CREATIVE HISTORY : A CLOSER LOOK : THE PEOPLE : MARY KINGSLEY

MARY KINGSLEY
Researching women can often be a difficult task since they did not leave many documents behind. Typically you only find women referenced through their father or husband’s names and accounts. If you have read about the Boulder flood in the Main Events, you will know that Mary was far from typical, and due to her notorious occupation as a prostitute, she made the newspapers more often than a typical frontier housewife. Despite her publicity as an infamous madam, there are still few sources available to document her life. Because little is known of Mary Kingsley, her story will be illustrated through a series of primary sources to demonstrate some methods for researching women. See How to Research: Women for more information. [probate records] [census records] [deeds/directories] [newspapers] Probate Records Sometimes you need to go to the end of someone’s life to learn about his or her beginnings. In Mary’s case her will offers some key items about her past. Currently, only abstracts of her estate files have been found, and an investigation of the actual documents still need to be made. But even abstracts can be full of good information and clues. One of the most important items found in the abstracts is her maiden name, Mary Kennelly. Her father was Edmond Kennelly of Knockloing, Ballchique Parish, County Kerry, Ireland, and she had at least two siblings, James and Annie Kennelly. At the time of Mary’s death on 14 July 1902, her brother was in Ayer Hill, Scotland, and her sister Annie lived in St. Louis, Missouri. These few facts give Mary a past, provide her a sense of place, and uncover clues for further research. Sometimes researching siblings will open new doors to the person of interest. Other items in her probate records also reflect parts of Mary’s life. Apparently litigation was underway in regards to her father’s estate, which is possibly what prompted the mention of her siblings. A detailed investigation of the records may reveal the issues surrounding her father’s estate and more information about her family. Mary also left behind two houses located between 10th and 12th Streets. They seemed to be in such poor repair that the estate’s administrator thought they would be impossible to rent to “desirable tenants.” Additional items included a gold necklace, earrings, a breast pin, some furniture, seventeen bottles of beer, and four cuspidors (spittoons). Due to her occupation as a prostitute, the beer and spittoons could have been items specifically intended for her male clientele. [Back to Top] Census Records According to Mary’s brief obituary she lived in Boulder for seventeen years, which would put her arrival around 1885. A Mary Kingsley is found in the 1885 Colorado census, working as a dressmaker and boarding with three other women in one house. She is a thirty-five-year-old widow, but lists her place of birth as Michigan with no reference to her parents. Could Michigan be the place she recently came from? But is Mary Kingsley really the same person as Marietta Kingsley that shows up in the 1900 census? It is difficult to say with certainty because there are several discrepancies between the two women. The most significant difference is age. In 1900 Marietta’s age was thirty-nine, not fifty like you would expect; she and her parents were born in Scotland; and her occupation was “fancy housekeeper,” another name for a prostitute. Both Mary and Marietta were listed as widows, and the 1900 census shows Marietta had bore two children, neither of which survived. So with all these differences, what can I take from these two records? I think it is possible these two women are the same, but additional supporting evidence certainly needs to be found. The variations in her name are of little significance since other records show her either as Mary, Etta, Mary Etta, Maryetta, or Marietta. The discrepancies in age could be explained because she might not have been the one that gave information to the census taker. The head of the household often was not at home, so other family members or neighbors provided the necessary statistics, so sometimes the information was not correct. When examining the census record, I noticed there was no date for Marietta’s year of immigration. Most likely she would have provided that information herself. Maybe a neighbor did not know that detail, so it was left blank. Finally, the differences in occupations are the most curious. The Mary in the 1885 census lived two doors down from a known prostitute, Mollie Gordon. Could a house full of women with the occupation of “dressmaker” have been a cover for prostitutes? Did she fall back on her skills as a dressmaker before making her presence known as a “lady of the night”? There is no way to know with certainty, and the names of the women she boarded with are not names of known prostitutes during that time. More investigation needs to be done. [Back to Top] Deeds and City Directories A preliminary index search of deeds revealed Mary was quite active with real estate, owning and selling several properties during her time in Boulder. The deed books also help establish a rough arrival date for Mary, with the first mention of a transaction by her on January 14, 1886. To locate her properties I used an early map of Boulder showing town blocks and lots, city directories, and the 1900 census. Deeds record the legal description of the property, making it easier to pinpoint on a map indicating property division. The city directories and census provide further evidence by putting an address to the property’s legal description. Further investigation into the actual deeds is necessary in order to better understand the terms stated in the documents. Below are the descriptions of the properties Mary Kingsley owned at one time, their locations on a map, and their corresponding addresses (if known) based on city directory listings.
In 1886 Mary bought Lot 1 on Block 44 in Boulder from Mary Arnett, which she sold eight months later back to Mary and Anthony Arnett. This property was located at the southwest corner of Front Street (Walnut) and 11th Street. See map for a detail of the block.
Mary purchased part of Block 4 in Culver’s Subdivision in 1889 from George Walker. The deed index does not clarify which lot or lots were purchased, but the location of the property was between Goss and Grove Streets and 18th and 19th Streets. About a year later Mary sold all or part of this property to Henry Johnson.
In October of 1892 Mary bought Lot 6 on Block 12 in Boulder from John W. Day and kept this lot until 1900 when she sold it to Lizzie Tipton. The property was located on the southeast corner of Water (Canyon) and 11th.
Several months later in February of 1893, Mary bought another property, Lot 2 of Block 11, one block west along Water Street. This is most likely the same property the 1892 city directory mentions as Mary’s residence on Water Street between 10th and 11th, and listed as 1036 Water Street in the 1896 the city directory. An address of 1042 was shown in the 1898 directory and 1900 census. Could this be the same property with an altered address or another house located next door? More research needs to be done to clarify the discrepancies.
In 1896 Mary bought her final property, Lot 5 of Block 12. Near the southeast corner of Water (Canyon) and 11th and next to her Lot 6 property, this is probably the place where she died. A newspaper article made note that she died on 14 July 1902 at her home at 1128 Water Street.
Because Mary owned several properties very close to one another there is some confusion when comparing the addresses from the city directories to the legal property description in the deeds. More investigation needs to take place into uncovering these street addresses. These might be found as the deeds are researched and her estate records are examined in detail. [Back to Top] Newspapers Mary might not have made the papers as often as her predecessors, but her activities, as well as those of her “girls,” kept the public aware of the problems of prostitution. The first mention of Mary in the newspapers was on May 16, 1888, when one of the women working for her died in Mary’s house of a cocaine overdose. Reportedly addicted to cocaine and morphine, Mamie Price died two weeks prior, and the Boulder County Herald noted that Miss Kingsley bought a cemetery plot for her at Columbia Cemetery. Mary appears one month later in a Boulder County Herald report of a violent scuffle that left Mary injured and two unnamed prostitutes sobering up in the jailhouse. Police arrived at Mary’s house as she defended herself with a “ten-inch carving knife” after receiving a large knot on her forehead and “scratches on her face [that made] her look like a clown in a circus.” During the May 31, 1894 flood, Mary makes a brief appearance in the papers when a police officer dramatically carried her, and her two pug dogs, on his shoulders from her crib through the floodwaters to safety. Only three months later in August of 1894, Trixie Lee, one of Mary Kingsley’s “inmates,” was shot at killed by a jealous wife. At the trial a month and a half later, Mrs. Maud Hawkes and her mother (who had urged her daughter to shoot Trixie) were acquitted of all charges. On July 16, 1902 the last mention of Mary Etta Kingsley was published. Her brief obituary merely states, “Miss Etta Kinsley, a women of the half world, died at her place at 1128 Water Street Monday evening. She was 75 years old and had been here seventeen years.” It is surprising how only a handful of newspaper articles can quickly expose the problems and hazards prostitutes faced while living such difficult and violent lives. Sometimes all it takes are a few small details to bring depth to an individual’s life. By using these articles, and others like them, a broader understanding of the history of prostitution in Boulder, Denver, Colorado, and the West, in addition to social and reform issues surrounding “fallen women,” can be brought to Mary Kingsley story. [Back to Top]