Gunnison County CO Archives Biographies.....Monson, William B. 1843 - ?
************************************************

Copyright.  All rights reserved.

http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm

http://www.usgwarchives.net/co/cofiles.htm

************************************************



File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by:
Judy Crook jlcrook@rof.net March 24, 2006, 8:40 pm

Author: 

Progressive Men of Western Colorado



     The tide of emigration in this country, which has flowed steadily westward

from the Atlantic coast, encountering every danger, enduring every privation and

conquering every difficulty, that has defied the rage of savage men and of the

elements and has commanded hitherto unknown conditions to its service and

advantage, until it has overspread the whole land and transformed it into a vast

expanse of productive energy and made it fruitful with the beneficent products

and blessings of the most advanced civilization, presents to the imagination one

of the most striking themes of interest in all the range of human history. 

Romance and poetry dwells on its story with delight, and legitimate history

finds in its spectacular yet substantial features of everlasting accomplishment

a most impressive field for thought and narrative.  In gross it is unparalleled

in the annals of time, although in individual aspects it may be but an oft told

tale.  In himself and in his immediate progenitors William B. Monson belongs to

this great theater of action, and is to be reckoned among the progressive men of

the section in which he lives because of his part in it and the manner in which

he has performed that part.  He is a native of Bourbon county, Kentucky, born in

1843, and the son of Hugh T. and May Monson, who were also natives of that

state, where the mother died in 1856, at the age of twenty-five, leaving two

children, of whom William was the first born.  When he was six years old his

father moved with the two children to Missouri, arriving there in 1850 and

remaining until 1863.  He then made another move westward, coming first to

Denver and a short time afterward locating at Fort Lupton, this state, where he

continued to reside until 1872.  At that time he went back to his former home in

Missouri, where he is still living, having reached the venerable age of

eighty-five and attained the position of a patriarch in the regard of the

community in which his evening of life is descending peacefully and happily to

the grave.  In 1858, at the age of fourteen, the son William began the work of

earning his own livelihood by taking charge of an ox team for a journey across

the plains to Salt Lake City, which he successfully accomplished and soon after

returned to Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, where he remained until the beginning of

the Pike’s Peak excitement in 1859.  He was at that time young and full of

energy, well developed physically and filled with a love of adventure and

endowed with a spirit of daring and self-reliance that welcomed danger and

difficulty in almost any form.  He purchased an ox team and started with others

to the new land of promise whose golden music had just thrilled the world, and

perhaps with high hopes of what it might have in store for him.  Arriving at

Denver, he found it profitable to engage in freighting between the older

settlements along the Missouri and Mississippi, and so returned to St. Joseph,

Missouri, with his team employed in that business. He continued freighting

between Denver and St. Joseph for several years, making a number of trips and

encountering on almost every one hostile Indians eager to steal the stock and

take the scalps of any white men they might find on the plains.  The life was

full of hazard, but had a flavor of keener enjoyment on that account.  Still

after a few years of it, in which he saw all its phases, Mr. Monson determined

to abandon it and settle permanently in the West.  He took up his residence at

Fort Lupton, where he was employed as station keeper for a period of twenty-five

months.  In the winter of 1863-4 he moved to Denver and the next spring took up

land in the vicinity of that city on which for nearly ten years he was

profitably engaged in raising sheep and cattle.  In 1873 he sold out there and

moved to Douglas county, locating near Castlerock, where he continued ranching

and raising stock until 1877, when he brought his horses and cattle to his late

site, pre-empting on one hundred and sixty acres of land and soon after

purchasing more, and on this land was actively occupied in the stock industry

with an expanding business and increasing profits.  Subsequently he sold his

ranch and stock and is now living at Ohio City, Colorado.  Mr. Monson has been

married three times, his first marriage being to Miss Arvilla Doyle in 1872. 

She died in 1881, at the age of twenty-eight, leaving two children, Luke B. and

Susan M.  In 1883 he married his second wife, Miss Mary Sours, who died in 1892,

leaving one child, her son William E., she being also about twenty-eight years

of age at her death.  His third marriage occurred in 1893 and was to Miss Mary

F. Medley, who still abides with him.  They have two sons, Eugene and Hugh T.  

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

File at: http://files.usgwarchives.net/co/gunnison/bios/monson413gbs.txt

This file has been created by a form at http://www.genrecords.org/cofiles/

File size: 5.4 Kb