People

: Samuel James Hamilton; He was born in Ohio to Harvey A. Hamilton and Jane Hamilton. The 1880 US Census record lists his father as a huckster. His mother was an Irish immigrant and homemaker. Samuel Hamilton, then age 24, was working in a car shop. According to his daughter, Cordelia (Hamilton) Files, he was married and had a daughter named Edna by that marriage while still living in Ohio. He moved to Mesa County, Colorado sometime before February 18, 1893, when Colorado marriage records show that he married Martha Evelyn Newbury. Hamilton was homesteading in the area, as were Newbury’s parents. Together, Samuel and Martha lived on a homestead north of Fruita. They left the area and returned to Ohio to care for Samuel’s sister and mother. Samuel bought a home at 15 South Peach Street in 1904, after their house in Ohio burned (his wife and children were already in Fruita on a visit at the time). He worked as a house painter and wallpaper hanger and was one of the best, according to his daughter Cordelia. He was also a drinking man, she said, who spent much of the money he made on booze.

: Samuel L. Edwards; He was a farmer, originally from South Carolina, who lived in Hotchkiss, Colorado in the early Twentieth century. He married Emily (Young) Scatliff sometime after her divorce in 1914. US Census records show them living together in Hotchkiss in 1920 with her sons Frank Art Johnson and Willard Johnson. According to oral history interviewee and daughter of Emily Young, Helen (Young) Johnson, Samuel pretended to like the children, but was mostly bent on having them work for him on his farm. He made a pass at Helen and tried to rape her. From then on, she gave him no respect. He complained about this to Emily Young, who sent Helen to live with her grandparents in Denver (where she graduated from high school). He became so abusive toward Emily Young that she nearly died. She eventually divorced him.