HORSE & BUGGY DAYS

The time is 1908. The place is at Rule Creek, just east of Las Animas, Colorado. The child is my father, Scott Walter Dobbins Jr., the second child of Scott and Susan Maud McConnell Dobbins. Called “Buzz,” a nickname given to him by his sister Dorothy, he was born in July of that year.

I began genealogy research in 1984 and I was fortunate that both my father and his older sister were still living. I knew they had both been born in Bent County, Colorado, but I sure didn’t know much about their early life. Because I lived fairly close to my father in 1984 he and I spent lots of time talking about his growing up. But I also wrote lots of letters to my Aunt Dorothy, who still lived in Colorado, asking so many questions that I’m sure I drove her nuts. She was four years older than my father, so I knew she held the key to many things that he just vaguely remembered.

Within a short period of time – maybe 6 months after I started “bugging” her – she informed me that all my questions made her decide to write down the story of her life. I’d get a copy, she said, as soon as she finished the first part, which was to be from her birth to her leaving home for nurse's training. I had a hard time waiting, but sooner than I expected her story showed up in the mail.

She told of my grandparents meeting in Colorado Springs at a band concert. She told how Grandma was a city girl and how difficult it was for her to learn to live on a ranch out in the dry land farming area of eastern Colorado. She told how they raised turkeys on the ranch and grew wonderful melons that my grandfather intended to show at the county fair – that is until the goat got into the garden and took a bite out of each one of them. Shortly before my dad was born, the family sold the ranch and moved to town.

In her story Aunt Dorothy told me that quite often the family would take horse and buggy rides out into the countryside near Rule Creek, where the ranch that my great-grandpa had homesteaded had been.

The photograph above is one that I came upon by accident not too long ago, tucked between some blank pages of an old family album. The handwriting belongs to my Grandma Dobbins. As best as I could, I cleaned the photo up a little bit. Not many family pictures of the Las Animas years exist and the few that do are in pretty poor shape. I’m so pleased that this one has survived.

RANCHING IN LAS ANIMAS, COLORADO

In the course of researching my family tree, occasionally I come upon old photographs that I find perfectly charming. They don't necessarily tell me anything I didn't generally know, but they may give me little details that help me understand a little better about what life was like "then" and "there." This photo above is one of those.

This picture is taken close to 1906 on the ranch outside of Las Animas, Colorado, owned by my grandparents, Scott Walter and Maud Susan McConnell Dobbins. My Aunt Dorothy, pictured with her mother, was born in 1904 and my father in 1908. Shortly before he was born, the family sold the ranch and moved into town, where the family lived until 1920 when they moved to Colorado Springs.

This ranch was a little southeast of Las Animas; Scott's father Jim had homesteaded it in 1884 and had first tried to raise cattle on it but later opted for raising horses. Except for growing a few things for their own use, it was never used in farming. A family story tells that Scott once was raising cantaloupes for the county fair -- apparently he had a knack for doing that, as he was considered to have "prize wining" melons -- but after the goats got in the melon patch and made short work of the hand-coddled melons, it pushed Scott over the edge and he gave up ranching for city life. There were a few stories left to the family about the ranch but none about raising turkeys.

Every time I look at this photo I laugh to see my grandma holding a turkey. If she had been holding her daughter, or even the dog, it wouldn't have been funny. But she appears so nonchalant about it that I wonder why she has it in her arms. Little Dorothy is dressed warmly, so perhaps the picture was taken around Thanksgiving time and the "selected" turkey had been culled out for you know what.

The dog was named Beppo, and he lived long enough for both my Aunt and my Dad to remember him from their childhood. My grandmother Maud had always lived in a city, first in Kentucky and then in Colorado Springs, and adapting to ranch life was a real challenge to her. One family story is that she tried her best not to complain, but when a large snake got in the house and curled up on a shelf in her kitchen, she marched the kids out of the house, put them in the buggy and drove to a neighboring house until Scott came home and dispatched the snake. She was brave, but not that brave.

Scott's dad and mother, Jim and Nannie Corel Dobbins, came to Las Animas from Kansas with their two sons, Robert Gaston and Scott Walter, in 1875. Jim first worked at Ft. Lyons, carrying the mail. He was friends with Luke Cahill, who was once Kit Carson's orderly. In Luke's later years, he gave Jim a rifle that had belonged to Carson. Jim passed it on down to his oldest son, "Gaston," and it eventually was donated to the Museum of the Fur Trade in Chadron, Nebraska and there authenticated as having belonged to Kit Carson. Scott and Maude were friends with the Thompson family, whose son Llewellyn had a long career as U. S. diplomat. President Eisenhower, named Thompson Ambassador to Moscow in June 1957. But before Llewellyn became a diplomat, he was my Aunt Dorothy's first boyfriend.

Las Animas is a tiny little town but it is rich in history. It is especially rich in my Dobbins family history, that's for sure!

GENEALOGY IS DEFINITELY FUN!

When I mention genealogy to my kids they roll their eyes, thinking I can't see them but I am very attuned to it (I had lots of practice watching them when they were teenagers). However, I am sure when they are old and decrepit they are going to enjoy all the wonderful "finds" I've made through the years.

One example is actually two photographs - one of the Las Animas (Colorado) Band about 1895 and another photo of it around 1910. Their great-grandfather appears in each of them -- but more than that, each picture shows what life was like in that time period.

Their great-grandfather (my grandfather) was Scott Dobbins Sr. He died when he was only 44 years old and my dad was only 8. There are no family stories handed down about him. But these pictures tell a lot.





The Dobbins family lived in a tiny dry-land farming community east of Pueblo, Colorado. The town was Las Animas, and this is the Las Animas City Band. Scott had an older brother named Gaston and he is on the right hand side of the bottom row holding a trombone. Way up on the top row, right, is Scott, who always played a cornet. The Dobbins family were always involved in music.

What I learned is that during this period in our country's history, band competitions were regularly held. These bands traveled to various locations, even as far as to an adjacent state, to complete in very elaborate and ceremonial competitions. If you are lucky enough to be able to find a newspaper story about such a competition your mouth will drop open to learn what lengths the bands went to in order to make a good showing. The above picture came to me from Gaston's son, Percy, back in 1984. He told me at the time that there was another picture in which he himself appeared but he wasn't able to find it. In 2001 I received a copy of that one from Percy's daughter, who had come upon it stored in an old scrapbook belonging to her long-deceased father

This is the same band taken about 1910 or thereabout. And yes, it is Cousin Percy posing in the front. Percy was born in 1902, so I'd guess he's about 8 years here. My grandfather Scott is on the extreme left hand side and his brother Gaston is directly behind him. My own father would have been 2 at this time, way too young to pick up a horn. (He later learned to play a banjo).

I am so pleased to have these photos. One of them reeks of the old west; the other of the early 20th century. Finding things like this and being able to explain them is what genealogy is all about. It certainly is about more than just getting dates and names.