The Adams family reunion July 1940, courtesy of Mary Jane Adams.
Mary Jane Adams identified the attendees as follows:
Front row L to R: The blonde children are Barton and Evelyn Marshall. Sitting on the stairs are Mary Jane Adams’ father and grandfather, Carroll O. Adams and Oliver M. Adams.
Second row: L. to R: Donald Marshall; his wife, Helen Marshall; her son from a previous marriage, Jack Marshall; Helen’s mother and Oliver’s twin sister, Olive Adams Marshall; Rowena Adams, Carroll’s sister; and Carroll’s wife Velma Adams; The 2-year-old sitting on the lap of my grandmother, Blanche Adams, is Mary Jane Adams; Donna Adams, Carroll’s sister, is sitting next to her; Carol Jean Adams, Mary Jane’s then 5-yr-old sister.
Two weeks later, after most of the family members had returned home, another family reunion took place at Estemere—this time, the Olin Lee family of Colorado Springs.
Mary Jane and Carol Adams at Estemere July 1941.
From 1940 to 1943, the number of public events and group visits to Estemere appeared to decline, or at least were not mentioned in the newspaper columns giving news of Palmer Lake. Rodney and Ellen Palmer did spend a few weeks at Estemere in 1941 as did Oliver and Blanche Adams, but the Adams couple had left Estemere by mid-July in 1942. Frank Adams has written:
The property [Estemere] was sold when it no longer served its main purpose—a vacation retreat for three families. By this time [1944] all the children were married (I believe) and scattered…and there was no one to take care of the property during the long winter months. Vandalism was always a concern. Before the sale, each family chose one favorite memento to retain. The only item I positively remember was the oil painting that hung in the living room (or billiard room) that had a bullet hole[119] and was chosen by Uncle Clarence. It hung in his YMCA office thereafter, and the rumor this painting was [sold] to reduce the mortgage is not true.[120]
Pine Crest Campers and Officials at Estemere (1938-1948)
After the Methodist Church bought Pine Crest in 1926, the facility hosted Methodist church youth camps, retreats, and conferences during the summer and also leased Pine Crest to other denominations for their youth camps at Palmer Lake. For more than 20 years, the Epworth League Institute held a summer camp for Methodist youth during one week in July or August. The camps attracted up to 650 students annually and staff from Methodist churches throughout the state of Colorado. The available cabins at Pine Crest did not provide sufficient space to house all camp attendees, and we know that during some of those years, staff members and students found living quarters at Estemere.
Clarence Vessey was an owner of Estemere during some of those years, and he and his cousin, Bernard Vessey, were members of the First Methodist Church in Colorado Springs. In addition, Bernard Vessey often sang at the Pine Crest camps. Bernard Joy, a recreational director from Denver, was on the Pine Crest staff in 1938 and paid Estemere’s water bill that year, indicating that Pine Crest faculty or campers stayed at the mansion that summer. The next year the “Estemere boys” hosted a wiener roast on the grounds. The boys at Estemere, known as the “mid-nighters” [it sounds like no curfew was enforced at Estemere!] challenged the Pine Crest faculty (the “swifties”) to a baseball game in 1941. The faculty won 15-14.
Girls attending the Pine Crest Institute stayed at Estemere in August 1942. The daily newsletter observed:
Can it be true that the Estemere girls ate ten loaves of bread, eight packages of cheese, three jars of pickles, two heads of lettuce, plus punch and marsh mellows last night?[121]
In fact, Estemere also accommodated girls registered at Pine Crest that August:
Mrs. Eitlegeorge, Dean of girls at Pioneer Hall, Estemere, when interviewed stated that they had been ‘all good chiluns’ thus far, but she’s keeping a hair brush handy…. There are now one hundred and eleven girls situated there.[122]
The daily newsletter also reported that:
The Estemere girls’ Dorm “Pioneer Hall” has a new name. It was officially christened “Bedlam Bungalow” this morning by Mrs. Eitlegeorge, Dean of Girls. Afterwards she went around pulling covers off the girls who had been noisy the night before. We are pretty sure they didn’t appreciate it very much. The morning air is so comforting and cold!
After the War, Pine Crest erected new buildings, so its campers no longer had to look for places to stay in Glen Park cottages or at Estemere. However, for three summers from 1946 to 1948, the Board of Trustees of the Pine Crest Association held their August meeting at Estemere Lodge. Attending were men who had played an important part in developing Pine Crest, participating in its camps, and overseeing its financial affairs for many years. The trustees of Pine Crest (most of whom were Methodist ministers) who met at Estemere included Dr. Rufus C. Baker, Rev. Kenneth H. Sausaman, Rev. William R. Burnett, Rev. Ben H. Christner, Rev. Franklin A. McDaniel, Rev. Leon H Sweetland, Rev. Roy H. McVicker, Rev. R.O. Gilpin, and Louis A. Haruf.
Japanese-American Campers at Pine Crest and Estemere
The 1943 Methodist youth camp at Pine Crest was notable for the presence of 12 Japanese-Americans, who, with their families, had been interned since September 1942 at a “relocation center” set up by the U.S. Government at Granada, Colorado, near Lamar. The center was called “Camp Amache.” One hundred and ten thousand people of Japanese descent had been removed from their homes and businesses on the West Coast after the bombing of Pearl Harbor pursuant to an order issued by President Franklin Roosevelt, and more than 7,000 Japanese from California ended up in Colorado at Camp Amache.
We do not know which of the Japanese-American youth attending Pine Crest may have been at Estemere, but many girl campers stayed at Estemere’s Pioneer Hall. Plans were made to put the faculty and some of the boys in the mansion and cottage, for the Board of Trustees of the Pine Crest Commission had met in the spring of 1943 and heard a report about housing facilities for the upcoming summer’s Institute:
We had fifty cots, forty-five mattresses, and [learned] that Estemere had been engaged, which would provide facilities for thirty-five boys and the faculty.[123]
Three of the boys from Amache attending the Pine Crest camp, George Hinoki, Joe Kamiya, and Akira Sameshima, now men in their eighties living in California and Hawaii (see bio sketches), cannot recall whether they stayed at Estemere or in one of the Pine Crest cabins. But it is quite certain that they at least visited friends at Estemere or were on the grounds for an event connected with the camp during the first week of August 1943.
Joe Kamiya, who was president of his high school class, wrote an article in the Pine Crest newsletter on “Life at Amache”:
Estemere will qualify this statement: Amache has sent some really swell guys, well, and gals too, to Pine Crest. These former Californians, who are easily identified by their jet black hair and dark brown eyes, hail from the much publicized Granada [Relocation] Center, near Lamar….
Some [internees at Camp Amache] work in the center, doing such chores as washing dishes for a group of about 250, which comprises a section of the center known as a block, at $16 a month. Many others, after obtaining clearance from the War Relocation Authority and the FBI, left the center on short term and indefinite leaves to work on mid-west and eastern farms and towns. While a few were able to find colleges to attend, all the younger people had the chance to go to the elementary and high schools within the center.
The evacuees, 70% of whom are American citizens, are becoming increasingly interested in resettling in normal communities…. An undying faith in our country was displayed by the Japanese Americans at the time volunteers for a special army combat team were [sought and] thousands signed up.
The delegates from Amache say they are receiving a real thrill here at Pine Crest, and all of them feel that their experiences here have given them myriads of new friends and will provide many pleasant memories…when they return to Amache.[124]
Estemere Lodge under Margaret and William C. Blietz
(1944-1949)
William Charles (W.
C.) Blietz was born in Elgin, Illinois, on 08 October 1883, where he worked as a bricklayer and mason. William married his second wife, Margaret MacIver, in Illinois, and arrived in Colorado in the mid-1930s and lived for a short time in Greeley, Arvada, and Parker. In early 1944, William and family came to Colorado Springs, and on 20 June 1944, William and Margaret bought Estemere from the Adams, Palmer, and Vessey families.[125] William and Margaret had three sons and two daughters (David, Donald, Gail, Norman, and Carol), all of whom spent time at Estemere.
Blietz continued the Estemere Lodge as a year-round facility, but he also had a place on the highway passing through Palmer Lake that he ran as a motel.[126] It was quite small, with only three and an office, but when the motel filled up, as it sometimes did in the winter when snowstorms blew in and travelers decided it was safer to stop for the day, late arrivals were taken to stay at Estemere. Margaret would serve them breakfast in the morning. On many late, snowy nights the Blietz children would be displaced from their own bedrooms by these stranded travelers. In the morning Margaret would go room-to-room calling their names to ensure they weren’t late for school.[127] In 1947, W.C., needing even more motel rooms in town, removed half of the Carriage House and used the lumber to build a room structure adjacent to his existing “motel.”
Methodist church groups from Denver also came to Estemere to spend a night or a weekend. The sons remember that up to 300 people would meet in the Carriage House for political rallies, requiring William to set up 100 extra cots to accommodate the crowd. In 1949, a new section of U.S. 85, called the Monument-Larkspur bypass, was under construction. This new section of highway was better engineered and would reduce the distance between Colorado Springs and Denver. However, its effect would be to reroute most of the automobile traffic between the two cities away from Palmer Lake. This would dramatically reduce business in the commercial establishments of the town, and William Blietz was smart enough to realize what the impact of the new bypass would be on his motel and lodge business. He signed the deed of sale for Estemere to Helen T. Dees on 02 December 1949.[128] Less than two weeks later, the new stretch of highway was opened, and with that inter-city traffic passing through Palmer Lake was reduced to a trickle.
William never stayed in one place for very long—Estemere was one of the longest. After Estemere, the Blietzs moved to Florence, Colorado, where William operated the swimming pool. But the Blietz children recounted[129] that Estemere was by far their favorite—even better than the swimming pool in Florence. At Estemere there was always something to do, and hide-and-seek was a great favorite.
W.C.’s stationery. Note the use of the photo from Vessey’s Rocky Mountain Association flyer. It is also the same as a previous Sanborn postcard.
W.C.’s “motel,” built in 1948 with lumber from Estemere’s Carriage House, is now a four-plex apartment
(next to the former B&E Restaurant in Palmer Lake).
Gail and W.C. Blietz 1945. [130]
Don, Norm, and Gail Blietz ca. 1945. Right—David. Note the Shed (summer cookhouse) behind the kitchen.
The Shed, seen on the far left side of the right-hand photo, above, served multiple purposes over its many years at Estemere. It was originally the summer cookhouse, smokehouse, and icehouse. In later years, with the advent of electricity and refrigeration, it was no longer needed for these activities and it became a lowly storage and tool shed. The small add-on directly behind David was the Kitchen.
David, Don, and Norm each had their favorite pet chicken. They would take them into the tower and toss them out of the windows to see which could fly the farthest![131]
Norman E. Blietz and Carol R. Blietz Weedman on trike in 1949.
Personalities of Estemere (1935-1949)
Rev. Oliver Martin Adams
Adams was born 13 May 1887 in Hodgeman County, Kansas. He graduated from Campbell College in Kansas in 1908 and from Kansas Wesleyan College in Salina, Kansas, in 1916. Adams had wanderlust for most of his life. He was a teacher in Kansas, sold insurance in Nebraska, worked for the YMCA in Kentucky and Omaha (traveling each state as part of his job), and was ordained a Congregational minister in June 1921. He was a pastor in that church for 36 years, serving churches in Lincoln; Omaha; Onawa, Iowa (1931-1940); Enterprise, Oregon (1940-43); Ogden, Utah; Crete, Nebraska; and in Washington state (1952-55). He and his wife, Blanche, traveled to the Holy Land in 1938 and visited 12 Mediterranean countries. Rev. Adams, who was a co-owner of Estemere from 1935 to 1944, brought guests to stay there under the auspices of “Adams Tours.” Of his children, Rowena, Oliver, Frank, and Donna spent the most time at Palmer Lake. Rev. Oliver Adams died 08 December 1970 in Crete, Nebraska.
Margaret and William C. Blietz
William Charles Blietz was born in Elgin, Illinois, on 08 October 1883. He married about 1907 and had five children by his first wife, Mabel Wedell. He was a bricklayer and mason by trade and for some years worked for the Illinois State Highway Department in Elgin. William married his second wife, Margaret MacIver, in Illinois, and they moved to Tucson, Arizona, in the mid-1930s, and then lived in Greeley, Arvada, and Parker, Colorado. The Blietz had three sons and two daughters, all of whom lived in Estemere. In early 1944, William and family came to Colorado Springs. Soon thereafter, William and Margaret bought Estemere from the Adams and Vessey families.
From 1947 to 1949, Blietz served on the Palmer Lake Town Council, and he was the building chairman of the Little Log Church in Palmer Lake. He oversaw construction of the Church basement in 1948. He was also one of the trustees of the Little Log Church when it was incorporated in 1949. After leaving Palmer Lake, the Blietz family moved to Florence, Colorado, where they ran the American Nauheim Baths, a place with hot mineral baths and a swimming pool. Helen Dees had owned this spa and deeded it to Blietz, apparently in at least partial payment for Estemere. The content of the mineral water at Florence was identical to that found in springs in Nauheim, Germany, hence the name of the spa at Florence. Later, William and his family moved to Greeley, Colorado, where he ran a grocery store and also worked on several construction projects. William died in Greeley, Colorado, on 31 January 1961 at the age of 77. Margaret Blietz died on 23 January 1989.
Rodney David Palmer
Rodney Palmer was born in Washington, Iowa, on 17 August 1895 and moved to Kansas in childhood. He married Ellen Vessey (1897-1978) and they had one son, Gail Rodney Palmer (1916-2000). By 1920, Rodney was working as the physical director of the YMCA at Salina, Kansas. Later he held the same position at the “Y” in Oklahoma City. Rodney and Ellen spent short periods of time at Estemere between 1935 and 1943, but Gail was seldom there. Palmer, a co-owner of Estemere, liked to fish in the streams and reservoirs near Palmer Lake. After Palmer retired, he moved to Little Rock, Arkansas, where he died in December 1976.
Clarence Irving Vessey
C.I. Vessey was born in Clayton, Kansas, 13 April 1889. He graduated from Campbell College in Holton, Kansas, and began working for the YMCA in 1907 as a bookkeeper in Wichita. Vessey was general secretary of the YMCA in Salina, Kansas, in 1917, and later with the “Y” in Dubuque, Iowa, and Hastings and Lincoln, Nebraska. C.I. came to Colorado Springs in 1929, where he was general secretary of the “Y” until 1949. Vessey was a member of the First Methodist Church in Colorado Springs, was associated with the city’s Council of Churches, and was secretary-treasurer of the El Paso County Ministerial Alliance. He was a cousin of Bernard Vessey, also of Colorado Springs. Bernard was an accomplished singer, performed through the years at the Little Log Church, and directed musical selections at Palmer Lake’s Yule Log Ceremony. Clarence Vessey was a co-owner of Estemere from 1934 to 1944 and spent weekends there with his parents, his wife, Ethel, and three daughters. Vessey retired from the YMCA in 1949 to many accolades and died in Colorado Springs on 09 June 1962.
Lucartha “Lucy” and Frank S. Vessey
Frank S. Vessey was born in Wisconsin in September 1862 and was a farmer most of his life. His wife, Lucy, born in 1869, was a n
ative of Kansas. They had two daughters, Blanche and Ellen, and a son, Clarence. The Vesseys had lost their farm in Kansas, and after their son and sons-in-law purchased Estemere, they moved to Palmer Lake. The Vesseys spent most of four winters from 1935-36 to 1938-39 at Estemere, probably the first time anyone had lived at Estemere during the winter since 1889-1890 when Dr. Finley Thompson and his family had occupied the house. Frank Vessey died in Colorado Springs in May 1939.
Religious and Educational Leaders at Estemere in 1935
Many of those who stayed at Estemere Lodge from 1935 to 1949 were ordinary travelers on the highway between Denver and Colorado Springs or tourists on summer vacations. However, there were some special events held at Pine Crest, a Methodist camp at Palmer Lake, during that period which brought nationally prominent figures in religion and education to the town, and some of them checked in at the Estemere Lodge. We have records of five such men who stayed at Estemere during the summer of 1935, and they are representative of the accomplished and distinguished professionals who came to the mansion in its earlier years.
Bishop Hiram A. Boaz
An 1880s Victorian Mansion in the Colorado Rockies: The Estemere Estate at Palmer Lake Page 16