Charles Edgar Crosswhite Ranch

Charles Crosswhite was born, in 1875, in Missouri.  He was one of six sons of Alexander Doran and Lucy Crosswhite. After the death of his mother in 1894, his father traveled to Colorado, with the family, in 1896. The family settled in Douglas County close to Cherry.

Charles found work in the dairy of David Williams, the founder of Williamsville, and by 1897 was managing Mr. Williams’ creamery and cheese factory. Charles Crosswhite is credited with first bringing the Babcock testing system of butterfat in milk to the area. This enabled the creamery to test for buttermilk content in the milk so that watering the milk down would no longer be profitable to the dairy farmer.

In January of 1901 Charles and Annie Belle Williams, the daughter of his employer, David Williams, married. The Castle Rock Journal ran this article on January 25^th:

Crosswhite-Williams, two popular Douglas County young people happily unite in holy bonds of matrimony… at high noon, many of the friends of Mr. and Mrs. D.R. Williams gathered at their home at Cherry to witness the marriage of their daughter…to Mr. Charles Edgar Crosswhite. The young bride looked very beautiful in a tucked dress of white net trimmed in shirred satin ribbon and ruches of net, decorated in smilax and American Beauty roses. Mr. and Mrs. Crosswhite will begin housekeeping at once in a newly furnished house. Quite a number of nice presents will add pleasure to the new homeamong other items were the following: sewing machine, two rocking chairs, a steel range, silver knives, forks and spoons and hemstitched napkins.

They had five children while living in Colorado; William Lloyd, Hazel LeRue, Richard Percy, Lucy Elvira and David Eugene and then a daughter, Edna Mae, was born after the Crosswhite family moved for a short time to Oklahoma. In 1913 the Crosswhite’s returned to Colorado moving back to Cherry. They rented 760 acres which was Annie’s father’s ranch according to the newspaper Record Journal. In 1915 another son, Edgar W. was born and Thomas F. was born in 1919.

“Our County Candidates; Charles E. Crosswhite, the Democratic candidate for Representative, has been a resident of Douglas County for 20 years where he has been extensively engaged in ranching, stock raising and the dairy business. Everyone who knows Mr. Crosswhite will testify as to his marked integrity in all avocations in life and business. Should the people elect him as their representative in the legislature they will be assured of having their interests intelligently attended to. This well be an opportunity to elect a man to this important office whose interests are identical to your own.”

This was the article that ran in the Record Journal on November 3, 1916, but according to both the “History of Colorado” and the book “Our Heritage the People of Douglas County” he served in 1914 in the 21^st General Assembly of the Colorado Legislature from Douglas County.

In the 1920s Charles seems to be caught up in business matters. In 1920 he purchased the University Hill Dairy and Produce Company of Boulder, which had a herd of fifty dairy cattle, along with what was reported to be an up-to-date and sanitary enterprise. He was also the president of the Cherry Creek Mercantile and Transportation Company which had been organized by the Cherry Creek farmers in 1918.

Between 1922 and 1923 three more children were added to this family bringing the number of children to eleven. Twins, Eleanor L. and Ester L. were born in 1922 and in 1923 Doris was born. All of the Crosswhite children grew to adulthood.

A long and fruitful life was enjoyed by Charles and Annie. They lived for a time in Denver, after Charles sold his ranch in 1931. Early in his coming to Colorado, 1896, Charles was interested in mining and once again he became interested in this endeavor working for himself and later with Louis Higby of Greenland, serving as manager for a mine in Central City and mining on his own in New Mexico for manganese. He, also lived in California, and settled during his retirement in Central City, Colorado.  Charles died in 1959 at 84 years of age and Annie, still residing in Central City, died in 1968 at 86 years of age.

Thanks to the Colorado Historic Newspaper Collection, Ancestry.com United States Census information; the book “History of Colorado”; the book “Our Heritage the People of Douglas County”.