Article Contributed on: 10/31/2009 1:09:52 PM
Throughout our 150 years of Golden ghosts, two of the most interesting and noted have been those of a sister and brother in a prominent family,
Grace and
Kingston Broad. They have resided for over a century now at the historic Broad family home, a designated historic landmark at 1422 Washington Avenue. The story of them is told in great detail in the
Transcript issue of October 30, 1979, and here is their story with more worth adding:
The Broad family were pioneers of Jefferson County, when
Richard Broad and his wife
Mary and children came from Superior Mine, Michigan. After living in Central City for a year they took up a farm on Ralston Creek, which they worked until 1885, at which point his now grown son
Richard Jr. moved to Golden, becoming an employee of the State Industrial School for Boys and then becoming partner of the dry goods firm of Hammond & Broad (located where Clear Creek Books is now at 1200 Washington) in 1887. In time Broad would own that building and have his clothing store there. He became a prominent Republican politician, serving on the Golden City Council along with 3 terms as Mayor from 1903-05 and 1913-17, Jefferson County Commissioner from 1893-99, and being a trusted friend of Senator
Simon Guggenheim.
Broad purchased the family home, which had been built in 1879, and expanded and modified it into a beautiful place for his wife and four children. However, tragedy shadowed the Broad family throughout their time in this region. Broad's brother
Robert was kicked in the head by a horse as a child, a skull impact only partially operated on which caused him great pain, which was cured by replacing it was a gold plate as an adult, but whose continuing seizures ultimately led him to suicide for fear of going mad and becoming a burden to his wife and family. Two of Richard's overall six children,
Arthur and
Lucian, died as infants, and two others, Grace and Kingston, also died too soon in life.
Grace S. Broad was born in 1884 on Ralston Creek and lived in Golden nearly all her life, nearly all of which was spent in this house. At age 3 she was diagnosed with epilepsy, and was considered incurable. From that time forward her family and particularly mother
Sarah gave her great care and attention. Grace was known to like sitting by a breezy open window in her wheelchair, but from time to time she also got to play outside.
Mrs. Criley remembered Grace was mentally disabled but that didn't deter Criley from treating her any different, and they togaggan sledded, likely down Court House Hill just outside the Broad home, as girls. Grace grew to the age of 34, when she died in on February 28, 1919, a victim of the third wave of the great flu epidemic that had swept Golden.
Kingston Richard Broad was born in Golden in 1905. He grew up here a popular young man, graduated from Golden High School, and then graduated with honors from Wentworth Military Academy in Lexington, Missouri. However, while in the promising prime of his life, Broad contracted tuberculosis, from which he suffered for nearly a year. He died in 1925 at age 20, and was remembered by the
Transcript as an "especially likeable young man, generous to a fault, and he will be missed by young and old."
In the 90 years since her death many people have reported to have seen Grace at the family home, even if not knowing who she was or if others had seen her. Grace has most often been seen in the back bedroom of the lower floor, where she was most often in life. According to
Edna Heeren, who lived in the Broad home for over 20 years starting in 1945 and ran it as a boarding house, said that Grace's apparition has always been described the same, according to the
Transcript: "She appeared in a wheelchair. The woman wore a high necked white blouse with ruffles around the collar and sleeves." Among those reported to have seen Grace included a 10-year-old boy, an Irish woman boarder who refused to sleep there because she said it was haunted, a Spanish teacher from Mexico who refused to sleep there again after one night, and two School of Mines students who stayed there a week "before they freaked out and refused to sleep there again" according to Heeren.
Heeren's daughter
Aida Hoskins said she saw Grace at the front of the house one night when she was 11 or 12. She told the
Transcript "It was a woman in a wheelchair" but she couldn't make out her features. "It was not like a mist or a shadow. It was a form that manifested itself in the room. And it was visible." In a dark room with some moonlight in it "She was lighter than the room." Hoskins believed on other occasions that she felt Grace in the room, and would notice her cat Ebony staring and following something with its eyes that was not visible to her.
Terrey Young, who lived in the house a couple of years, said Grace appeared to him around November-December of 1977. According to the
Transcript "Terrey was sitting in the living room when she looked up and saw a woman opening the windows in the dining room...Mrs. Young described a very cold breeze in the house while there was no wind outside...Even though she couldn't make out the features of the mysterious woman, Mrs. Young said she could tell it was a young woman. The stranger was wearing a dark dress that fell to the floor. It was high necked with long sleeves. Her hair was worn in a bun. The woman stayed perhaps a minutes and a half before disappearing. Terrey said she got up to move, went into the dining room and found the windows still open."
Heeren never saw Grace, but one night during the late 1960s she discovered a stranger standing in the living room. According to the
Transcript, "It was a young man. He was tall and good looking. She said he had curly hair and wore a high collar shirt and suit. The man was trying to give her a message before he disappeared." She had no idea who he was, but later while looking through old photos with the Thuet family across the street Heeren recognized Kingston from one of the photos.
Both Heeren and her daughter believed in the ghosts and also considered them not to be threatening at all. Hoskins told the
Transcript "I've never felt alone" at the old house. It is possible others have seen or felt Grace and Kingston at the Broad home since then. While I have a wardrobe from that house personally in my possession I have not had them visit me, so apparently they do not come with the furniture!