Saguache County CO Archives Biographies.....Ball, George March 10, 1849 - ?
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Judy Crook jlcrook@rof.net November 7, 2005, 5:35 pm

Author: Progressive Men of Western Colorado

George Ball 

     In the forty years of his active labor as man and boy, since he began to

earn his own living and make his way in the world unassisted, George Ball, who

is now one of the progressive and prosperous ranch and cattle men of Saguache

county, this state, and is comfortably fixed on a fine ranch of three hundred

and twenty acres seven miles southeast of the county seat, one-half of which he

entered as a homestead and the other half acquired by purchase, has seen much of

the world, and mingled with peoples of widely differing characteristics and

engaged in a great variety of pursuits.  The experience has been valuable to him

in satisfying his love of adventure and desire to see the world, but more in

giving him knowledge of himself and his strong points of character, and teaching

him how to rely on them for his advancement in life and in meeting its frequent

and trying emergencies.  Mr. Ball is a native of “merrie England,” born in

Staffordshire on March 10, 1849.  His parents, George and Prudence Ball, were

also English by birth, and passed their lives in their native land.  The father

was a dipper in the potteries, and made good wages at his work but he did not

have much to give his children in the way of a start in life.  Of the seven

children in the household Moses and Hugh have died, and  Joseph, who is

superintendent of the second division of the Rocky Mountain Coal & Iron Company;

Joab, Isaac, and George, the last named being the second in order of birth of

those who are living.  He received a very limited common-school education, and

began to work in the potteries at the age of nine years, being employed in their

interesting work five years.  From the age of fourteen to that of nearly

seventeen he did hard labor in the coal mines.  Then, impelled by a strong

desire to seek more fruitful opportunities in the new world, where they were

said to abound, and where thousands of his countrymen had found them, on August

5, 1867, he sailed from Liverpool for the United States, and ten days later

arrived at Pittsburg, Pennsylvania.  The first three years of his residence in

this country were passed working in coal mines in Mercer county and along the

Monongahela river in that state, and the next two in the same occupation in many

different and widely separated places, among them Illinois, Vancouver Island,

the Puget Sound country, near San Francisco, California, and in the vicinity of

Coos Bay, Oregon.  In the spring of 1872 he came to Colorado, and after mining

at Georgetown until October of that year, he went to Wyoming and mined coal at

Carbon until Christmas day, then returning to this state, worked ten days in the

mines at Golden.  In January, 1873, Mr. Ball located half of his present fine

ranch on a homestead claim, and traveled to it from Denver with all his worldly

possessions on one wagon drawn by one yoke of oxen, leaving the capital city on

January 16th and arriving at his homestead on the 29th day of the same month,

the temperature during this time being thirty degrees below zero, and the

journey full of hardships and suffering.  But his subsequent triumphs on the

tract of his choice and the addition he has made to it, have amply rewarded his

heroic efforts to secure it and demonstrated his wisdom in the selection.  One

hundred acres of the land is well adapted to grain and seventy acres to hay, the

remainder being good pasture ground.  The ranch is well fenced and provided with

comfortable and commodious buildings and other necessary improvements.  He

raises large quantities of oats and other cereals, and his hay is first-class in

quality and abundant in quantity.  Mr. Ball has given his business close and

careful attention, and it has rewarded his zeal with returns proportioned to the

outlay.  He has been something of a hunter, too, and has a large collection of

mounted specimens of wild game, trophies of the chase, including birds, animals

and reptiles, all secured and mounted by himself, assisted by his brother

Joseph, since 1886.  The collection is valued at five hundred dollars and is

wholly of Colorado products.  Mr. Ball is a Republican in politics and an

earnest worker for his party.  Recognized as one of the substantial, progressive

and far-seeing men of the county, he is prominent in all local affairs and

occupies a high place in the regard of the people.

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

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