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GARFIELD
COUNTY, COGENWEB PROJECT
Stauffer Pharmacy
Jesse and Almeda Stauffer were the first licensed
pharmacists in Rifle. This is their brief biography.
Jesse Ebersole Stauffer
was born June 11, 1873 in Pennsylvania. When he was 5 years old, his parents
moved the family to Lecompton, Kansas and by 1880 were settled on a farm near
town.
Jesse married Almeda Smith June 5, 1901, in Lawrence Kansas. Almeda was
born April 30, 1872 also in Lawrence Kansas. They had one child together, son
Harold Eugene born January 4, 1904 in Rifle.
Jesse grew up largely on the
farm and attended common school in Kansas. After preliminary common school and
college education, he served an apprenticeship in a Lawrence Kansas drug store.
He graduated from the State University School of Pharmacy in 1897. In that same
year he came to Colorado and first resided in Gumnison. Working in a drug store,
he held positions as clerk and manager.
Almeda graduated High School in
Lawrence Kansas and also served an apprenticeship before entering the School of
Pharmacy. She graduated in 1897 in the same class as her husband to be. At
graduation, she accepted the situation of head clerk for the firm of H. S.
Raymond & Company which position she held until her marriage to Jesse in 1901.
They were married in Lawrence, Kansas, resided first in Gunnison, then came to
Rifle in July of 1902. They purchased the ruble of Rifle's City Drug which had
burned down. It consisted mostly of a pile of bricks collapsed into the
basement.
They built a one story pharmacy business with basement and were
open by December of 1902. During that time, Jesse caught typhoid and was severly
ill about four weeks, not recovering until about the end of August, 1902.
They operated the pharmacy together until Almeda passed away March 26, 1943.
Jesse then married Thelma Todd Ewers in 1945 and they continued the business
until he retired in 1954.
The pharmacy was then sold to Claude Graham who
was married to Jesse's niece, Laura Fay. Laura was Lester Stauffer's daughter,
Lester being Jesse's two year older brother.
Thelma is known as a long time
Sunday School teacher in Rifle and donated many of the photos that were
published in Rifle Shots. The Stauffers were long time members of the First
Christian Church.
Jesse is noted for his civic involvement and for
generations of Rifle teenagers as a first employer. All of us who grew up in
Rifle enjoyed their soda fountain.
Towards the end of his life, Jesse lived
in Grand Junction for several years. After he passed, Thelma moved to San Diego.
She is buried in Denver.
Jesse passed away June 23, 1970. Thelma passed away
March 14, 1988. Jesse and Almeda are buried in Rose Hill.
Marriage Record
Jesse Stauffer Registration Card -
Front
Back
About 1910
Old Stauffers drug soda fountain (City Drug) Harry
Odgers, Beverly Massey (?), Dr. Moore
About 1950
 
Rose Hill Cemetery Rifle Colorado
Lester Stauffer (brother of Jess) on Hunter Mesa Circa 1905
Laura Stauffer's
Marriage Record
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