Charlotte “Lottie” Gardner was a famed resident of early West Las Animas and a shining example of the resilience and fortitude of pioneer women.
Charlotte’s father, Christian Hesse, left Germany to escape military service and brought his family first to Ohio and then, at the outbreak of the Civil War, moved farther west, settling near St. Joseph, Missouri. With the help of his children, he created a fine farm. Charlotte, however, longed to get away. One day she announced that she was eighteen years old and was moving to Omaha where she found work as a nurse companion. In 1868 she met and married James Gardner.
James wanted to go farther west where opportunities were greater. He made arrangements for Charlotte and their baby to stay in Omaha and began work on the Santa Fe railroad, which was building west towards the mountains. A year later, when the track was completed as far as Granada, Colorado, he sent for his family. They arrived on the first regular train to make the complete run to Granada. The trip took several days as the train stopped often to leave freight, and at times, to let huge herds of buffalo cross the track.
“Lottie” was the first white woman to reside in Granada, and while life on the prairie was hard, she was never homesick. She and James built a house and had two more children. Sadly, in 1882, James took sick and died of typhoid fever. Charlotte was left with three small children and no means of support.
Relying on her reputation as an excellent cook, the resourceful young woman sent word to the cowboys that if they would just give her two hours’ notice, she would provide a good meal for 25¢. It wasn’t long until she had enough customers to provide for her family.
But in 1886, her luck changed again. Following the railroad, the town of Granada and most of its businesses moved to a new location three miles east. Before long, Lottie’s was the only house left in Granada and it was hard for the cowboys to come there for meals as they were out on the range a great deal.
Once again, her cowboy customers came to the rescue, persuading Lottie to move to the booming town of West Las Animas. They all pitched in and hired a carpenter to take apart her house in sections and helped load the sections on a railway flat car. They also raised the money to pay the cost of moving.
Dave, Charlotte’s brother, offered to move the family. The furniture was loaded into two wagons. Since the mud in that spring of 1884 was exceptionally deep, the trip took four days. Lottie and the children walked to lighten the load.
Arriving in West Las Animas, there wasn’t time to wait until her own house was ready, so Lottie rented a house on Bent Avenue and on the third day she was serving meals again. By the time her own house was built on the corner of 4th Street and Bent Avenue, Lottie had all the boarders she could serve, so she built a boarding house adjacent to the house. From the day of its opening there was never a vacant room. Convinced by her success, local leader Judge Ewell offered her finance to open a hotel and in 1887, The Gardner House opened on the site that is now the Kathleen Tomlin Memorial Bell Park.
The hotel was modern and beautiful – a large, two-story, clapboard building. A porch extended across the front. Its roof served as a balcony for the guests in the evening. The yard was sodded and swings were installed. Two oil-lit street lights were placed in front of the hotel.
The lower floor had a large lobby, baggage room, parlor, dining room, kitchen and two choice bedrooms for special guests. To the rear was a double room for waitresses and chambermaids, as well as three family rooms. On the second floor were sixteen guest rooms. Several separate buildings were back of the hotel including a laundry house, where members of baseball teams took their baths after their games.
Each guest room was furnished with a high headboard, wooden bed, a dresser, washstand with necessary crockery, a rocker, a straight chair and was heated by a small drum stove. Lace curtains hung in the windows. Heavy white counterpanes covered the beds and guest towels were of heavy linen.
A night’s lodging was $1.00 or $5.00 for the week. Meals were 35¢ for boarders and 50¢ for others. Meals were served family style on two long tables that seated sixteen persons each with fresh linen cloths and napkins. The dishes were china instead of the usual stoneware. The silverware was of real silver, as were the water pitchers and sugar and creamers. A large, silver castor containing condiments was in the center of each table. At the end of each table were tall glass compotes for fruit. Cut glass dishes held jelly and jam. All of this glass reflected the light from a huge cut-glass chandelier with hanging prisms.
Life was quite pleasant at the hotel. Comfortable chairs, along with a lovely desk, were in the carpeted parlor as was a big Chickering piano on which popular tunes of the day were often played. Bowls of apples were placed on the huge sideboard, and in December, bunches of stemmed raisins tied with red bows were available for the guests. Each Fourth of July $100 worth of fireworks were shot from the hotel lawn.
By 1903, Lottie was again a widow, now by the name of Graham. She had paid for the hotel and its furnishings herself, educated her three children and had seen them established in business with homes of their own. She decided to sell the hotel. It became the Park Hotel and later a rooming house. In 1959, fire damaged part of the second story and finally, in 1977, it was condemned by the state. Lottie’s grand hotel was sold for salvage.
Details for this story came from the October, 1960 issue of The Colorado Magazine,
published quarterly by the State Historical Society of Colorado.