The Stoiber brothers had developed the Silver Lake mine in Arastra Gulch and built the mill at the mouth of the gulch; later Ed took over the mine and Gus the mill. Mr. and Mrs. Ed built a home they called Waldheim which, because of its size—ball room, game rooms, etc.—and its fine construction and expensive furnishings, became known as the “Mansion”. There they entertained most lavishly, often passing out expensive party or dinner favors. (The author acquired one of them—a beautifully engraved solid silver dinner spoon.)
The madam undertook a good part of the management of the mine herself, sometimes all of it, and was capable of subduing the most obstreperous miner who ever landed there. She was the lady who, to spite her neighbors, built the tall fence around her place in Silverton.
They left Silverton about 1904 and, after Stoiber died, the madam erected a fine home in Denver, surrounding it with a fence. She had one husband before Stoiber and two others afterwards but no one knows for sure what became of them. Her last home was a villa in Italy where she died. A large fortune was left behind which is still being handed down to heirs of heirs.
Mears signed a contract with the Gold Prince mine at Animas Forks, to haul its ore to Silverton over the winter of 1906-07. Therefore, it was necessary to prepare against the vicious snow slides between Eureka and Animas Forks. He decided to build several heavily timbered snow sheds and anchor them in rock in the hillsides. The first, 500 feet long, at a bad place near the Silver Wing boarding house, not far from Eureka, was completed in October. A slide that winter smashed it and dumped it into the Animas River Canon. Mears gave up on snow sheds.
On March 24, 1906 concussion, which is the rush of air at the edges of a slide, did great damage to the Green Mountain mill in Cunningham Gulch and killed the mine foreman. It also destroyed several S. N. cars. At the same time a slide demolished the boarding house at the Shenandoah mine and killed twelve men.
Near Animas Forks two men were asleep in the same bed. One was thrown toward the center of the room and carried away while the other was thrown toward the wall and was saved. In the same season two men were killed at the Robert Bonner mine near Burro Bridge on the S. R.
These are only samples of slides that happened nearly every winter. Often bodies, frozen stiff, were recovered from slides and stood against the handiest wall.
One summer a request came to Silverton for a great quantity of columbines for some national convention that was to be held in Denver. A “Columbine Special” train was run from Silverton to Animas Forks for the purpose of procuring them. Mears donated the use of the train, railroad men donated their services and townspeople donated their time. They gathered what they estimated to be 25,000. A hardware man supplied washtubs in which the flowers were packed and shipped. They went out of Silverton on flat cars but were transferred to box cars at Alamosa. The columbines reached Denver and were displayed in front of the Denver Post building.
The Pullman was in a couple of wrecks, the first in the summer of 1908. New rail was being laid and hadn’t, in one place, been spiked. Meyer was the engineer and was pulling a train of three coaches going south when the accident happened near Silver Lake, two miles out of Silverton. The engine and one coach went over the rail all right but the next coach caught on it, turned over and took the Pullman with it. When Conductor Hudson came along getting people out he found one woman with her head and shoulders completely through a window on the under side. The car had lit on a couple of ties, which held it up, preventing her from being crushed. Only her hat was knocked off. When settlements were made the worst casualty was found to be a box of peaches for which the owner asked and received 75 cents.
Another time, about 1911, a train was going north when, near Waldheim, the Pullman, which had too long a wheelbase for curves, gave a swing and the top part left the trucks, flopping over and taking a coach with it. Booker was the engineer this time, Hudson, the conductor and Ruble, the fireman. When they arrived they found the dust so thick they could scarcely see or breathe. Ruble and Hudson walked along on the sides of the coaches pulling people out of the windows. They came to Mrs. William Terry securely fastened and soon found the trouble—her skirt was caught between a rock and the side of the coach. Ruble used his pocket knife to cut a piece out of the back. The poor fellow, easily embarrassed anyway, never heard the end of cutting off the lady’s skirt.