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Front-porch gathering at the Corcoran home, 711 Denver Avenue, Fort Lupton, CO, year unknown. (Photo courtesy of the Fort Lupton Museum.)

This group of people have gathered at the front of John and Katie Corcoran’s home at 711 Denver Avenue, which still stands (see Google maps at https://www.google.com/maps ).   It’s the second house south of 7th & Denver on the west side of the street and was built by John Corcoran around 1903.   Corcoran, a carpenter, also built the corner house just south of theirs at 701 Denver Avenue, which is also still standing.

John, born in 1861, and Katie, born in 1863, were both from Pennsylvania.  They married in Philadelphia in 1883 and arrived in Lupton in February of 1885. John was Fort Lupton’s lamplighter when the city still used gas streetlights, and he possessed expertise in plumbing, so his house may have been the first, or one of the first, houses in Fort Lupton to have modern plumbing. 

John and Katie had five daughters, one of whom died in infancy.  The other daughters, from oldest to youngest, were Bessie, Florence, Hattie and Ethel.  The photo portrays a gathering of Corcoran family members and others, the latter of whom were probably tenants.    

The identified family members in the photo are as follows:  John Corcoran is the man with a moustache wearing a vest and standing in front, and Katie is the woman standing on the porch in front of the screen door to the right of the white pillar.     The woman sitting to the far left on the porch wall is Bessie or Ethel, and the tall woman standing behind her and to her left is Florence.  Hattie is the woman in the dark dress sitting in front of the left pillar.   The man standing to the right of Hattie with the bowler hat may be Hattie’s first husband, Jack Stahl. 

Kathryn Stahl, born to Hattie and Jack Stahl at the Hotel Jerome in Aspen, was a very talented pianist.    In the silent movie era, Kathryn would play the piano to accompany the films being shown at Fort Lupton’s Star Theater, which was one of a string of theaters owned by brothers Harold and Don Stewart, who were originally from Wyoming.  It is believed that the Star Theater is where Katherine and Harold first met.  They would later marry and run a film distribution company in Denver for years.    

Bessie married William J. Winbourn in 1905.   In the 1910 Census, they are listed as living next door to the Corcoran’s, most likely at the 701 Denver Avenue address, along with their son, Cornelius J. Winbourn, who was born in October of the previous year.  In October of 1914, Bessie gave birth to a second son, Thomas Hugh Winbourn. 

After the girls had grown, Katie operated a boarding house in their home.  It’s clear from looking at the 1910 and 1920 U.S. Censuses that, in addition to boarders, Katie and John kept their house open to family, and it could find itself fully-packed.  In 1910, it was home to 13 people:  Mr. and Mrs. Corcoran;  daughter Ethel, 17; daughter Hattie, 20, her husband, Jack Stahl, and their 2-year-old daughter, Katherine; daughter Florence, 21, and her husband, Albert Padfield; and boarders John Petty, Ray Padfield, Albert Lawrence, Logan Scott and William Loughran.    In 1920, the place was home to 11 folks:  Mr. and Mrs. Corcoran; daughter Hattie Stahl and her daughter, Katherine; and boarders Clyde and Opal Gilmore, James Patterson, Earl and Mae Cummings; Maxwell Martin and James Tweed. 

Katie Corcoran died in 1925 at approximately age 60 and is buried at Hillside Cemetery.  After her mother’s death, Bessie continued to take in boarders at the Corcoran house.

In the late 1920’s, Bessie [now Bessie Shallenberger — she and William Winbourn divorced in August of 1923 and she later married Charles Shallenberger), who was a nurse and midwife, began operating a maternity home, also referred to as a birthing house, at the Corcoran place.  Expectant mothers and their doctors would gather at the Corcoran house for impending births.  After delivery, Bessie continued to look after the mother and baby, even doing cooking and cleaning for them until they were well enough to leave. 

Birthing houses were an important resource at a time when hospitals were much fewer in number.  A second birthing house in Fort Lupton, which probably opened in the late 1930’s, was the one operated by Roberta Fetters, a nurse, at the Fetters’ home at 1061 McKinley Avenue (the house is still there).  These houses would have served not only Fort Lupton but surrounding towns as well, such as Wiggins, Roggen, Keenesburg, Hudson and Platteville. 

Bessie also took care of the sick.  For example, two articles in the Greeley Tribune, dated 1929 and 1931, respectively, report the recovery of two typhoid fever victims, Mrs. W.H. Mayfield and Mrs. Darlene Graves Patridge, under Bessie’s care.  

John Corcoran died in 1933 at age 71, having been cared for in his final days by Bessie.    He is buried at Hillside Cemetery.

Bessie closed the birthing house in 1943 after she married George Funk.  Bessie died in 1963 and is buried at Hillside Cemetery, as are her two sons, Cornelius and Hugh, and their father, William Winbourn.    

REFERENCES:

  • Colorado County Marriage Records and State Index, 1862-2006 (Ancestry.com)
  • Colorado Divorce Index, 1851 to 1985 (Ancestry.com)
  • Corcoran family information provided by Linda Vanderpoel
  • Greeley Tribune newspaper, various issues
  • U.S. Social Security Applications and Claims Index, 1936-2007 (Ancestry.com)

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