John Cleveland Osgood's Sociological Experiment
1901-1909
by Darrell Munsell
The village of Redstone is one of the earliest and best examples of a model industrial village founded at the turn of the twentieth century on the progressive-era concept of welfare capitalism. Established by John Cleveland Osgood, the “Fuel King of the West” and founder of the Colorado Fuel and Iron Corporation (CF&I), Redstone embodied his vision of a progressive future for his corporation’s employees. It was his grand model village, his workers’ paradise, designed, according to George McGovern, “to safeguard the worker, and his output, from boredom, indignity, drink, and disgust.”
Although it lost that purpose many years ago and no longer is an industrial village, this brief historical review reminds us of why Redstone’s creation over a century ago was an important chapter in Colorado history.
Redstone was Osgood’s laboratory for CF&I’s newly adopted labor-management strategy of industrial betterment (welfare capitalism).By providing quality housing and improved sanitary conditions, educational and recreational opportunities, and health care and entertainment, the corporation hoped to create a generation of contented and productive workers that would free communities from strife and want. Redstone was CF&I’s most elaborate and expensive effort to eliminate labor unrest through planning and social control.
The village was “the jewel” of the corporation’s new industrial betterment towns built between 1901 and 1903.
This concept was reflected in several ways, each representing some aspect of Osgood’s progressive agenda. Osgood provided the best school in the entire CF&I system, where students from kindergarten through the primary grades were taught by two teachers. Adult education and vocational training were also offered. The clubhouse was the most prestigious in the corporation’s system, and according to the New York Times “for completeness” rivaled “many a city club.” It was the pride of the village. A large ball room was located on the second floor and an auditorium with a stage equipped with scenery, electric lights, and all the modern features was located on the third floor. Other public or commercial buildings in Redstone included the Big Horn Lodge, Redstone Inn, and Colorado Supply Company Store, which was second in the CF&I system only to the Pueblo store in size and operation.
All the public buildings and Cleveholm Manor were heated with steam heat, a feature well in advance of many buildings in cities across the nation. Electricity and plumbed water were also luxuries to all Redstone residents that were not available for many in Denver and New York City.
Each family was offered a garden plot & cow.
provided dairy and beef for the store.
Redstone served Osgood well in generating positive press for his sociological experiment. The glowing reports from social-reform national periodicals and major newspapers portrayed Osgood and CF&I’s general manager Julian Kebler as benevolent executives whose social betterment work had produced grateful and contented employees. Redstone was frequently noted as the corporation’s model for demonstrating the benefits of progressive paternalism. From all indications, workers in Redstone and neighboring Coalbasin seemed satisfied with their working and living conditions. Unlike most of their fellow workers in Colorado’s southern coalfields, they did not go on strike in 1903-1904. The complaints of abusive control heard in the towns and camps in southern Colorado were absent in Redstone, and the workers in this model village continued to enjoy the positive aspects of industrial betterment—better-quality housing, a more sanitary environment, more extensive entertainment offerings, and better educational opportunities than the old company towns provided.
But the glory of Osgood’s Redstone was short-lived. The closing of the Coal Basin mines and the abandonment of Redstone in 1909 symbolically marked the end of CF&I’s participation in the early progressive-era social reform movement that Osgood had instituted. After 1911, Redstone became a virtual ghost town. Its mark in national social-economic history, however brief, was nonetheless significant.
The Redstone Castle and the most historic part of the village are listed in the Redstone National Historic District.
Darrell Munsell is also the author of From Redstone to Ludlow: John Cleveland Osgood’s Struggle against the United Mine Workers of America and Protecting a Valley and Saving a River: The Crystal River Environmental Protection Association 50 year history. Darrell recently co-authored with his wife, Jane, Redstone: John Cleveland Osgood’s “Ruby of the Rockies”