Notes
Admin or Biographical History: Frances Cron was born in Pennsylvania in 1888. She first came to Broomfield in 1893 at age four with her mother, Harriet "Hattie" Burton Cron, who was pregnant with Frances' brother Thomas Cron. Harriet had just left her husband to come live with her parents, Thomas and Sarah Burton, who were neighbors to homesteading farmer William Brown. William and Harriet married three years later in 1896, and had four daughters. By 1900, however, tragedy struck the family. Millie, William and Harriet's first daughter, died at age three, with Thomas Cron dying at age six; Harriet passed away from complications during the birth of daughter Elizabeth, who passed away six months after Harriet. This left William Brown to care for Frances Cron and her two sisters, Ellenor and Blanch Brown, while also keeping after a ranch and working as Broomfield's town constable. Frances looked after her sisters at home while her father worked.
William remarried in 1914, taking Amie Collum as his wife. Amie was related to the Browns' neighbors, William, Rosella, and Annie Burgess, whom Frances was very close to. Frances - who had an eighth grade education from schools in Broomfield - then decided to continue her education at Barnes Business College in Denver. Utilizing the Denver and Interurban passenger lines on the Kite Route, she later worked as a secretary at various Denver businesses.
In 1917, Frances married her husband, Russell Ridsdale. They had four children. The family ultimately moved to Boulder, where Russell supported the family through his own horse tack shop and store awning design business. In her old age, Frances spent time writing and collecting poetry and rhymes. Frances passed away in 1970.
Sources:
Pettem, Silvia. Broomfield: Changes Through Time. Longmont, Colorado: The Book Lode, 2001.
Turner, Carol. "On History: A glimpse into the good life of an early Broomfielder." Broomfield Enterprise (March 3, 2012): available from <http://www.broomfieldenterprise.com/ci_20089971>; accessed November 25, 2015.
Custodial History: Frances Cron kept and wrote in two diaries from 1910 until 1917, when she married her husband, Russell Risdale. Both diaries, as well as a collection of Frances' photographs and poems, were eventually passed on to one of Frances' daughters, Janet Risdale Justice-Waddington. Janet donated the poems and digital scans of the journals and photographs to the Broomfield Depot Museum in 2015.