Eagle County CO Archives Biographies.....Borah, Jacob E. April 13, 1847 - ?
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File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by:
Judy Crook jlcrook@rof.net November 10, 2005, 12:44 pm

Author: Progressive Men of Western Colorado

Jacob E. Borah [biography includes a photograph, not posted]

   Jacob E. Borah, a younger brother of Alfred G. Borah, a sketch of whom will

be found elsewhere in this work, was born at Morgantown, Butler county,

Kentucky, on April 13, 1847.  Mr. Borah obtained a meager common-school

education and began to make his own living at the age of fifteen.  He remained

in Kentucky until July, 1868, then moved to Missouri to look up a location.  Not

being pleased with the outlook, he soon afterward went to Grant county,

Wisconsin, where he remained until 1872 and farmed with profit.  In the year

last named he changed his residence to Cherokee county, Iowa, and after three

years of differing employments there came to Boulder county, this state, joining

his brother Alfred as a partner in mining operations.  On June 14, 1878, they

moved to Leadville, and from there they prospected in various parts of the

Western slope.  Their success was good until 1885, when Jacob located at Gypsum,

and since then he has been continuously engaged in hunting, trapping and serving

as a tourists’ guide, his reputation in the latter capacity being first-class

and wide-spread.  He has an outfit of seventy-five pack animals with mess wagons

and twenty hounds, and knows all the country in Wyoming, Idaho, New and Old

Mexico and Colorado, and besides he has a pleasing personality and an obliging

disposition which make him very popular as a guide.  Many large parties of

tourists from different parts of the world have had the benefit of his services

and have gone away afterward singing his praises wherever their duty or

inclination took them.  As an illustration of his success in his profession it

is only necessary to state that during the year of 1904 forty-three bears and

thirty-four mountain lions were killed by the different parties he escorted.  In

one instance during the season they killed six bears in twelve days, which

included the entire time they were out, including moves, etc.  Mr. Borah was

married on October 14, 1890, to Miss Minnie H. Hockett, a native of Cedarville,

Kansas.  They have two children, L.J. and LeRoy.  This hardy trapper and guide

has not lost his fondness for ease, security, and all that civilization reckons

among the goods of life; but the wilderness, rough, harsh and inexorable as it

is, has charms for him more potent in their seductive influence than all the

lures of luxury and sloth.  True, his path is often chocked with difficulties,

but his body and soul are hardened to meet them; it is beset with dangers, but

these are the very spice of his life.  And he has, in addition to his knowledge

of woodcraft and other qualifications as a guide, the happy faculty of putting

those who are with him in touch with his spirit in this respect and making them

enjoy to its full the rugged life of the wilderness, wherein men, beasts and

nature herself seem armed against them.

Additional Comments:
From Progressive Men of Western Colorado.  Chicago:  A.W. Bowen & Co., 1905

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