William C. Stover was born on July 11, 1841 in Virginia, and moved to Colorado in 1860 to ranch. Beginning in 1870, he operated a mercantile business with John C. Mathews, and then took over the firm himself until 1880. Stover served as a member of the Colorado Territorial legislature, and in 1876 helped draft the state constitution. He also assisted in getting the State Agricultural College located in Fort Collins. He later was nominated for state senator and lieutenant governor, and was elected to the Fort Collins city council. He was also a banker who founded the Poudre Valley Bank in 1878 and served as its president. The Poudre Valley Bank was a stockholder of the Water Supply and Storage Company in 1911.

Stover remained active in business, real estate, and banking for his whole life. Stover was also a founding member of North Fork Ditch Company in 1878 (later the North Poudre Irrigation Company). In 1887, he joined forces with James Arthur, Jay Bouton, Charles Mantz, and F. W. Sherwood to buy the Fort Collins town ditch (Fort Collins Irrigating Canal) which thereafter became known as the “Arthur Ditch.” Stover passed away on October 8, 1907.

 

Citations:

-Evadene Burris Swanson. Fort Collins Yesterdays. Fort Collins, CO: Evadene Burris Swanson, 1993. pp. 33, 45.

-Ansel Watrous. History of Larimer County Colorado. The Old Army Press, 1911. pp. 111-112, 313-314.