Pitkin County CO Archives Biographies.....Staats, Henry A. July 9, 1848 - ?
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File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by:
Judy Crook jlcrook@rof.net March 16, 2006, 11:46 am

Author: Progressive Men of Western Colorado

     Born on the rich alluvial plains of Illinois, and reared to the pursuit of

agriculture amid their prolific fruitfulness and ease of culture, Henry A.

Staats, of Pitkin county, living near Snow Mass on a fine and well-improved

ranch of four hundred acres, was nevertheless so well instructed in the art of

farming and reared with such valuable lessons of self-dependence and closeness

of observation, that when he came to apply his knowledge in this state where the

conditions of an agricultural life are so vastly different, he soon found

himself master of the situation and has won a substantial competence by his

thrift and energy here as he would have done almost anywhere, being one of the

men to whom circumstances are made to minister and yield tribute.  His life

began on July 9, 1848 at Egypt, in the great Prairie state, where his parents,

Hiram and Jessie Staats, the former a New Yorker by nativity and the latter born

in Scotland, settled in 1830.  The father was a farmer and a manufacturer of

leather, and wrought at his craft until 1861, then turned his attention to the

hotel business, conducting a popular and much frequented hostelry on the old

national road at Ewington, Effingham county, and also served continuously for

fifteen years as justice of the peace.  His office was a favorite place for the

young folks to get married, they coming from all parts of the surrounding

counties.  In 1874 he came to Colorado and located a homestead twenty miles west

of Denver, where he ranched, raised hay, grain and cattle, and conducted a

general farming business with success and profit.  He was a firm and active

Democrat in politics and his wife belonged to the Methodist church.  She died in

1885 and the father in 1895.  They were the parents of eight children, three of

whom, Andrew, Christina, and Mary, are deceased, the last named being at the

time of her death Mrs. Samuel Moffit, a resident of the South.  The surviving

children are Nelson, Martha, Jennie, Sarah and Henry A.  Henry received but

little schooling except what he got from that exacting but thorough taskmaster,

experience. At the age of ten he was obliged to go to work on the farm to help

his parents, and after that there was seldom an opportunity to attend school. 

He remained at home until he was thirty-six, but in the meantime, when he was

but fourteen, enlisted in the Union for the Civil war in 1861, and served one

year as messenger boy for the quartermaster of his command.  After leaving the

army he engaged in railroad contract work in his native state, with his brother,

helping to build the Eads bridge over the Mississippi at St. Louis and the

tunnel there, along with other jobs of importance.  In 1874 he came to Colorado

and located at Denver.  A year later he went to New Mexico and San Juan, and for

four years he was occupied in prospecting and mining with moderate success,

locating and disposing of some of the richest claims in that territory.  In the

summer of 1879 he returned to Colorado and took up his residence at Leadville. 

After mining there a month he crossed the range through Independence pass in

company with Wilson and Thomas Durant, breaking the trail, and made the trip

without adventure worthy of note except some difficulty in fighting fires, as

the whole section was burning, and reached Aspen on July 18th.  There were but

few settlers in this portion of the country then, and all the conditions of life

for those hardy adventurers who had cast their lot here were wild and rugged.

Mr. Staats continued prospecting until 1886. He built one of the first cabins at

Aspen and also a blacksmith shop, and in partnership with the Staats brothers

ran a pack train between the new camp and Leadville and Twin Lakes.  This was

not a profitable enterprise and stopped at the end of a year.  Indian threats of

hostility made all but thirteen of the settlers leave the region, some of those

remaining being Mr. Staats, Michael Lorenzo, Warren Elliott, Warrner Root, Henry

Tourtellotte, Keno Jim and Joseph Dietz.  In 1881 Mr. Staats located a portion

of his present ranch, a pre-emption claim of one hundred and sixty acres, to

which he has since made additions until the ranch now comprises four hundred

acres, all of which is under cultivation.  The principal crops are hay, grain

and garden vegetables; and horses and cattle are raised in good numbers and with

fair profits.  The head of the house is an earnest and loyal democrat in

politics, and a man deeply interested in the advancement of his community.  He

was married on March 27, 1886, to Miss Ella Harmon, a native of Androscoggin

county, Maine, and daughter of George and Jedidah (Foss) Harmon, who were also

born in that state.  They were married in 1835 and settled on a farm at North

Livermore, Maine.  Here were born to them fourteen children.  In the spring of

1861 they moved to Beloit, Wisconsin, where the eldest son was practicing law.

Their second son Edward graduated from Beloit College in 1862, having left

Waterville College to come west with the family.  In 1863 they moved to

Minnesota, where they engaged in farming until the father died, September 6,

1876.  Ella L. graduated from Mankato Normal School in 1874 and was successfully

engaged in teaching for ten years.  She then came to Colorado in 1884.  The aged

mother came to Colorado in 1887 to live with her children.  She died May 5,

1900, at the home of Mrs. Staats.  Only four of her children survived her,

Herbert R., Mason, Columbia and Ella L. (Mrs. Staats). 

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

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