John L. Dailey
Seneca County, OH
Ft. Wayne, Allen County, IN
Omaha, Douglas County, NE

 

John L. Dailey is a native [November 19, 1833] of Seneca county, Ohio.  Learning the printer’s trade in Fort Wayne, Ind., he went to Omaha in 1855 and worked on the Nebraskian, and later published the Dakota City Herald for upward of two years.  his next move was to the mouth of Cherry creek in the spring of 1859; his subsequent connection with the printing business in Denver being related in this chapter.  After his permanent retirement from it in 1874 he was interested in various other business enterprises until elected Treasurer of Arapahoe county in 1877; a position to which he was re-elected in 1879.  He is still an honored citizen of Denver, and is now, as he has been for a long time, engaged in real estate transactions. 

History of Denver, with Outlines of the Earlier History of the Rocky Mountain Country, Jerome C. Smiley, editor, (c) 1901, p. 668

 

David C. Dodge
Salem, MA
Elgin, IL

 

David C. Dodge, Vice President and General Manager of the Rio Grande Western Railway, born in Shirley, Mass., November 17, 1837, is of an old New England family which came from England in 1638 and settled at Salem, Mass.; he being of the eighth American generation, and the eighth of his name in order of descent.

Colonel Dodge, as he is generally known in Denver, began his railroad career early in life.  At the age of sixteen he entered the engineering department of the Fox River Valley road at Elgin, Ills., and continued with that road and with the Wisconsin Central until March, 1856, when he engaged with the Chicago, Iowa & Nebraska railroad, for which he was General Freight and Passenger Agent, and Paymaster, from 1857 to 1862.  In 1861 he served in the Commissary Department of the Federal army at Chattanooga, Tenn., and in the Quartermaster’s Department at Memphis.  Terminating that service in October of that year, he returned to Iowa and became General Agent of the Chicago & Northwestern road at its then western terminus.

Colonel Dodge came to Denver in May, 1865, and for nearly two years was engaged in mercantile pursuits.  In 1867 he became the General Agent of the Chicago & Northwestern road for Colorado and New Mexico, a position he retained until 1870 when, upon completion of the Kansas Pacific road to Denver in August of that year, he accepted a like position in the service of that road and in which he continued until the spring of 1872.  On May 1, 1872, he was appointed General Freight and Passenger agent of the Denver & Rio Grande road, and so served until December, 1878.  In March, 1879, he was appointed General manager of the Denver & Rio Grande in which position he continued until April, 1884, when he became Vice-President and General manager of the Rio Grand Western road, a position he has ably and continuously filled since that time.

Colonel Dodge is prominent among the many great managers of railroads developed by the American system of railways.  In addition to his services as outlined in the foregoing, he was, from 1885 to 1888, in charge of the Mexican National Railway in Mexico.  While his railway interests and duties have much of the time required his presence elsewhere, his home has always been in Denver since his coming to Colorado in 1865, and he has been closely identified with the development and advancement of the city. 

History of Denver, with Outlines of the Earlier History of the Rocky Mountain Country, Jerome C. Smiley, editor, (c) 1901, p. 616

 

Major Jacob Downing
Arapahoe County, CO
Albany, NY (Albany Co.)
Cleveland, OH (Cayuhoga Co.)
Cook County, IL
Mountain City, CO
Central City, CO
Denver, CO 1860

 

Major Jacob Downing, whose name and services as a commander are so intimately associated with the defense of pioneer Colorado against invasion by the Confederate forces, and with the later operations against the Indians on these plains, was born in Albany, N.Y., April 12, 1830. After a thorough English education at the Albany Academy, he became a clerk in the City Bank of Albany, of which Erastus Corning was President, and so continued until 1850 when, with his parents, he removed to Cleveland, Ohio. After several years of travel in the west he located in Chicago in 1855, where he studied law. In the spring of 1860 he came from Chicago to Colorado and temporarily cast his fortunes with Mountain City - later merged into Central City.

Late in the summer of 1860 Major Downing removed to Denver, and has been a citizen here since that time.  He participated in organizing the Provisional city Government in the autumn of 1860, and in 1861 recruited and organized a company, of which he became Captain, for the First Regiment Colorado Infantry which was later made a cavalry regiment.  For his brilliant services and conspicuous gallantry in the campaign and battles in New Mexico that drove Gen. Sibley out of that Territory, he was made a Major of cavalry.  So much of his services is involved in our accounts of the operations against the Confederates and later against the Indians, that it would be a needless repetition to outline them here.  After the New Mexico campaign Major Downing was placed in command of the important frontier post, Fort Larned, Kansas, where he successfully protected 240 miles of stage-coach and emigrant route against the Indians with but 150 men at his command.  For these services and for his management of the Indian tribes in that part of the country he was complimented by the Commanding General of the Department.  He next became Assistant Inspector General or the Department, with nearly a dozen western military posts and camps under his jurisdiction.

Major Downing remained on that duty until the outbreak of the Indian troubles in 1864, when he entered upon his distinguished services in the Indian campaign. With a small force he fought the battle of Cedar Canon where, though outnumbered three or four to one by the Indians, he defeated them by the first serious blow struck them in this part of the western country. Returning to Denver with his command, he led one of the columns of Colonel Chivington’s expedition against the Cheyennes and Arapahoes at Sand creek.

Mustered out of the service in December ,1864, Major downing returned to civil life in Denver.  In 1867 he was elected Probate Judge of Arapahoe county, and upon expiration of his term engaged in dealing in real estate, and in farming and stock-raising.  But in that period, as elsewhere narrated, he was called upon to organize defense of the city against the last two menacing outbreaks of the plains Indians.  Having acquired near Green Mountain, five miles west of Denver, a fine ranch of 2,000 acres, he has long been one of the most extensive stock-raisers in the State.  It was he, in 1862, who introduced alfalfa in Colorado.

On November 1, 1871, Major Downing married Miss Caroline Rosecrans, of Saratoga, N.Y.; a descendant of an old and distinguished Revolutionary family. 

History of Denver, with Outlines of the Earlier History of the Rocky Mountain Country, Jerome C. Smiley, editor, (c) 1901, p. 409