Bandits and Badmen: A History of Crime in the Colorado’s Cripple Creek District

c 2022 by Jan MacKell Collins

The following is excerpted from Lost Ghost Towns of Teller County, Colorado, Cripple Creek District: Last of Colorado’s Gold Booms, the Single Action Shooter’s Society and Brothels, Bordellos & Bad Girls: Prostitution in Colorado 1860-1930.

The last of Colorado’s great gold booms occurred in the Cripple Creek District, high on the backside of Pikes Peak, in 1891. Prior to that, the ranchers populating the area were hardly concerned with crime. The busy bustle of city life had yet to descend on the area. With the discovery of gold, however, the region’s status quickly turned from that of quiet cow camps and homesteads to several rollicking boomtowns within a short distance, each complete with the accompanying evils.

The growth of crime in the newly founded Cripple Creek District grew in proportion to the swelling population as prospectors, merchants, doctors, attorneys and a fair amount of miscreants descended upon the area. Marshal Henry Dana of Colorado Springs once joked that crime was down in his city because the law-breakers had all moved to Cripple Creek. He wasn’t far off. Already, rumors had circulated for some time that the Dalton Gang of Kansas had used the area as an outlaw hideout. As the district grew, the Dalton’s moved on to their fateful end in Coffeyville, Kansas.

But for every outlaw who left the area, there was another one to take his place. Bunco artists, robbers, thieves and scammers soon descended upon the district in great numbers. The Cripple Creek District was still in its infancy and would lack proper law enforcement for some time. Only after Cripple Creek ruffian Charles Hudspeth accidentally killed piano player Reuben Miller while attempting to shoot the bartender at the Ironclad Dance Hall did the city ban guns for a short time. But it was already too late. Cripple Creek’s outlaws were already blazing their own bloody path through history.

By 1894, gangs and undesirables were running rampant throughout the district. “Dynamite Shorty” McLain was one of the first bad guys to make the papers for blowing up the Strong Mine in the district city of Victor during labor strikes. There was a gang hanging around Victor too, headed by the Crumley brothers. Grant, Sherman and Newt Crumley, lately of Pueblo, found the pickings quite ripe and soon fell in with outlaw Bob Taylor and his sister Nell, Mrs. Hailie Miller, Kid Wallace and O.C. Wilder.

Sherman Crumley was especially susceptible to running with would-be robbers. In May of 1895, he and Kid Wallace were arrested after five armed men robbed the newly formed Florence and Cripple Creek Railroad. Apparently a “toady” named Louis Vanneck squealed after receiving less than his share of the loot, which primarily consisted of money taken from passengers. Wallace went to jail, but the popular Crumley was acquitted. Following the incident, the Crumley gang contented themselves with cheating at poker and rolling gamblers in the alleys. Sherman was also a known thief, often stashing his loot in abandoned buildings around smaller communities like Spring Creek just over Mineral Hill from Cripple Creek.

The Crumleys remained in the Cripple Creek District for some time, until Grant shot mining millionaire Sam Strong to death at the Newport Saloon in Cripple Creek in 1902. Grant was not without good reason, for Strong had suddenly pulled a gun on him and accused him of running a crooked roulette wheel. Still, the killing of a man was not a reputation the Crumley’s wished to sustain, and the threesome quickly moved on to Tonopah and Goldfield, Nevada. Grant quickly earned a fine reputation as a man about town, while Newt became quite respectable and even owned the fabulous, four-story Goldfield Hotel for a time. His son, Newt Jr., would become a state senator.

The activities of the Crumleys were actually quite minor compared to those of “General” Jack Smith and his followers at the district town of Altman. Miner, poet and Colorado Springs Gazette-Telegraph columnist Rufus Porter (aka the “Hard Rock Poet”) once wrote a ballad about the town’s first marshal, Mike McKinnon. The honorable lawman died following a gunfight with six Texans (but not, allegedly, before he killed all six outlaws). Porter may have actually been recalling an incident from May 1895, when outlaw General Jack Smith dueled it out with Marshal Jack Kelley. Smith had been running amuck for some time and had been warned by Kelley to stop trying “to run the town in his usual style.” On May 14, Smith wrapped up a night of drinking by shooting the locks off the Altman jail, thereby freeing two of his buddies, who were already incarcerated for drunkenness.

Smith wisely left town, but the next day, a constable named Lupton and one Frank Vanneck located him in a Victor saloon. “I want you, Jack,” Lupton said, to which Smith replied, “If you want me, then read your warrant.” Lupton began reading the warrant, but Smith appeared to go for his gun. The constable quickly pinned the outlaw’s arms while Vanneck shoved a gun to Smith’s chest. Smith was arrested with a bond of $300. He managed to pay the bond quickly, however, and was next seen riding toward Altman “with the open declaration of doing up the marshal who swore the complaint.” Altman authorities were notified as Lupton and Victor deputy sheriff Benton headed for the town. By then, Smith had already gathered a small force of men, including one named George Popst.

The bunch headed to Gavin and Toohey’s Saloon, where Smith started ordering one drink after another. Outside, Lupton and Benton met up with Marshal Kelley and set out in search of the General. Kelley “had just lifted the latch of Lavine and Touhey’s [sic] saloon, when ‘crack’ went a gun from the inside. The ball struck the latch and glanced off.” Kelley threw the door open and shot Smith just below the heart. From the floor, Smith fired and emptied his own gun as Kelley continued shooting him. Outside, Benton fired a shot through the window that hit Popst. “The latter may recover,” predicted the newspaper, “but Smith is certain to die.” Popst also died, about a week later.

Saloon shootings in the Cripple Creek District occurred with such frequency that sometimes, they were hardly regarded as newsworthy. An 1895 article in the Colorado Springs Gazette reported half-heartedly that Joe Hertz, a.k.a. Tiger Alley Joe, was shot above the Denver Beer Hall in Cripple Creek by Clem Schmidt. Hertz staggered down to the bar exclaiming, “That crazy Dutchman shot me!” A few minutes later, he fell to the floor and died. The Gazette neglected to follow up on the crime or make comment on its effect in Cripple Creek. The year 1896 did not prove much better for the lawmen of the district. General Jack Smith’s widow, a prostitute known as “Hook and Ladder Kate,” masterminded the robbery of a stagecoach outside of Victor. In early April, Coroner Marlowe was contending with the likes of J.S. Schoklin, who dropped his loaded gun in a saloon and subsequently fatally shot himself in the side.

On April 25 and April 29 during 1896, Cripple Creek suffered two devastating Cripple Creek that sent residents into a full blown panic as much of the downtown area and hundreds of homes burned. Folks hurried to rescue what they could in the wake of the flames. Thousands of goods and pieces of furniture were piled high in the streets. It was prime picking for looters and arsonists, the latter whom set even more fires to instill further panic so they could rob and steal. In response, firemen, police and good Samaritans beat, clubbed or shot the law-breakers as a way to restore order.

Petty crimes and robberies continued intermittently for the next few years, and brawls and gunfights were common throughout the district. Crimes increased dramatically when the Cripple Creek District rallied against Colorado Springs to form Teller County in 1899. El Paso County clearly did not want to lose its lucrative tax base from the rich mines of the district. Arguments over the matter turned into all-out screaming matches, fights, and shootings. Thus the newly formed county, with Cripple Creek as the county seat, found itself besieged with lawlessness, free-for-all fights in the saloons along Myers Avenue, and high-grading of gold which was so widespread it was hardly thought illegal.

For several more years, law enforcement continued grappling with the outlaw elements around the district. Incidents making the papers included the death of James Roberts, who was clubbed with a gun and left to die on the floor of the Dawson Club as other patrons urged him to the bar for a drink (a portion of Roberts’ skull, used in testimony against his killer, is on display at the Cripple Creek District Museum). Down in Cripple Creek’s infamous red-light district on Myers Avenue, prostitute Nell Worley was arrested for shooting at a man breaking down her front door. Nell was arrested  because the bullet missed its mark and hit a musician on the way home from the Grand Opera House instead. Luckily he was only injured.

Indeed, Myers Avenue was peppered with illegal gamblers, pick pockets and drunks who felt free to wave and fire their guns at will. The red-light district spanned a full two blocks, offering everything from dance halls to cribs, from brothels above saloons to elite parlor houses. Crimes, suicides, death from disease and frequent scuffles were the norm on Myers Avenue, where anything could happen – and eventually did. Today, Madam Pearl DeVere remains the best-known madam in Cripple Creek, and her fancy parlor house, the Old Homestead, remains one of the most unique museums in the west.

Over in Victor, vice-presidential nominee Theodore Roosevelt visited in 1900. His purpose was to speak to the masses of gold miners about the virtues of switching to silver coinage. Clearly, that wasn’t a great idea, and Roosevelt was attacked by an angry mob of protesters as he disembarked from the train. Cripple Creek postmaster Danny Sullivan is credited with keeping the crowd at bay with a two by four until Roosevelt was back on the train. A year later Roosevelt visited again, this time as Vice President. This time he was treated much kinder, although the apologetic city council of Victor kept him entertained for so long that he barely had time to visit Cripple Creek before departing.

When labor strikes reared their ugly head once again in 1903, citizens of the district found themselves pitted against each other. Union and non-union miners fought against one another. Neighbors stopped speaking to each other. Down in the schoolyards, even children fought on the playground over a debate they actually knew little about. Soon, miners were being jailed and/or deported from the district, and one time the entire staff of the Victor Record newspaper was arrested for publishing an unpopular editorial. Things reached a head when professional assassin Harry Orchard set off a bomb at the Vindicator Mine and blew up the train depot at the district town of Independence.

Now, corruption politics reared its ugly head. During a heated election debate in the district town of Goldfield, deputy sheriff James Warford was hired to oversee the elections. According to Warford, Goldfield constables Isaac Leibo and Chris Miller were shot in self defense when they refused to “move on.” An examination of the bodies, however, revealed both were shot from behind. Eight years later, long after the strikes had been settled, Warford was found beaten and shot to death on nearby Battle Mountain. His murder was never solved.

Within a few years, the Cripple Creek District’s gold would soon become too expensive to mine, and folks slowly began moving away. The sharks and scheisters moved on too, in search of fresh pigeons to pluck. It would be many more decades before legalized gambling would find its way to Cripple Creek, bringing a whole new, modern generation of eager residents, as well as the accompanying crimes.

For history buffs, there are still some mysteries remaining in the district yet. In Mt. Pisgah Cemetery at Cripple Creek, a wooden grave marker was once documented as reading, “He called Bill Smith a Liar.” Urban legend has it that after gambling was legalized, renovations of Johnny Nolon’s original casino in Cripple Creek revealed, a body in a strange shaft under the building. During the excavation of an outhouse pit at the ghost town of Mound City during the 1990s, remains of a perhaps quickly discarded revolver were found. These and other mysterious remnants still surface now and then, to remind us of the many other crimes the lively Cripple Creek District once witnessed.

Image: James Roberts’ skull remains on display at the Cripple Creek District Museum. Courtesty Jan MacKell Collins.

Clyde, Colorado began as an early stage stop

c 2022 by Jan MacKell Collins

Portions of this article are from Lost Ghost Towns of Teller County, Colorado.

   Prior to the gold boom in the Cripple Creek District, folks wishing to access today’s Teller County used a series of wagon and stage roads. The oldest of these was the Cheyenne & Beaver Toll Road Company which began in Cheyenne Canyon near Colorado Springs and joined what is today known as Gold Camp Road. The route was originally established in 1875. Two years later the name of the road was changed to the Cheyenne and Beaver Park Toll Road. At the confluence of Bison Creek and Middle Beaver Creek, a new wagon road veered off towards Seven Lakes, a resort just below the summit of Pikes Peak. A stage stop was established at this junction which would later be known as Clyde.

   Though only a stage stop, services at Clyde did include a place to stay for the night, as well as food, and libations. Clyde prospered as the last stop before the ascent to Seven Lakes. The road running by also prospered, its name changing again in 1879 to the Cheyenne, Lake Park and Pikes Peak Toll Road Company. With the gold boom in the Cripple Creek District beginning in 1891, the road through Clyde gained even more popularity as the shortest route to the district from Colorado Springs. Promoters, including the Colorado Springs Chamber of Commerce, spent upwards of $18,000 to improve the toll road.

   Miners especially found Clyde a great place to escape from the throngs of people swarming the Cripple Creek District. As merchants of Clyde prospered from these and other travelers, a post office opened under the name Seward in August of 1896. The name was changed to Clyde in October of 1899, after the son of resident George McCarthy. The post office application explained that the office would serve 35 people but was expecting to serve 100 or more in time.

   The families at Clyde were of the hard-working variety with lots of children. Being far away from good medical facilities, unfortunately, took its toll on babies in this remote spot, resulting in a higher-than-usual mortality rate. Unable to afford tombstones, or to reach nearby established graveyards in winter, many ranch families simply buried stillborns or infants on the family property. Most of these graves were never marked and have subsequently been forgotten over time.

   The Colorado Springs & Cripple Creek District Railroad (CS & CCD), later called “The Short Line”, was built through Clyde in 1899 on its way to the District. The railroad was developed by mine owners who were sick of paying expensive freight fees to the Florence & Cripple Creek and the Midland Terminal Railroad, both of whom also extended to the District. Irving Howbert, president of Colorado Springs’ First National Bank at the time, convinced the mine owners they could finance their own railroad. Howbert, of course, became president.  The railroad was a limited success; even with the renowned Seven Lakes Resort above town abandoned, passengers still favored accessing trails to Pikes Peak from Clyde via the Short Line.

   George McCarty continued serving as postmaster at Clyde in 1900 while working on the side as a miner. The Cripple Creek District directory for that year notes that Clyde was referred to as Clyde City, a sign that locals hoped the town would grow larger. At the time, however, only a few miners were living there. Another resident was W.S. Gerber, a saw-mill operator who was renting a home from P. McNeny. The house was located next to the post office building which was owned by a Mr. Swink. In May, Gerber, hoping to cash in on insurance money for his household goods, burned both buildings (Gerber beat a hasty retreat to Nebraska but was arrested for the crime upon his return in January of 1901). Counting Gerber, the entire population, according to the 1900 census, only numbered twenty-nine people. And to McCarthy’s disappointment, the post office closed in September.

   Those who loved living at Clyde refused to die with the town. Over the years Clyde, as well as a number of satellite camps, remained home to several settlers who knew there were still plenty of ways to make a living there. One of the outlying communities was Saderlind, identified on a 1901 CS & CCD timetable as a stop between Rosemont and Clyde. The whistlestop was located roughly 2.2 miles from Rosemont and 6 miles from Clyde. How many people lived at Saderlind proper is a mystery, since they were counted as residents of Clyde and only appeared in the 1910 census.

   There were plenty of visitors to the area, too. Majestic Cathedral Park was just up the road. Area prospectors continued searching for gold. Ranchers benefited greatly from the wide meadows and ample water. And when Vice President Theodore Roosevelt passed through on the Short Line in August of 1901, the community was in a buzz for days.

   Soon, the Short Line was in hot competition with the Midland Terminal, which had been charging two dollars for a round trip ticket between Colorado Springs and Cripple Creek. A fare war started, ending when the Short Line successfully beat out the Midland at .25 cents per round trip. The resurgence of interest in Clyde was so good that Frank Cady, postmaster at the Love post office nearby, submitted a new application to reopen the post office at Clyde. Cady cited 140 people as living at Clyde, with the total number of people using the post office at 300. Clyde’s post office successfully reopened in September of 1901.

   With the post office back in place, a new rail station and water tank were constructed in November. There was also a school. There was also Cathedral Park, just around the bend from Clyde along the railroad. The “sublime scenery, fantastic rocks and cathedral spires” of this amazing formation beckoned passengers from the Short Line, which offered daily excursions to the park. Awaiting patrons was a dance pavilion complete with a corrugated iron roof, a five-room “dwelling” and two refreshment stands installed by the company. It was perhaps around that time that an artificial lake was constructed at Clyde for recreational purposes.

   What with people enjoying themselves looking at the natural wonders around Clyde, there was little crime reported until 1904, when assassins Harry Orchard, Johnnie Neville and Johnnie’s son Charlie camped near Clyde. The group was working on behalf of the mine owners during a most violent and tumultuous labor war in the Cripple Creek District. Orchard was orchestrating a plan to blow up the depot at the Cripple Creek District town of Independence, which the group did successfully on June 5. Thirteen men were killed and several others injured.

   Throughout the early 1900’s, Clyde’s population remained at a mere handful of residents. In 1905, when the number was around fifteen citizens, the figure included Joseph D. Schneider who had married his sweetheart, Elmira May Moore, in 1895. The couple homesteaded at Clyde in 1905 and Schneider worked as a section boss on the railroad. The family homestead, meanwhile, grew into a large ranch totaling 2,000 acres. In his early years Schneider was known as “difficult”. When he bought his first car he was in the habit of yelling “Whoa!”, cussing at the vehicle when he wanted it to stop, and even jumping from the newfangled machine when it went out of control. Later in life his demeanor softened.

   The population of Clyde remained at fifteen through 1908. Still on board were schoolteacher Miss J.E. Kenton, as well as station agent and postmaster Chas. F. Redman. But the tiny village could hardly justify its post office, which closed a final time in September of 1909. The number of people shot up to an amazing eighty three residents in 1910, but that number included numerous railroad workers who were likely temporary. Eighteen section hands shared quarters in the railroad’s section house, ten of them being Greek immigrants. Eight others were Japanese. Also living in Clyde was school teacher Harry G. Goves. Two other people worked at the Clyde  Timber Company. The McCarthy family was still there too, including young Clyde who was now eighteen years of age. Clyde and his brothers were employed as farmers on the family homestead.

   The 1910 census at Clyde is notable because at the time, several small satellite camps surrounded the community. They included Rosemont, Saderlind, Summit, Bald Mountain, Bunker Hill District and Seven Lakes. At Bald Mountain there were only five residents. They included prospectors Frosty Clemens, Frank Nelson and James Snodgrass, all widowers in their forties and fifties. Frosty Clemens in particular was a character of sorts whose name has become legend in his part of the country.

   Born in 1865 in Missouri, Clemens was allegedly a cousin of Samuel Clemens, better known as the prolific writer Mark Twain. By the time he arrived in the area, Clemens was a widower who apparently had been prospecting for some time. Local folklore cites that Clemens dug several mines but never found much in the way of fortune. Ultimately, according to legend, Clemens died in 1916 when “he pulled a permanent lid of gravel down over himself in one of his mines.” It is also believed that he built what is now known as Frosty Clemens Trail in Frosty Park.

   The Bunker Hill District was located on Bunker Hill between Bald Mountain and Rosemont. Residents of the district were all farmers, most of whom had departed the area by the time of the 1920 census.

   With the formation of Pike National Forest, a ranger station was built at Clyde between 1912 and 1917. The Cripple Creek District mines were dwindling, and fewer people were using the Short Line. When the dance pavilion roof at Cathedral Park collapsed during a heavy snow, nobody bothered to rebuild it. Former resident Glenora Meyers also remembered that the school house was just one room with 12 or so students. Those who still loved the peaceful paradise that was Clyde, however, maintained a number of homesteads in the area.

   Longtime homesteaders included Isadore and Minnie Meyers, who moved to Clyde from the Cripple Creek District city of Goldfield in 1914. The family home was a one and a half story cabin made from square logs. The bottom floor contained the front room, kitchen, and bedroom for the Meyers. Their many children slept on the second floor in a large room divided by a curtain for the girls and boys. A cellar was stocked with vegetables and canned goods. The outhouse was out back. Water was carried from Middle Beaver Creek across the road. The Meyers’ daughter, Glenora, remembered that “there never was any shortage of snow in winter. Sometimes, the snow drifts were so high that we could walk over the tops of the fences. Of course, to go anywhere, the road had to be shoveled out by hand or plowed out with what was called a go-devil. This was a triangular shaped contraption that was weighted down with rocks or sometimes with us kids and pulled by our faithful team of horses.” At Christmas and other times, the family would take a trip to Victor with hot rocks wrapped in newspapers to keep everyone’s feet warm.

   Beginning in about 1917, the Meyers alternated their time between Clyde and a nearby place they simply called “Camp” near Gould Creek. The family felled and sold timber at Camp. They were also farming by 1920. The family lived briefly in Colorado Springs, where Minnie died in 1926. Isadore continued living in both Colorado Springs and at Camp through at least 1940.

   A year after the Meyers first migrated to Camp, the telegraph office at Clyde closed. It was replaced by a telephone system so train engineers on the Short Line could talk with the dispatcher. In 1920, however, the Short Line ceased operations altogether, and residents of Clyde were counted in the population of Victor during the census that year.

   Today, the old stage road that preceded the Short Line meanders onto the private property comprising Clyde. Two miles from where Middle Beaver Creek has washed out, the old road is a home lived in by the Reifenrath family during the 1920’s. John Reifenrath is believed to have built the large log house, which contained four rooms downstairs and four bedrooms upstairs, each with its own closet. The 1920 census lists John, his wife Mary and their children Edward and Lucille living there. John worked as a farmer and stockman.

   Stories of Clyde reflect that there were still a number of residents there throughout the 1920’s. Around 1921, a particularly heavy rainstorm threatened to break the dams up at Seven Lakes. The children of Clyde were gathered in the second story of the ranger station, which was quite sturdy and thought the safest place to put them. Everyone survived, and in 1922 the old railroad bed gained new life when W.D. Corley purchased it at auction for $370,000. Corley, a coal operator-turned-capitalist, beat out three other bids, including one representing mining millionaire A.E. Carlton. Corley tore up the tracks, filled in the trestles, and turned the rail bed into the Corley Mountain Highway toll road. The toll was one dollar and on a good day, reaped $400 in fees.

   The toll road enabled others at Clyde to prosper as the area remained a popular picnic ground. In 1924 Jim and Helen Schneider moved into the former Clyde Pavilion and converted two of its rooms to living quarters. In 1927 a new post office application was submitted by the Clyde Eating House but was denied. During the 1930’s, Pike National Forest took over the Corley Mountain Highway, renamed it Gold Camp Road, and opened it for free to all.

   The Schneiders and their children continued living off the land. They grew hay, harvested block ice from some nearby caves, and traded hand-churned butter to Seven Lakes caretaker Clyde Reynolds in exchange for fresh trout. The Clyde School closed in 1936. The last teacher was Mr. McComb, who was known for his excessive drinking habits. Into the 1940’s, Clyde next served as a stopover for mule trains training soldiers from Camp Carson in Colorado Springs. The soldiers gave the Schneider children candy bars and bought moonshine from the family.

   For a time beginning in 1947, there was a hotel at Clyde called the Clyde Inn. One of the Schneider children, Hank, was now living with his wife Ida in the old school. Their furnishings in the large classroom included a grand piano from the Victor Opera House in nearby Victor. Also during that time, Chuck and June Bradley moved to the area and purchased much of Clyde to use as their family ranch.

   Clyde resident Frances Kramer remembered that the Clyde Inn was closed up and shuttered during the 1950’s. The hotel was later purchased by some investors from Colorado Springs, but burned to the ground on September 9, 1954. Clyde’s last school survived, however, and was purchased by Robert and Laverne Rayburn in 1954 for $1,500.00. The Rayburns installed a door between the attached teacherage and the schoolroom, expanded the kitchen and added a second bathroom, fireplace, back door and picture window.  

   The Bradley family, meanwhile, continued purchasing ranches, including that of the Schneiders, throughout the 1960’s. In 1974 Chuck Bradley subdivided lots at Cathedral Park Estates and tried to sell them, but the effort was in vain. Picnic tables that had been present at Clyde were dismantled by the Forest Service during the 1980’s even as Gold Camp Road remained a popular tourist destination. When Teller County commissioners attempted to close the old railroad tunnel outside of town in 1988, residents of Clyde and others complained until the tunnel was reopened.

   These days, the school and former ranger station are all that really survive of old Clyde. The historic area remains as private ranching property; folks driving down Gold Camp Road are cautioned to obey all no trespassing and private property signs.

Image: A 1933 picnic near Clyde.