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A Select Vacation Tour to Marble, Colorado contains 55 photographs, 11 clippings, 6 pieces of ephemera, and 1 letter documenting an inspection trip for potential investors to marble and slate quarries in Colorado organized by the Knickerbocker Syndicate.

A Select Vacation Tour to Marble, Colorado contains 55 photographs, 11 clippings, 6 pieces of ephemera, and 1 letter documenting an inspection trip for potential investors to marble and slate quarries in Colorado organized by the Knickerbocker Syndicate.

The album (18 x 25.5 cm) is lacking a front cover, but the contents are undamaged. The first item is an illustrated brochure attached to the album's front cover that describes the upcoming journey and provides a detailed itinerary and sample menu. While aimed primarily at current investors in the Colorado-Yule Marble Company and the Colorado Slate Company, “families and friends or acquaintances” were also welcome. The cost was not specified.

The rest of the album documents the trip and promotes the quality of company products. Photographs show Yule marble in use at the Cheesman Memorial in Denver and the Youngstown, Ohio, courthouse. Pamphlets and newspaper articles also declare the marble to be of better quality than Carrara marble and the slate is in quantities that will eclipse Wales in the industry, who was the world leader at the time.

The passengers made a thorough inspection of the Yule Marble site over two days and are shown riding from the mill to the quarry site in the new electric trolley powered by electricity generated from the Crystal River, on the quarry floor watching workers extract blocks that will be shaped into columns at the mill, and visited the site of the slate quarry which was in the early stages of development. Other highlights of the trip included stopovers at Glenwood Hot Springs Lodge and Colorado Springs, excursions to tourist sites like Pikes Peak and Cripple Creek, and city tours in Kansas City, Denver, and elsewhere. Local newspapers covered many of these visits, and clippings are included in the album.

Also present is a letter of appreciation to the mine supervisors signed by 31 of the travelers and an illustrated report on the state of the mine by a mechanical engineer on the trip named Arthur M. Chidester (who also took most of the album’s photographs).

The San Luis Valley, Colorado, promotional album contains 26 photographs as well as testimonials, articles, maps, and periodical excerpts that served to promote estate development in the San Luis Valley, Colorado, in 1908.

The San Luis Valley, Colorado, promotional album contains 26 photographs as well as testimonials, articles, maps, and periodical excerpts that served to promote estate development in the San Luis Valley, Colorado, in 1908.

Professional photographer O. T. Davis made 18 of the 26 photographs in this album. His work was part of an effort by the Oklahoma Land and Colonization Co. (based in Kansas City, Missouri) to attract settlers to the region. The company had purchased some 20,00 acres of land in the valley. The photographs and accompanying testimonials, letters, articles, and maps that make up the rest of this album were designed to attract potential buyers and investors.

The album (21.5 x 30 cm) has brown leather covers and begins with a group of typed declarations attesting to the impressive quality and quantity of Colorado agricultural products, including one by a former Colorado governor stating: “There may be a few favored spots that can raise potatoes as good, but nowhere in the world can better be produced.” Other statements tout the favorable climate and plentiful water sources. The introductory testimonials are followed up by photographs, most of which were taken by O. T. Davis on August 18th 1908, though some were taken later on in the harvest season. The images show impressive yields, prosperous homesteads, and plentiful water sources and also include in-town scenes showing well-dressed men and women, a bustling train station, a sturdy schoolhouse, and busy liveries.

Following the photographs more documentation is included such as sworn affirmations that artesian wells are plentiful, unattributed periodical articles touting the regions’ yields of field peas, sugar beets, hay, hogs and cattle, and magazine photographs with the same positive perspectives as Davis’s photographs. Also present is a railroad map of the Denver and Rio Grande Western Railroad’s extensive system in the region and plans to complete a link to San Francisco in 1909, thus opening regional products to worldwide markets.