Democratic Vistas

Hotel Owned by My Grandmother's Family

July 5, 2010 (evening)

I arrived in Sterling CO last night at about 5:30. Vicki, my cousin from Bremerton WA, and John, her husband, were already there. They were with some cousins from the area that I had not met. It was taking a little longer than I expected to arrive because I was lost for about 40 minutes in Denver. Somehow, I missed the same turn six times from four different directions. This would seem to defy the laws of physics, geometry, or basic human intelligence, but I was convinced I could get through Denver without looking at the map. Then, once I looked at the map, I had no idea where I was.

When I finally arrived in town, Vicki told me to come to the library on the town square. When I drove up, Vicki and John were waiting outside. They ushered me into the library where about 18 or so relatives, by blood or marriage, were gathered.

Russ and Cindy, two of the relatives, had recently turned over the family farm to Matt, their son, and moved into the building, which had been a library, then a bed and breakfast, and now a home. Russ and Cindy have a lot of beautiful bookcases.

In the group were also Karol and Joann, two more cousins I had never met. I am related to the other people in the room by marriage.

Before this gets too confusing, I should explain a little family history. Peter Jensen, my great-grandfather, emigrated from Denmark with his entire family in 1884. They eventually homesteaded in Deuel County, just over the border in Nebraska. Henry, my grandfather, married Musa Polley. The Polley family owned, a number of hotels in the area, including the Pioneer Hotel in Julesburg CO. The Jensens married into a number of other families in the area—Jurgensen, Peterson, Sowder, Johnson, and Jacobson. Of the entire group, my two sons and I are the only ones who carry the Jensen name.

Henry and Musa, my grandparents, moved to Vaughn WA around 1911 (a rough date), where my father was born. My father joined the Navy, served in most of the major sea battled in the Pacific during WWII, met my mother, who was working with the Red Cross, and eventually settled in Virginia Beach in 1956.

So, Vicki, my first-cousin, grew up on the west coast. I grew up on the east coast. We didn’t meet until we were both about 30 years old. Neither of us had met any of the relatives in the Colorado area until relatively recently. Vicki met some of them through the mail when she was doing a genealogy of the family. When I made a trip to the west in 1993, I met two of these cousins, Lloyd Peterson (whos has since passed away) and Cindy Sowder, who weren’t in this group. That’s probably enough. This is starting to sound like one of those “begat” sections of the Old Testament.

After we talked for a while, Russ handed me a framed document, dated December 6, 1890. The document announced the citizenship of Peter Jensen, my great-grandfather. Russ told me he wanted me to have it, so it would be passed down through the Jensen side. It was an amazingly generous act from a cousin I had met about twenty minutes earlier.

The next day, Vicki, John, and I visited the Fort Sedgwick Historical Society and the Depot Museum in Julesburg. Mary, the archivist, opened both facilities just for us, on her day off. We then drove around looking for the Polley homestead, which we think we found, the Jensen homestead, which we were near but couldn’t quite find. We also looked at the Polley hotel in Bruhl, which is abandoned (Vicki likes to have momentos of these spots, so I unscrewed a door hinge with a dime, while she blocked the view and John kept the motor running in the car), and the Pioneer Hotel in Julesburg. All along the trip, we shared what we knew about family history.

We met Russ and Cindy for dinner and spend sometime after dinner visiting Russ’s accounting office and chatting in their library/home. It’s been a great day. Tomorrow I start to drive toward Yellowstone.