An 1880s Victorian Mansion in the Colorado Rockies: The Estemere Estate at Palmer Lake

by Edwards, Daniel

  Frank L. Smith

  May 26, 1871— May 9, 1910

  Emily L. Smith

  May 13, 1838—Dec 26, 1909

  Eben Smith

  Dec 17, 183—Nov 5, 1906

  Melvin Hill Smith

  May 13, 1898—June 28, 1921

  Adelaide Smith Barber

  June 25, 1898—April 7, 1985

  L.A. Barber

  Sept 27, 1899—Nov 25, 1984

  Leonard Smith

  1899-1924

  Josephine Hill Smith

  1870-1946

  Eben Smith's home in Los Angeles.

  There are more items related to this chapter on the DVD.

  Chapter 4

  Cora Carnahan and Smith Family Relatives at Estamere (1910-1926)

  Cora Smith Carnahan Takes Over Estamere

  With the death of Eben Smith in 1906 and the subsequent death of Emily Smith in December 1909, ownership of Estamere passed to their descendants. Cora lived at Estamere for at least the next ten years, but it is unlikely that Frank Smith ever went to Estamere after his mother’s death, as he died less than five months later. (Short biographical sketches of Frank Smith and Cora’s husband Charles Carnahan, together with sketches of other members and spouses of the Smith and Carnahan families, appear in the “Personalities of Estamere” section later in this chapter.)

  Cora Smith Carnahan thus became the primary owner/resident of Estamere in 1910. The next summer it was reported that:

  Estamere house, the home of C.T. Carnahan, is occupied by the family and a retinue of servants, and will be the scene of many house parties of prominent Denver people during the season.[55]

  Cora’s daughter, Doris, attended an exclusive girl’s school in Washington, D.C., and she invited some of her Denver friends to stay at Estamere during the summer of 1912. Cora’s son, Harold Carnahan, a student at the Lawrenceville prep school in New Jersey, spent the summer vacation with his parents and also asked Denver friends to visit him at Estamere.

  A local article, in the summer of 1912, noted the beauty of the grounds at Estamere: huge lilac bushes in full bloom and the white and lavender snowball flowers. The house itself was described as an

  attractive two-story structure containing some thirty rooms, presenting interior decorations that mystify and entrance. The art works are magnificent, coming as they do from the master hands of two continents. The furniture presents in style that of the period of Henry the Eighth, with the modern square-cornered effects. With its sad tale of untimely deaths and struggles to build against great odds, Estamere still stands the most beautiful summer home in the state.[56]

  Charles, Cora, and daughter Emily returned from a European trip in May 1913, but the couple was already or soon thereafter estranged; the two were unlikely to have spent time together at Estamere after that time. Perhaps as an indication of the state of her marriage, there is evidence that Cora had put Estamere on the market in the spring of 1913. It was reported that the board of governors of the Denver Motor Club were looking to purchase a building for use as a country club, and the prospective locations included the Mt. Morrison Hotel at Morrison, the Weisenhorn lake property near Boulder, and Eben Smith’s old home at Palmer Lake.[57] It turned out that a Denver family ultimately rented Estamere during the summer of 1913 (see below).

  Doris Carnahan was busy the next summer making her social debut and attending parties and dinner dances with the youth of Denver high society. Cora was in Denver watching over her daughter’s social life. No doubt her mother’s wealth and Doris’ own charms made her an attractive target for the affections of socially prominent young men. Unfortunately, Doris’ engagement to Courtland S. Dines in April 1915 turned out to be a fateful choice, even though Dines was the son of a prominent Denver attorney who had been a witness to Eben Smith’s will years before.

  A week after Doris’ engagement, Cora Carnahan obtained a divorce from Charles, her husband of 22 years, on the grounds of desertion. However, by then Cora herself had become friends with one Thomas A. Costello (see bio sketch), with whom she had attended the annual El Paso Club ball on 31 December 1913. Cora and Thomas sailed for Hamilton, Bermuda, where they were married on 03 March 1916. Thomas was only 28 years old, 20 years younger than Cora. Harold Carnahan, then in New York, attended the wedding, as did Mrs. Robert Cary of Denver, a longtime friend of the bride. Earlier in 1916, Charles Carnahan remarried a woman 33 years his junior.

  While Cora Costello and her new husband Thomas, and Doris Dines and her new husband Courtland, may have stayed at Estamere for a short time during the summer of 1916, the house was occupied in August by Frank Smith’s oldest son, Eben and his wife, Margaretta. Mrs. Eben Smith’s sister, Miss Laura Onderdonk, was a guest at Estamere that month. Margaretta Smith opened Estamere in July 1917, but her husband had left to fight in World War I. Eben Smith, named after his millionaire grandfather, never saw Palmer Lake again; he was killed in France shortly before the Armistice ended the War in November 1918.

  Cora Smith Costello and Doris Carnahan Dines returned to Estamere in July 1917, and Thomas Costello joined his wife there during some weekends that summer. The Costellos also spent time at Estamere in 1918, but by the summer of 1919, Doris Dines was divorced, and Cora’s marriage with Thomas was strained. Cora spent the summer of 1920 in Coronado Beach, California, with her daughter Doris and granddaughter, Emily C. Carnahan. There is evidence that Estamere and its adjoining land were valued at $13,500 in 1919.

  Doris Carnahan Dines. Laura Onderdonk.

  Estamere as Rental Property

  Thomas F. Daly

  Thomas F. Daly, his wife Elthea, and daughter Nellie, rented Estamere from July to September 1913. Daly came from Wisconsin to Leadville in the 1880s and began work as an ordinary miner. He soon entered the leasing business and began operating Leadville mining properties under bond and lease. During that period he must have made the acquaintance of Eben Smith. Thomas then entered the insurance business and moved to Denver in 1895. In 1905, he organized the Capitol Life Insurance Company. In 1913, he was its president as well as head of the Thomas F. Daly Agency Company that handled business for the London Guarantee and Accident Company and the Massachusetts Bonding and Insurance Company.

  Daly’s daughter, Nellie, was a student in Washington, D.C., perhaps at the same school Doris Carnahan was attending. Cora Carnahan was busy in Denver during the summer of 1913 supervising the social activities of her daughter Doris who had returned home from her school in Washington, D.C. Cora and Doris visited Estamere at least once that summer. Elthea Daly and Cora had a number of mutual friends, and Elthea invited them to visit her at Estamere, as Cora had done in earlier years. Among those in Denver society who went to Estamere that summer were Mrs. Robert Cary, Mrs. John Gower, Mr. and Mrs. Sherman Fisher, Miss Betty Sharply, and Mrs. Lloyd Wilkins.

  William S. Partridge

  Estamere was rented during the summers of 1920 and 1921 by William S. Partridge, his wife Helen, and daughter Elizabeth. Partridge originally came from New York and was working in Denver in 1891 as clerk and treasurer of the Denver & Rio Grande Railroad, a position he held for more than 20 years. By 1920, Partridge had moved to Holly, Colorado, where he was manager of a land company. Holly was the headquarters of the Holstein (dairy cattle) Breeders’ Association (HBA), and the HBA held its annual picnic and dance at Estamere in August 1920. An orchestra from the Antlers Hotel in Colorado Springs provided the music, and a large crowd attended.[58]

  The Partridge family returned to Estamere in 1921 and had many visitors during the summer:

  Mr. & Mrs. W.S. Partridge had as their guests this week Mrs. Partridge’s father, Mr. W.H. Wallace of Denver, Mr. Robert Work of Pueblo, Mrs. J.M. Thomas of Spokane, Washington and Miss Martha Magnon, Denver. Bob Beck and Ashley Benson are their guests over this week-end.[59]

  The HBA again held its banquet and dance at Estamere on 04 August:

  W.S. Partridge was a host at a picnic Thursday for the Holstein Breeders’ asso
ciation, which held its annual outing at his summer home, Estamere. Over 100 members of the club, their families and those interested in Holstein breeding were present. Conferences and talks on stock raising occupied the greater part of the day, and a dance was held later in the afternoon.[60]

  We have no specific information about Estamere from 1922 to 1925. Cora Costello appears to have been away from Denver during most of the time from 1920 through 1924, and it is not known whether she or Doris, who had married Robert C. Van Schaack, of the Denver real estate family, about 1921, ever returned to live at Estamere. It is doubtful whether either of Frank Smith’s two surviving sons occupied the mansion after 1917. Melvin H. Smith had married in 1916, divorced in 1919, remarried, but died in an automobile accident in Los Angeles in June 1921 at the age of 23. Frank Leonard Smith had moved to Santa Fe, New Mexico. Cora’s son, Harold S. Carnahan, committed suicide at Pasadena, California, in November 1924 at the age of 30. Someone in the family must have engaged local residents at Palmer Lake to keep a watch on the property in the early 1920s.

  Plans for a Sanitarium at Estamere

  One of Dr. W. Finley Thompson’s last ambitious projects at Palmer Lake had been to build a hotel-cum-sanitarium in the town to take advantage of its favorable climate and environment. He raised money in London, corresponded with a British specialist in the field, and sought support of a well-known Denver physician. Thompson set up the Colorado Hotel and Sanitarium Company, and, as mayor, was present at the opening of The Rocklands Hotel and the Palmer Lake Sanitarium in July 1889.[61] The sanitarium was not able to establish itself as a viable business operation, and the institution did not survive Thompson’s departure from Palmer Lake in the summer of 1890. The Rocklands Hotel, however, continued in operation until it was destroyed by fire in September 1920.

  Ironically, Estamere could have become the site of another town sanitarium in 1925. However, the Palmer Lake Town Council, perhaps unaware of Thompson’s enthusiastic efforts 35 years before to create a local business based on treating those suffering from asthma and tuberculosis, hastily acted to keep a sanitarium out of the town. The few facts that are known are a commentary on the widespread racial prejudices of that period.

  A declaration of trust to establish a National Sanatorium for Colored Tuberculosis Patients was filed with the county clerk in Colorado Springs in January 1923. Three of the four trustees were African-American clergymen at local churches, and the fourth was a Colorado Springs real estate dealer. While there were two or three TB sanitariums already operating in the city at that time, they may not have welcomed the admission of black patients, and/or the trustees wanted to establish a national sanitarium that would draw blacks from all over the country. The trustees began the search for a suitable site for the proposed sanitarium and to raise the necessary funds for its construction. It must have been difficult to raise sufficient funds, so the National Sanatorium trustees began to look for an existing building that, at reasonable cost, could be converted to functioning as a TB sanitarium. Apparently the trustees came to know about Estamere in the fall of 1925 and heard that it was available for purchase.

  When the Palmer Lake Board of Trustees (town council) got wind of these developments, it considered the situation an “emergency” and quickly enacted an ordinance “for the immediate preservation of the public peace, health and safety.” The ordinance, on 26 October 1925, declared it unlawful to establish or maintain a sanitarium for the treatment of tuberculosis or any other contagious disease within the corporate limits of the town and set a fine not to exceed $300 for each offense.[62] The Vassar-educated daughter of a prominent Denver attorney, who had a summerhouse at Palmer Lake, reflected what must have been commonly shared sentiments of the educated and uneducated alike when she wrote of this affair to her sister:

  Indeed we are lucky to have escaped the negro sanitarium…. The damage to P[almer] L[ake] as an attractive summer resort would have been enormous…. I don’t think the escape was really so narrow as you imagine. High minded negroes make a great effort not to come in where there is definite objection to them. I should expect them to inquire the attitude of the community before they completed their purchase…. Sanitaria are unwelcome everywhere and negroes are unwelcome. And the combination! But at least they ought not to be in the heart of a summer resort for whites, so we can properly rejoice that they are not to be in Estamere.[63]

  Fortunately, social attitudes do change over time, and in this regard the town of Palmer Lake later made amends in the 1970s when its voters elected Emory Hightower the town’s first black mayor.

  Personalities of Estamere (1898-1920)

  Eben Smith and his wife, Emma, lived long and productive lives. The lives of their children, in-laws, and grandchildren, unfortunately, were all too often filled with turmoil, heartbreak, and disaster. Whether due to the corrupting influences of great wealth, individual failure to exercise prudent judgment, or simply victimized by inexplicable bad luck, many of Eben Smith’s survivors led dysfunctional lives that sometimes ended in tragedy. These are the brief life stories of the Smith family members and some of their spouses who spent time at Estamere.

  Cora Isabel Smith (Daughter of Emily and Eben Smith)

  Cora I. Smith was born at Central City, Colorado, on 28 March 1868. She left Aspen in May 1891, applied for a U.S. passport in Philadelphia, and spent nearly a year traveling in Europe. In 1893, Cora married Charles T. Carnahan, whom she had met in Leadville. Cora first came to Estamere in 1898 and spent parts of many summers there through 1919. Cora and Charles Carnahan had four children: Harold, Doris, Emily, and Charlotte, but divorced in 1915, at which time Cora was said to have transferred property worth about $100,000 to Charles. A year later, Cora married Thomas A. Costello, who worked as a broker in Denver and was also associated with his father in the oil business. The couple was living apart in early 1920, and Thomas soon moved to southern California. However, Thomas applied for a passport in January 1924 for himself and his wife, Cora, and indicated they were to sail from San Francisco that month on a tour of Japan, China, Singapore, India, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Great Britain, France, Italy, and Germany. In their passport application we note that Cora took 12 years off her real age! Cora Costello returned to Denver in 1925, though she continued to spend time in California. In 1934, for example, Cora spent time in Los Angeles and in 1941 was at the Hotel Del Coronado near San Diego. Cora Costello died in Denver on 17 January 1956 at the age of 87. She, along with many of her family members, is buried in the Eben Smith Mausoleum at Fairmount Cemetery in Denver.

  Emily Smith and children.

  Charles Tingley Carnahan (First Husband of Cora I. Smith)

  Charles T. Carnahan was born in Cadiz, Ohio, on 31 July 1861 and went to Leadville, Colorado, where he entered the mining business in 1881. He first worked as an assayer at the Little Chief Mine, but once he became Eben Smith’s son-in-law, his fortunes improved considerably. Charles became manager of the Resurrection Gold Mining Company. The Resurrection Mine at Leadville was owned by David H. Moffat, Eben Smith, and Charles Carnahan. Later in Denver, Charles was vice president, treasurer, and general manager of the C.T. Carnahan Manufacturing Company that manufactured Murphy drills and sold other mining machinery. Charles was at Estamere with members of his family from 1898 to 1912.

  Charles Carnahan achieved notoriety in August 1903 when he shot a contracting freight agent of the Burlington Railroad in its Denver offices. Charles had entertained the same gentleman at Estamere the year before, and perhaps believed that his guest, Hugh Swearingen, was paying too much attention to Cora. According to the press account:

  Carnahan followed his intended victim into the room, and standing…not five feet from where Swearingen was sitting, fired four shots at him in rapid succession. None of the bullets took effect and the railroad man leaped upon his assailant. Carnahan struck him over the head with the revolver, inflicting an ugly wound. He then threw him to the floor and was about to send a bullet into his brain when help
arrived. Carnahan was taken to the city jail, but was bailed out in a few minutes by Fred Moffat, cashier of the First National Bank and other friends…. The cause of the deed was Carnahan’s belief that Swearingen had insulted his wife. His friends say he [Carnahan] had been drinking heavily just prior to the shooting. Both men are well known in the best circles of society.[64]

  Carnahan pleaded guilty at his trial and was sentenced to serve one day in the county jail and fined $500. The sentence was suspended on payment of the fine and court costs. Carnahan was said to believe that the man he tried to kill had threatened to destroy his domestic happiness.

  After his divorce from Cora in 1915, Charles married Maria Brinkerhoff of Long Island, New York. Maria was born in Cadiz, Ohio, in 1894, 33 years after Charles’ birth in the same town, and Charles had known her when she was a little girl. The couple had a daughter, Mary Ann, who was born in New York in 1918. Charles and Marie later settled in Summerville, South Carolina, and they also spent time at Asheville, North Carolina, where Marie died of tuberculosis in October 1935. Charles also died there in August 1937 at the age of 76.

  Thomas A. Costello (Second Husband of Cora Smith Carnahan)

  Thomas Addison Costello was born in Buffalo, New York, on 01 May 1888. He must have spent a tumultuous childhood. His Irish grandfather, Patrick H. Costello, established a tannery business, founded the town of Costello, Pennsylvania, and died in 1890 leaving a $2 million estate. Patrick’s son, John H. Costello, married in 1881 and had seven children, although only three, John H. Jr., Thomas A., and Clarence, lived past childhood. John H. Costello inherited a large part of his father’s estate, but was taken to court by the guardian of his three young sons, who claimed that in dissolving the family partnerships, selling their assets, and using the proceeds to buy stock in the United States Leather Company, John had acted to deprive his children of a large part of their inheritance. The complicated legal proceedings dragged on for 20 years, but in the meantime, marital discord between John and his wife, Sarah, broke out and he was taken to court.