Denver, Colorado 1901 History

Benjamin Barr Lindsey
Denver, Arapahoe County, CO
Jackson, TN

page 538

Benjamin Barr Lindsey, County Judge for Arapahoe county, was born in Jackson, Tenn., November 25, 1869; the son of L.T. and Letitia (Barr) Lindsey.  His father located in Denver in 1878, the family following about a year later.  When twelve years of age he was sent to Notre Dame University near south Bend, Ind., where he remained two years, and where, at the age of thirteen, he had won a gold medal for superiority in public speaking.  In 1884 he went thence to his birth-place, lived on his grandfather’s farm, and attended the Southwestern University at Jackson.  There he won a second gold medal for superiority in public speaking; all the other contestants having been his seniors by from five to eight years.  In 1887, when seventeen years old, the business reverses and ill-health of his father required him to leave the University and return to Denver where, soon after, his father died.  Having been the elder of four children, though yet a mere boy, the burden of responsibility for and support of the family then devolved upon him.

Notwithstanding this termination of his University course, Judge Lindsey, having resolved to fulfill his intention to become a lawyer, entered the law office of Hon. R. D. Thompson in the capacity of office-boy, and devoted all his spare time to the study of law.  His earnings during that period were increased by employment in the mornings as a route carrier of newspapers for one of the Denver dailies, and in the evenings at janitor work in one of the large office buildings.  With the help of a younger brother aged fifteen, the family was thus provided for and he was enabled to prepare for admission to the Bar.

Immediately after his admission in 1893, Judge Lindsey engaged in practice of his profession.  In 1896 he formed a partnership with Senator Fred W. Parks, under the firm name of Lindsey & Parks, and which soon became prominent among the law partnerships of younger members of the County Bar.  This relation successfully continued until, in January, 1901, Judge Lindsey was appointed County Judge for Arapahoe county, to succeed Hon. R.W. Steele, who had resigned in consequence of his election in the preceding November to the Supreme Court of the State.

A Democrat in politics, Judge Lindsey became influential in the councils of his party in 1899, and soon won recognition of his merits.  In that year Governor Thomas appointed him Public Administrator, a position he relinquished to accept the higher honor conferred by his party when he was appointed to the County Bench - generally regarded as the most important nisi prius Court in the State.  In the Democratic convention in the autumn of 1900, and that consisted of over 800 delegates, he had, though but thirty years of age, come within fifteen votes of being nominated as a candidate for District Judge.

Judge Lindsey is now the youngest Judge in the State of Colorado.  Unmarried, he resides with his mother and a younger brother, upon whom he continues to bestow the care and solicitude that have been his since boyhood.