elaborate decorations garlanded the rest of the room. The bride wore a $7,000 outfit of real lace lingerie, and a brocaded satin gown, trimmed in marabou. President Arthur, senators and congressmen attended the ceremony but their wives did not, refusing to forgive the illicit affair and banning the Tabors from society. The gown is now in the State Museum.

GLAMOROUS WEDDING

When Baby Doe married Tabor, March, 1883, no expense was spared to make the occasion memorable. A room of the Willard Hotel in Washington, D. C., was decorated for supper. The centerpiece was six feet high—a wedding bell of white roses, surmounted by a heart of red roses and pierced by an arrow of violets, shot from a Cupid’s bow of heliotrope. Other elaborate decorations garlanded the rest of the room. The bride wore a $7,000 outfit of real lace lingerie, and a brocaded satin gown, trimmed in marabou. President Arthur, senators and congressmen attended the ceremony but their wives did not, refusing to forgive the illicit affair and banning the Tabors from society. The gown is now in the State Museum.

THE BRIDE’S BEAUTY WAS CELEBRATED AFARHer reddish gold hair, of which she had masses, was worn in a large chignon at the nape of her neck until about a year before she married Tabor. She frizzed the front hair for a fluffy effect; but later she wore the back hair high and had the whole elaborately curled. Many men succumbed to her charm and looks; among them, Carl Nollenberger, popular Leadville saloon keeper, who had a beer tray made, portraying her dainty profile. Her earlier photos have naturally arching eyebrows; but later she pencilled these blacker and straighter. She preferred color; the black is mourning for her father who died May, 1883. By then, she had also had her ears pierced.

THE BRIDE’S BEAUTY WAS CELEBRATED AFAR

Her reddish gold hair, of which she had masses, was worn in a large chignon at the nape of her neck until about a year before she married Tabor. She frizzed the front hair for a fluffy effect; but later she wore the back hair high and had the whole elaborately curled. Many men succumbed to her charm and looks; among them, Carl Nollenberger, popular Leadville saloon keeper, who had a beer tray made, portraying her dainty profile. Her earlier photos have naturally arching eyebrows; but later she pencilled these blacker and straighter. She preferred color; the black is mourning for her father who died May, 1883. By then, she had also had her ears pierced.

Another portrait.

The wedding dress.

Another portrait.

BABY DOE TABOR’S DREAM HOUSESThe second house that Tabor bought was on the south side of 13th and ran from Grant to Sherman. Shown are Tabor with his favorite horse and Baby Doe beside a disputed statue. Three of the scandalous nude figures can be seen, too, at the left by the spruce tree and in the center of the pool. The interior shows a playing fountain, crystal chandelier, heavy walnut furniture, oriental rugs and hangings, oil paintings, mirrors, a loaded buffet, silver pitcher and every sort of bric-a-brac, dear to those of the Victorian era.

BABY DOE TABOR’S DREAM HOUSES

The second house that Tabor bought was on the south side of 13th and ran from Grant to Sherman. Shown are Tabor with his favorite horse and Baby Doe beside a disputed statue. Three of the scandalous nude figures can be seen, too, at the left by the spruce tree and in the center of the pool. The interior shows a playing fountain, crystal chandelier, heavy walnut furniture, oriental rugs and hangings, oil paintings, mirrors, a loaded buffet, silver pitcher and every sort of bric-a-brac, dear to those of the Victorian era.

Interior view.

THE FIRST BORNNo baby had such lavish belongings and such wide attention as Lillie Tabor, who was born in July, 1884. Her christening outfit cost $15,000. Her mother, who was fond of keeping scrapbooks, entered many clippings about her beautiful baby. The right-hand page contains three clippings from January, 1887, describing the visit of the artist, Thomas Nast, to Denver and his sketching the baby for Harper’s Bazaar. When Lillie was eighteen, she ran away to McCourt relatives in Chicago. Later she married her cousin, John Last, and settled in Milwaukee. Her daughters, Caroline and Jane, resided there for some years after Lillie’s death in 1946, concealing their Tabor descent.

THE FIRST BORN

No baby had such lavish belongings and such wide attention as Lillie Tabor, who was born in July, 1884. Her christening outfit cost $15,000. Her mother, who was fond of keeping scrapbooks, entered many clippings about her beautiful baby. The right-hand page contains three clippings from January, 1887, describing the visit of the artist, Thomas Nast, to Denver and his sketching the baby for Harper’s Bazaar. When Lillie was eighteen, she ran away to McCourt relatives in Chicago. Later she married her cousin, John Last, and settled in Milwaukee. Her daughters, Caroline and Jane, resided there for some years after Lillie’s death in 1946, concealing their Tabor descent.

Scrapbook.

SILVER DOLLARBaby Doe lost her second baby, a boy; and her third child, born in 1889, was another little girl. She only enjoyed four years of the rich, petted life that her sister had had. Christened a long string of names, she used Silver and Silver Dollar the most. Although Lillie resembled Baby Doe in looks, Silver, who had the nickname of “Honey-maid,” was closer to her mother. Silver spent most of her adolescence and young womanhood in Leadville, living with her mother at assorted cheap locations. She was fond of horses, gay parties, dancing and excitement.* * *Baby Doe’s favorite daughter tried to be a newspaper woman, a movie actress, and a novelist with one printed book, “Star of Blood.” But she failed in all her ventures. Silver Dollar’s end was tragic and sordid in the extreme. She was scalded to death under very suspicious circumstances in a rooming house in Chicago’s cheapest district. Not yet thirty-six years old, she was a perpetual drunk, was addicted to dope and had lived with many men under several aliases. Her funeral expenses were paid by Peter McCourt.* * *

SILVER DOLLAR

Baby Doe lost her second baby, a boy; and her third child, born in 1889, was another little girl. She only enjoyed four years of the rich, petted life that her sister had had. Christened a long string of names, she used Silver and Silver Dollar the most. Although Lillie resembled Baby Doe in looks, Silver, who had the nickname of “Honey-maid,” was closer to her mother. Silver spent most of her adolescence and young womanhood in Leadville, living with her mother at assorted cheap locations. She was fond of horses, gay parties, dancing and excitement.

* * *

Baby Doe’s favorite daughter tried to be a newspaper woman, a movie actress, and a novelist with one printed book, “Star of Blood.” But she failed in all her ventures. Silver Dollar’s end was tragic and sordid in the extreme. She was scalded to death under very suspicious circumstances in a rooming house in Chicago’s cheapest district. Not yet thirty-six years old, she was a perpetual drunk, was addicted to dope and had lived with many men under several aliases. Her funeral expenses were paid by Peter McCourt.

* * *

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