  Map Independence is the town of many names—and yet it never had an official post office of “Independence!” It happened this way: the camp was started in the spring of 1879 by a group of prospectors from Leadville, headed by Billy Belden. They found an excellent gold placer at the head of the Roaring Fork and settled down to mine. They called the placer and their camp Belden. On the Fourth of July they made another big strike a few yards away and in their jubilation renamed their holdings, Independence, because of the day. Meanwhile their camp had attracted newcomers who were resented by the first arrivals, and feuds began to flare. The placer claims led to lode discoveries, and by 1880 the Farwell Company of Leadville had secured a dozen of the best properties. They began construction of a mill. At the same time a town promoter, William Kinkead, moved in and changed the name to Chipeta in honor of Chief Ouray’s wife. In January, 1881, he secured a postmaster’s job for himself with a post office called Sidney. The Farwell Mining Company disliked Kinkead’s action, and six months later they obtained a post office under the name of Farwell. A third group, antagonistic to both the first petitioners, obtained a post office in February, 1882, under the name of Sparkhill. That same year the first two post offices were discontinued, and Sparkhill won. But half the residents still called the settlement Independence. The town flourished with some four hundred residents until 1887 as both a mining camp and stage-stop on the road between Aspen and Leadville. But when the D. & R. G. and the Colorado Midland railroads After 1900 there was only one resident—the caretaker of the mill, Jack Williams, who called his home, Independence. In 1912 Williams departed, and so died Belden-Independence-Chipeta-Sidney-Farwell-Sparkhill-Mammoth City-Mount Hope-Chipeta-Independence—a town unique in nomenclature.... Before sightseeing around Leadville the visitor should read The Unsinkable Mrs. Brown, Silver Queen, Augusta Tabor and the Matchless Mine and Lusty Leadville. No mining camp in Colorado can equal Leadville for the drama of its history, and it is impossible to catch the region’s unique flavor without some preparation beforehand. There are a number of ghost towns in the environs. The most historic is Oro City in California Gulch, but we have chosen Stumptown because of its association with “The Unsinkable Molly Brown,” a musical comedy. To the south are Ball Mountain and fabulous Breece Hill where J. J. Brown was an eighth owner of the Little Jonny.
Franz Berko, 1957 The Little Jonny was probably Leadville’s richest mine. Properties such as the Robert E. Lee made more fantastic shipments—during a seventeen-hour stretch in January, 1880, some $118,500 was extracted—and others such as the Tabors’ Matchless have had more publicity. But the Little Jonny was rare in being both a gold and silver mine in a predominantly silver camp. Its principal owner was John F. Campion (“Leadville Johnny”) who employed Jim Brown as a superintendent until Brown was clever enough to find a gold belt in the workings of the mine. This was just at the time that the price of silver was falling and the Panic of 1893 was casting a pall on the silver camps. In return for this stroke of luck the grateful owners cut Brown in for an eighth share of the mine. Jim Brown had married Maggie Tobin, an illiterate Irish waitress, in 1886. In order to be close to the mines that he was managing at the time, he had taken her to live in Stumptown. One historian has contended that Stumptown is really Stumpftown, named for Joseph Stumpf. This seems unlikely as Stumpf was reportedly engaged in placering north of Leadville in the lower reaches of Evans Gulch some six miles from Stumptown on the Stumpf placer in the 1890’s. In 1897 he obtained the job of hoistman at the Little Jonny mine. At that time, seventeen years after Stumptown’s beginnings, Stumpf went to live in Stumptown to be close to his job at the mine. Apparently he lived in the same two-room log cabin (now gone) on the north face of Breece Hill that had been formerly occupied in 1886 by Jim Brown and his bride, Maggie (later “The Unsinkable”). The cabin may very easily have been the property of the Ibex Mining Company, owner of the Little Jonny. Stumptown began in 1880 with a main street that ran parallel to South Evans Gulch on the west side of the creek. It grew up around the activities of such mines as the Little Bob, St. Louis, Louise, Gold Basin, Winnie, Ollie Reed and Little Ellen (all of which were in South Evans Gulch). Above it on the face of Breece Hill were such famous producers as the Fanny Rawlings, the Big Four, the five shafts of the Little Jonny, the Modoc and the Eclipse. As “suburbs” of Leadville went, the town was fairly conservative. It was largely residential with a number of saloons, a pool hall and a fine school house. This building may still be seen in Leadville at the southwest corner of Sixth and Hemlock Streets where it was moved to serve as the Union Hall. Stumptown has only two dwellings left and is a complete ghost town, but unique because of “The Unsinkable,” an Irish lass who survived the sinking of the Titanic. D.K.P., 1960
D.K.P., 1960 |
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