Bolts of Tragedy: A Teen's Fatal Encounter in the Cripple Creek Mining District
Steven Veatch (noreply@blogger.com)
By Steven Wade Veatch On a fateful
Wednesday, July 15, 1914, 13-year-old John F. Bowen visited his friends at the
Kilpatrick Ranch near Gillette, Colorado. It started out like any other day for
John—his past behind him, his future ahead, but unlike other days, this would
be his last day on Earth. Young John Bowen had
lived an eventful life. He
was born in Leadville on January 12, 1901, to Irish parents. John and his
family lived in the Big Stray Horse Gulch in Leadville. His father, Thomas, work