A Victorian Mansion in the Colorado Rockies: The Estemere Estate at Palmer Lake: An Architectural and Social History of a Unique 19th Century Mansion - Softcover

Daniel W. Edwards grew up in Denver and received a PhD from the University of Chicago. He served as a Peace Corps volunteer in Nepal. Dan worked in Washington, D.C., for MCI Telecommunications, the Center for Strategic and International Studies, and the US Department of Commerce until his retirement in 2009. Dan came to Palmer Lake in 1947 and continues to spend his summers at “Red Crag” cottage in Glen Park (a part of Palmer Lake). The cottage was built by his grandfather, J. Stanley Edwards, in 1901. Stanley was an officer of the Glen Park Improvement Company for many years. Dan’s grandmother, Mabel W. Edwards, first visited Palmer Lake in 1891, taught elocution at the 1901 Rocky Mountain Chautauqua in Glen Park, and gave performances at the Chautauquas of 1899, 1903, and 1905. Dan’s father, Walker S. Edwards, began coming to Palmer Lake in 1911, and his mother, Martha, in 1928, when she stayed at C.H.L. Pillsbury’s house across the street from the building where Pillsbury had established the first grocery store in the town in 1886. Dan has done extensive research on the history of Palmer Lake that has resulted in a book, Dr. William Finley Thompson: Dental Surgeon and Founder of Palmer Lake (2008), and three “occasional papers” published by the Palmer Lake Historical Society: “Hotels, Tents, and Rustic and Tent Cottages in Glen Park,” (2009); “A Painter, an Investor, and a Journalist at Early-Day Palmer Lake” (2010); and “The Glen Park Companies and Their Chautauquas” (2011). Copies of these publications are available at the Lucretia Vaile Museum in Palmer Lake. Roger and Kimberley Ward purchased Estemere in January 1998 and spent twelve years living in and restoring the “Grand Old Lady” Estemere to her present glory. Roger graduated from McMurry University in Abilene, Texas, in 1967 with his BA degree in Physics. He received his MS degree in Physics from Purdue University in 1969. He began his career in quartz crystal physics at Hewlett-Packard Laboratories in Palo Alto, CA. After working for several quartz crystal companies, in 1983 Roger joined a small group in Salt Lake City, UT, working on quartz crystal sensors. They formed Quartzdyne, Inc. in 1990. Quartzdyne soon became the world-premier manufacturer of quartz crystal pressure sensors for down-hole oil and gas applications. Roger was president of Quartzdyne from its inception. In January 1998 Dover Corp. purchased Quartzdyne, and Roger retired to Estemere in July 1999.