A LETTER FROM THE PAST
Retyped exactly as received by
E. S. St. John, in 1936, from W. W. Cheely
Great Falls, Montana
March 8, 1936
Mr. E. S. St. John
Fort Lupton, Colo.
Dear Ed:
Yesterday I received a copy of the Fort Lupton Press, a most
excellent weekly newspaper, and covering it's community news
in a very thorough manner. In this edition was a story by
you, entitled "Railroad Service Offered Fort Lupton in 1870",
or words to that effect, which interested me very much.
In this story you tell of the building of the first depot at
Fort Lupton, which brings the memories of that early day flood-
ing back to me. As a boy I was helping my father, A.C. Cheely,
and we were hauling grain to contractors building in the Burlington
Railroad a few miles east of Fort Lupton. Fort Lupton, at
this time consisted of a small brick building, the property of
Charles Safford, who made boots for the cowboys up and down the
Platte River. I noticed that some brick and building material
was being unloaded near the railroad, and on inquiring the
occasion for this sudden burst of building activity was told
that the Union Pacific was building a depot for the new town there.
About the same time George Twombly, the pioneer merchant, commen-
ced the construction of a store to house his mercantile establish-
ment, and W. G. Winbourne, my uncle, who was interested in the town-
site, built a hotel, in which space was left for a store which he
afterwards established.
The Twombly establishment was moved from a frame building about
a quarter of a mile north on the main highway. This mercantile
house had it's start about ten years earlier, and was owned by
the father of Lo Monson, well known pioneer of these parts, and
who did not approve of calling the new town Fort Lupton, and in
order to bring about a change in the name of the town, had a big
sign across the top of his store building bearing the word
"Monsonville". Governmental approval of the Fort Lupton post office
settled this question.
My uncle, W. G. Winbourne, arrived in the Fort Lupton country in the
early 50's before the Civil War. He was from Guildford Court
House, North Carolina, and had been attracted to the place by the luxuriant meadows on the
west side of the Platte River, where he
homesteaded and settled down for life.
Most of my relatives were natives of Virginia and North Carolina,
and after helping to lose the great war between the North and the
South, rather than "go with the wind", which was not blowing any too kindly on a
conquered people, decided to seek new and greener
pastures. One young uncle, Richard Winbourn, fled to Cuba, but
soon came back to North Carolina, in time to join the hygeria of
Cheelys and Winbournes to the west, to the settlement that was
being built up by W.G. Winbourne, and who had urged them to come
to the new land of milk and honey.
Included in this group were A.C. Cheely, long since deceased,
James Cheely, now a 84 year old resident of Los Angeles, Bose,
John and Tom Cheely, all dead, brothers of A.C. Cheely and a number of others. This was in
1866. Of these uncles I think John Cheely
impressed me the most as he was a handsome man, with a flair for
the violin and for entertaining. He was the publisher of a weekly
newspaper at Evans, and early in my life I cast my lost with his
and became a newspaper man and still am, for that matter. He
was the father of Mrs. Genevive Hanawalt and Mrs. Leah Smith, both
of whom reside in Hollywood.
My people stopped at a half-way house on the east side of the
Platte River, two or three miles up the river from Fort Lupton,
This place had been built in the days when the Arapahoe Indian
was a real menace, and in the main room was concealed a trap
door which led, by devious ways, to an underground hideout, where
everyone crawled when word came that the Indians were coming.
But the Indians never came.
About the same time Chris Lambrecht, a sturdy young German, not
long over from the fatherland, located a homestead on the west
side of Fort Lupton. He worked there alone for several years,
and the great flood of the Platte River brought joy to his
house. When the flood was raging by his place Chris noticed a
young girl clinging to a tree that had been uprooted and was
being carried down the river. Chris demonstrated his bravery
by rescuing this damsel in distress. He was delighted to learn
that this pleasing young woman was a countrywoman of his, and
fell in love with her. As soon as she had recovered from her
experience he carried her off to a minister and married her,
and thus began the Lambretch romance which, in the course of
years, built up a nice estate and a sturdy German family.
The Twomblys was one of the dominant families of the new town,
George, John, Ben and Hugh, they were called, and they were all
fine young men. Hugh was the beau ideal of myself and the boys
of my tender years, because he was the sheriff of Weld County,
then a wide expanse of northeastern Colorado. I remember that
he would come riding up from Greeley, the county seat, on a
prancing horse, with a couple of six-guns strapped to his hips,
and was a most dashing figure. Ever after that I wanted to be
Sheriff of Weld County, but time and fate disposed of me otherwise.
John and George Twombly ran the Fort Lupton Mercantile House,
which was the rendezvous of al Luptonians. George built the
first brick residence in Fort Lupton, the show place of the town,
although modest enough when compared with modern buildings.
Maggie Twombly was George's wife and helped him in the store.
I thought she was the most beautiful woman in the world, and when
my eyes were sore from the sand that the wind brought up from
Platteville, if I could gaze on pretty Maggie, my sore eyes would
be well again. I hope she reads this and gets joy out of it now,
I want her to know that the 60 years that have intervened between
then and now, have not dimmed the enthusiam of my admiration,
never before expressed. John Twombly located in Brighton, became
postmaster there, and County Commissioner of Arapahoe County and
afterwards a political magnate of Denver and postmaster of that
growing city.
Then there were the cowboys. How they thrilled my eye, when they
were riding away into the north country to adventure, as many of
them did every spring. There was Ben Twombly, one of the Twombly
brothers. He did not ride for others very long and was soon
running cattle for himself. Among the riders, Ben was my favortite.
He radiated happiness and to be noticed by him would thrill me
for days. With the years he developed into a man of considerable
property, was a fine neighbor and a worth while citizen. He has
long since been gathered unto his Fathers and I hope he sleeps
well. Then there was big, black, handsome Lo Monson, who quit
riding the range early and developed profitable farm property east
of Fort Lupton. And the Hammitt brothers, who rode away to fame
with the Buffalo Bill show of two generations ago.
Then the Burge tribe, sons of William Burge, for whose very
existence I am responsible. I remember one day driving up to the
Twombly store when George Twonbly rushed out and told me that
Junie Winbourn, my cousin, then a young girl of about 16 years,
was about to run away with a youth, whose name I do not recall.
So I turned my team around and started for the W.C. Winborne
ranch. I recall that my team was a couple of big heavy mares
and were hitched to a hay wagon. I soon had them on the run to
head off Cupid. There was a long wooden bridge across the Platte
River, just this side of the Winbourne place, and as I took this bridge on the run my
heavy team and wagon made enough noise to
awaken the dead. As I dashed up to the entrance of the Winbourne
place, W.G. Winbourne came running out. I told him what was about to happen and he took
Junie into a strong room and locked
her up. Then he called a family council and decided to take his
daughter down to some relatives in Alabama, where she would be safe as far as this
aspirant to her hand and W. G.'s broad acres were concerned. About two months later one
bright June morning, my cousin Junie returned to Fort Lupton and with her came her new
husband, William Burge. Her father was astounded but welcomed his
new son-in-law, and took him into his home. The son-in-law got
on the old man's nerves and he decided to put him to breaking wild
horses, in which Winbourne made a speciality. Burge, a mule
specialist, knew very little about horses, and the first wild team
he hitched up ran away and threw him out of the wagon, breaking
both legs at the ankle. When W. G. came home, he found his son-
in-law in bed in the front room, and after a couple of months of
this close association, decided as a matter of self protection to
stake Burge to a dry land farm. Twenty years later Burge owned
most of the farms in his neighborhood, and had more real money
than his father-in-law, and had brought into being a lot of sturdy
sons to help him till the land. So, if Rachel and Lucy, my two
sturdy mares who galloped over the bridge just in time to spoil
romance, had fallen in the river and broken their necks, there
would be no Burge tribe in Fort Lupton today.
I hope that you will write some more early day stories of the
Fort Lupton that we knew so well. In my time, Winbournes and
Cheelys were numerous in that section. Now no member of either
family resides there.
With my kindest regards and best wishes, I am.
Yours very cordially,
W. W. Cheely
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