Finding Aids

 

Using these Materials

Please contact the Center of Southwest Studies Archives Manager at archives@fortlewis.edu for more information about reproductions and accessing the collection.

 

Access Restrictions: There are no access restrictions on the use of this collection. The collection is non-circulating but open to the public for use in the Delaney Southwest Research Library at the Center of Southwest Studies.

 

Reproduction and Copyright: Materials held by the Center may be protected under U.S. and international copyright laws. Reproduction does not constitute a transfer of copyright or publication rights. Researchers are solely responsible for complying with copyright law and for obtaining any necessary permissions for reproduction or publication. The Center assumes no liability for unauthorized use of materials.

 

Related Materials: See also Collection M 046: Helene Searcy Puls papers, retained by Helene Searcy Puls, a Colorado poet who primarily lived in and wrote about the Durango–Silverton area.

 

Preferred Citation: [Identification of item], [Collection Title], [Collection Number], Center of Southwest Studies, Fort Lewis College, Durango, Colorado.

 

Collection Description

Historical/Biographical Note: Walter M. Boston (1878-1948), lived in Durango from ca. 1880 to 1902. His sister was Helen M. Boston, who married William N. Searcy in 1879. Judge Searcy served in the 6th Judicial District Court of Colorado from 1913 to 1932. Their children were Ruth I. (who married A. D. Ironside, father of Roderick Ironside) and Helene W. (who married Louis Puls)

 

Arrangement: The materials within this collection are organized in a single series, arranged chronologically by date of the materials' creation.

 

Acquisition Information: The Center of Southwest Studies acquired the components of this collection via donation over the years.  The certificates, diplomas, records of Walter Boston's academic achievement, a photo album and numerous card photographs of Walter Boston et al., and other materials pertaining to the Searcy family (Accession x2002:03014), were probably donated by Mr. Boston's widow Elsie M. Knight Boston in California, prior to the 1990s. Roderick A. Ironside added to the collection with donations of various items since April of 1995.

 

Processing Information: Arranged and described by Todd Ellison, Archivist

 

Detailed Description of the Collection

Container Description

Box 1:

Folder 1   Walter M. Boston, et al., card photographs and photoprints, ca. 1882-1935 (9 items). 

Folder 2   Walter M. Boston diplomas, 1900-1926 (3 items).

Folder 3   Walter M. Boston school records, 1901-1932 (ca. 20 items). 

Folder 4   Searcy/Boston families photo album, ca. 1902-1903 (1 volume). 

Folder 5   Silverton Railway Company/ Silverton Northern Railroad Company cardboard railway pass #321 for Mrs. W. N. Searcy for the year 1910, "signed" (actually, ink-stamped/printed) by Otto Mears. 

Folder 6   W. N. Searcy District Judge campaign materials: two copies on buff cardstock of a biographically descriptive election campaign broadside that the donor indicates is dated from fall 1930; a copy on yellow cardstock of the Oct. 12, 1912 Silverton Standard editorial for the 1912 primary election; one copy on tan cardstock of the Sept. 16, 1930 official state notice of his nomination for that position.

Folder 7   William. N. Searcy diary number 3, as a newly elected judge of the 6th Judicial District in Colorado, being his private journal of his first few weeks on the job in 1913, with color photocopy of the ledger cover, photocopy of pages 1-2, a 6-page transcription typescript by R. A. Ironside, Sept. 1997, including the latter's notes and historical perspective (this last item is not to be copied, and the donor has requested that no copies of any portion of it be taken from the Center of Southwest Studies).

Folder 8   The Fourth Department of State Government: an address delivered before the Colorado State Bar Assn. July 10, 1914, by W. N. Searcy of Durango, pamphlet, 22 pages, paperbound by The W. F. Robinson CO., Denver.

Folder 9   Silverton High School commencement program, June 2, 1916.  [Possibly of Helene Searcy?]

Folder 10   Deric in Mesa Verde: original of letter from Mr. Nusbaum (Mesa Verde National Park Superintendent) to Mrs. Ruth Searcy Ironside dated July 10, 1926, and newspaper clipping of Ruth Searcy's review of that book published in the Durango Herald of July 2, 1926.  (See also, in the Delaney Library, call number F782.N52 N9, the hardcover book by Deric Nusbaum, 1926, 166 pages plus illustrations -- front flyleaf is inscribed by the author to Ruth Searcy Ironside on May 1926 with the message "Hoping you like the Park.")

Folder 11   Walter M. Boston (San Dimas, Calif.) stationery envelope (with the clipping it contained, which was used to date the envelope), ca. 1926 (2 items).

Folder 12   The Big Fire: A Schoolgirl's Impression: photocopies of a two-page manuscript as recalled and written down by Helen M. Searcy, July 1, 1939, reporting her account of the great Durango fire of 1889, fifty years before, and one-page transcript by her grandson Roderick A. Ironside.

Folder 13   Helene Searcy Puls, reminiscence by her husband Louis George Puls, 1973 (photocopy only), 1 page. 

Folder 14   Jacob Adam Boston: biographical sketch and career chronology of the photographer in Durango and Silverton for many years from 1883-1900, typescript copyright 1995 revised 1997 and 1999 by Roderick A. Ironside, 2 pages.