Anonymous, 3 7/8 x 5 1/4 in. salted paper photograph on 7 x 8 3/8 in. cardstock mount. Verso pencil inscription reads, "Arrival of the first Choaches [sic] from Denver April 1859. Presented to Mrs. Eviline [sic] Lowry by her grandmother Mrs. S.S. Jones."

A rare, and probably unique photograph of stagecoaches posed before a four story brick building, tentatively identified as the Planter's Hotel in Leavenworth, Kansas, a partially visible sign of the "[Unite]d States Express Company" and "...Office Kansas".

In 1858, William H. Russell conceived of a daily stagecoach route between Leavenworth, Kansas and Denver, Colorado, connecting the Missouri River with the recently opened Rocky Mountain goldfields. Initially called the "Leavenworth and Pikes Peak Express Company" the company was incorporated in February 1859, and the first stage arrived in Denver on May 17, 1859. This photograph, supposedly dating to April, 1859, may represent the departure of a coach that would arrive in Denver a month later.

Beset with financial and Indian problems, the Pikes Peak Express Company lasted a mere three months before it was reorganized as the Central Overland and California Express Company, the parent company of the Pony Express.

Evaline Lowry Benjamin (1869-1954) was the granddaughter of John Stykes Jones (1811-1876), one of Russell's original investors in the Pikes Peak Express Company.

An exceptionally rare photograph.