William Jackson Palmer

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William Jackson Palmer, around 1870. Source: Denver Library Digital Collections

William Jackson Palmer (born September 18, 1836 near Leipsic (Delaware) , † March 13, 1909 in Colorado Springs , Colorado) was an American engineer and general in the American Civil War on the side of the Northern Union. He is a co-founder of today's " Denver and Rio Grande Western Railroad " (1870), several towns along its railroad lines in Colorado (Fountain Colony, later Colorado Springs, 1871; Manitou, later Manitou Springs , 1872; Alamosa , 1878; Salida , 1880; and Durango , 1880/81), and Colorado College (CC; 1874). After the Civil War and the abolition of slavery in the United States, he contributed financially and through donations of building land to educational institutions for blacks. For example, he made a significant financial contribution to the Hampton University in Hampton (Virginia), which was founded in 1868 and attended primarily by blacks until the desegregation was abolished . Palmer was a recipient of the Medal of Honor , the American government's highest military honor.

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Childhood and youth

William Jackson Palmer was born on September 18, 1836 on the Kinsdale Farm near the small town of Leipsic, Delaware.

His older sister Ellen was born in 1833, and his younger brother Francis Henry was born in 1838.

His parents, John and Matilda (Jackson) Palmer, belonged to a Quaker sect, the Hicksite Friends . According to the Quakers, each person has a unique value. From this one can understand the intense efforts of the Quakers to prevent humiliation and discrimination against individuals and groups. At the same time, Quakers are pacifist.

When Palmer was five years old, his family moved to Germantown, Philadelphia , Pennsylvania in 1841 .

Early working life

As an engineer, Palmer was involved in the construction of railroad lines in Pennsylvania until the start of the American Civil War. In 1851, Palmer worked in the engineering department of the "Hempfield Railroad" railway company. In 1854 or 1855 he went to study in England, the motherland of the railroad, for six months. From 1856 he worked as a secretary and chief financial accountant for the Westmoreland Coal Company; In 1857 he became the personal secretary to John Edgar Thomson, president of the Pennsylvania Railroad .

Military service in the Civil War

William Jackson Palmer, during the American Civil War, 1861. Broadbent & Company, Philadelphia. Source: Starsmore Center for Local History, Colorado Springs, Colorado.

Although he was skeptical to negative about the use of force due to his Quaker background, Palmer volunteered as a staunch abolitionist (opponent of slavery) to the Northern States Army when the American Civil War broke out in 1861. During the Civil War he was first colonel of the cavalry in the "15th Pennsylvania Cavalry" and later received the titular rank of brigade general. On June 21, 1865, Palmer was discharged from the Northern Army.

Later professional life

When he was involved in route planning for the Kansas Pacific Railway in 1867 , he met the English doctor Dr. William Abraham Bell, with whom he became friends and became the partner of most of his business activities. Palmer became President and Bell Vice-President of the Denver and Rio Grande Railway (the later "Denver and Rio Grande Western Railroad"), a narrow-gauge railway line founded by them in 1870 . Palmer and Bell worked towards the fact that from the 1870s onwards coal was increasingly used instead of wood to fire steam locomotives.

Palmer and Bell founded the Fountain Colony, later Colorado Springs, on July 31, 1871. The two were also involved in founding Manitou, later Manitou Springs, in 1872. Palmer invested significant sums in building roads and public parks in Manitou Springs, Old Colorado City (then a separate parish, now a borough of Colorado Springs), and Colorado Springs. He also funded Colorado College in Colorado Springs and founded the local newspaper there, the Colorado Springs Gazette. Palmer made financial contributions to a school for the deaf and mute, a tuberculosis sanatorium, and several public libraries. He settled himself in Colorado Springs. His wife, Mary Lincoln ("Queen") Mellen Palmer, taught at the First Colorado Springs School.

In the spring of 1880 Parmer became president of Mexico's Mexican National Railway . In the same year took part in the draft of the settlement plan of the village Bessemer, founded in 1886, which has been a district of Pueblo (Colorado) since 1894 . There he built the “Minnequa plans”, a steelworks for the “Colorado Coal and Iron Company” (CC&I), one of the largest iron and steel works in the country.

Palmer was president of the Denver and Rio Grande Western Railway from 1881 to 1901. Under his leadership, the narrow-gauge railway line from Grand Junction (Colorado) , the headquarters of the Rio Grande Western Railway, to Ogden and Salt Lake City in Utah expanded.

In 1883 he was the builder of the "Antlers Hotel" in Colorado Springs. When it burned down in 1898, he had it rebuilt in neo-renaissance style (the building from 1898 was replaced by the current building in the late 1940s).

Antlers Hotel in Colorado Springs. Photochrom postcard, probably from 1901, published by the Detroit Photographic Company, probably photographed by William Henry Jackson. Original caption: “53142. The Antlers, Colorado Springs. Copyright 1901 [?] By Detroit Photographic Co. "

In 1898 Palmer founded and operated the "Palace Hotel" in Durango, Colorado, which is still in operation there today, but now under the name "The General Palmer Hotel".

marriage and family

Mary Lincoln (Queen) Mellen Palmer, William Jackson Palmer's wife

William Jackson Palmer was married to Mary Palmer, nee Mellen, called "Queen". The wedding had taken place on November 7, 1870 in Flushing , New York. William and Mary had met in April 1869. The couple had three daughters: Elsie, Dorothy and Marjory.

Mary Lincoln Palmer, b. Mellen, died in England on December 27, 1894, at the age of only 44.

Old age and death

In the fall of 1906, Palmer fell from his horse and suffered spinal injuries, as a result of which he was partially paralyzed and dependent on a wheelchair.

He died at the age of 72 on March 13, 1909 and was buried in Evergreen Cemetery in Colorado Springs.

Honors

  • Palmer was a recipient of the Medal of Honor , the American government's highest military honor.
  • The watershed between the Platte River and the Arkansas River north of Colorado Springs is named in his honor as the "Palmer Divide".
  • The Palmer Lake community in Colorado and Palmer Park in Colorado Springs bear his name.
  • The Palmer Hall on the Hampton University campus was named in his honor.

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Find-A-Grave, "William Jackson Palmer," https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/6111

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personal data
SURNAME Palmer, William Jackson
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American engineer and general in the American Civil War on the side of the Northern Union
DATE OF BIRTH September 18, 1836
PLACE OF BIRTH near Leipsic (Delaware)
DATE OF DEATH March 13, 1909
Place of death Colorado Springs , Colorado