George J. Kindel

March 2, 1855
February 28, 1930

George J. Kindel


+


"So live, that when thy summons comes to join
The innumerable caravan that moves
To that mysterious realm where each shall take
His chamber in the silent halls of Death,
Thou go, not like the quarry slave at night,
Scourged to his dungeon; but, sustained and soothed
By an unfaltering trust, approach thy grave
Like one who wraps the drapery of his couch
About him and lies down to pleasant dreams."
--Bryant

+

DENVER, COLORADO
1930



GEORGE J. KINDEL

Brief Sketch of His Life, by a Friend

    George J. Kindel, after serving four years' apprenticeship as upholsterer and mattress maker with the Robert Mitchell Furniture company of Cincinnati, Ohio, came to Denver in 1877.  He worked at his trade with the Lewis doll furniture company and the Jas. G. Kilpatrick Furniture company in Denver until the Leadville excitement of 1878.

    With less than $100 capital he invested in mattress supplies and started by wagon for Leadville, the then famous silver camp.  Men died like flies with pneumonia because of lack of bedding and too much poor whiskey.  Most bed ticks were filled with shingle shavings off green lumber.  Water could easily be wrung out of the by hand.  Because of lack of store room or houses, he rented a roofless horse stable from the bonanza miner, H. A. W. Tabor, of Pittsburgh mine fame, afterward thirty-day $600 night-shirt senator of Colorado, who, after giving Denver the biggest and best boost it ever had, died practically a pauper.  In the absence of any reasonable bed filling other than wet shavings, Mr. Kindel skirmished the surrounding ranches and procured hay at $150 per ton.

    In less than four weeks' experience of wild and woolly Leadville, as mattress maker and undertaker (one job half completed), he hastened to get back to his first love, Denver, on a load of empty beer kegs.  He encountered a severe storm over Kenosha Hills which came near freezing him to death because of lack of proper clothing.  It took kind friends several hours of rubbing and thawing to bring him back to normalcy.

    As Mr. Kindel expressed it:
    "I shall never forget the pleasure of seeing Denver from the foothills of Morrison.  I then resolved to locate permanently in Denver, and, as Horace Greeley advised, grow up with the country.  I had hoped to get back to my old job of upholstering.  The foreman, of jealous nature, vowed to run me out of town.  I resolved otherwise.  I rented a barn in West Denver and began a mattress and upholstery shop.  It was hard sledding, working eighteen to twenty hours a day, eat when I could, and sleep on a box spring on the floor.  About this time I was reminded of a wonderful terrier I once knew, who was licked by a rat and ever after was afraid to tackle a rat.  I was not going to go the way of that terrier.  I was ready to die if need be, but never to lay down to defeat.

    "On the Christmas of 1879, I did some artistic work for Mrs. Governor Gilpin.  It was the turning point of my career.  It was then I met and often visited Governor Gilpin, whom I consider one of the most foresighted and prophetic men it has been my pleasure to meet.  He was considered by many as a crank, but history since has vindicated him.  He was anything but a fool.

    "The early mattresses were mostly made of shoddy wool, mungo, old rags, carpets and horse blankets, because freight rates on raw material -- hair, cotton, moss, etc. -- were prohibitive.  In self-defense I had to make what the trade called for, but always under protest.  I was possessed of the idea that a vegetable fibre like cotton ought to be improved by steaming and curling, same as horse and cattle hair.  This resulted in my inventing a single-bat cotton comforter and felted mattress.  I had wonderful success.  I was urged to establish plants in the East.  The freight rate on comforters made in Denver in 1891 was $3.00 per cwt. to Pacific Coast points, while if they originated in the East they would go via Denver to the Pacific Coast for $1.00.  The railroad obliged water competition.

    "I took the matter up with the Interstate Commerce Commission and secured relative rates for Denver.  Since then I have had innumerable cases before I. C. C. and never lost one.

    "The Kindel Comforter has since been copied East and West.  My exposé of shoddy bedding before the U. S. Medical Board resulted in prohibitory laws on manufacture of same in many states.

    "My persistent efforts for fair and relative transportation rates landed me a Supervisor of Denver and Congressman in 1912-14.  So far as I know, I am the only mattress maker that has ever had the honor to serve in the House of Representatives of the United States.

    "I always believed in the Golden rule:  `Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.'"

* * *

    But stalwart for the right, Mr. Kindel was no less stalwart against wrong, and once, feeling that he had been grossly deceived, he published a card picturing the president of a life insurance company (who was then dead) between Jesse James and the notorious Soapy Smith.  For this he was indicted for criminal libel.

    At his trial he acted as his own attorney and the jury acquitted him in seven minutes.  Thousands of these postal cards were later obtained by agents of other life insurance companies; hence it gained a wide publicity throughout the United States.  It is believed that this circumstance had not a little to do with the investigation of life insurance companies made a couple of years later by the Armstrong Committee of the New York Legislature, in which Hon. Charles E. Hughes first gained real fame.

* * *

BRIEF SUMMARY OF HIS CAREER
"KINDEL, GEORGE JOHN--Congressman; b. Cincinnati, Mar. 2, 1855; s. of Gabriel and Anna (Herkommer).  Educated St. Augustine sch. and public night schs.; m. Minnie A. [Danner], of Cynthiana, Ky., May 1, 1883.  Learned upholsterer's trade. ...  Removed to Denver, 1877.  President Kindel Bedding and Renovat. Co.  Member Board of Supervisors City and County of Denver, 1910-14.  Recognized as an authority on railroad and express rates.  Has instituted many suits before Interstate Commerce Comm. against railroad companies for discrimination against Denver, beginning 1892.  Won the first suit filed ... against express companies for excessive charges, 1908.  Prominent advocate parcels post.  Mem. 63rd Congress, 1913-15, 1st Colo. District; Democrat.  Author "Kindel's A. B. C. on Freight Rates" and many leaflets and articles on freight and express rates."
--Quoted from "Who's Who in America."

    To this it may be added that, on September 28, 1912, Mr. Kindel was presented a loving cup by his "friends in the automobile business" for having procured a reduction in their freight rates; and in that year it was testified by railroad auditors, in a freight rate hearing, that Mr. Kindel's efforts at that time had reduced railroad freight revenue in Colorado by one million, seven hundred thousand dollars a year.

    Again, without organized business support, he won the suit for reducing express rates from New York to Denver by 33% in 1914, while he was in Congress.  That saving, too -- in a structural rate reduction throughout -- was a regional saving.  Hence these were perhaps his greatest achievements for the city and state of his adoption.

    Mr. Kindel verily delighted to contribute to the comfort and happiness of others, knowing full well that
            "All who joy would win
            Must share it; Happiness was born a twin."

    Probably the greatest joy that he ever won was to share the achievements, just above mentioned, of public justice, with the whole region he loved so well.  In this respect a retort of his, upon one occasion, to Postmaster General Burleson, that he "was a wholesaler and not a petty retailer," is quite fitting.  While never overlooking his individual friends, his paramount aim always seemed to be that of a benefactor of the community.  His activities for fair freight rates made Mr. Kindel a nationally known figure for many years, and these activities ceased only with his death.

    Modestly successful in his business, without craving a great abundance of wealth, Mr. Kindel practically retired from business before he was sixty.  That he was a quality-minded man, with a bent for public service, as distinguished from a quantity-minded man, may be seen in part from the fact that with his meagre and hard-won schooling he was one of the 1,880 with only a common school education who, among the more than 14,000 college-bred men, appeared in "Who's Who," which altogether numbers some 24,000 men of distinction, or about one-fortieth to one-fiftieth of one per cent, of our population.  The quality and spirit of Mr. Kindel's mind is further shown, in part, by some of the striking quotations he adopted to illustrate his contentions in two of his pamphlets of recent years, which he stated might well be his monument:

"A truth, once told in however feeble voice, is bound to be heard."
"An arc light is conducive to good morals."
    --Rev. Myron Reed.
"Shrouds have no pockets."
    --Anonymous
"For a people wanting unto themselves there is no hope."
    --James Wilson, Justice of U. S. Supreme Court
"To sin by silence when we should protest, makes cowards out of men."
"Your first step to entire freedom must be commercial -- that is, freedom of industry."
    --John Bright
"To no one shall we deny Justice, nor shall we discriminate in its application."
    --Magna Carta
"One disproportionately burdened in acquiring is denied equal rights."
    --Benjamin Harrison
"The rights of every man must stand or fall by the same rule."
"The obligation to do Justice rests upon all persons . . . ."
    --U. S. Supreme Court
"Fair transportation, like free circulation, means Life; discriminative transportation, like impeded circulation, means Death."

* * *
HIS FATAL TRIP -- AND DEATH

    On February 27, 1930, he left Denver before 6:00 a. m., with his friend and attorney, Winthrop Bosley, to deliver what was in fact his last word on freight rates to the electorate of Colorado, through the columns of the Haxtun Harvest.  Based on indisputable facts (such, for instance, as figures from the I. C. C. showing that in 1928 all farm products tonnage paid a freight 77% higher than the average of all tonnage), it was in the nature of a challenging open latter to former Gov. McKelvie of the Farm Board, which was published on March 5, and -- whether due to this open letter or not -- in the papers of March 11, Gov. McKelvie cancelled his engagement to speak in Sterling on March 12.  He left Haxtun about 1:30 p.m. of that day for the return trip, mentioning that he would be glad to say he had driven 375 miles in one day at seventy-five.  Before leaving Sterling at 3:00 p.m. he complained of feeling unwell, with a distressing shortness of breath.  He expressed an intention to drive slowly, but forty minutes later, due to his illness (of which symptoms several other instances have since come to be known), he lost control of his auto.  After ploughing ahead for 100 yards through a sandy field alongside the roadway, he car struck the abutment of the concrete bridge on the main highway, due probably to his sheer lack of strength to swing the car another three or four feet, which would have brought him safely on to the highway again.  It is believed that he accidentally touched the accelerator after the car left roadway, as it then picked up speed and after the impact with the abutment the car completely overturned and plunged, top down, into the irrigation ditch running under the roadway.  He had sustained internal injuries in he wreck which would have caused death, but he also suffered a cerebral hemorrhage, which, it is advised, was imminent in any event.

    He passed on at about 3:00 p.m., February 28, 1930.

    Funeral services were held at 1:30 p.m., March 4, 1930, after the body had lain in state in the rotunda of the State Capitol building from 10:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m., March 3, 1930, where a steady concourse of people from all walks of life paid a requiting tribute to his services and memory.

    The funeral parlors of the Olinger Mortuary were inadequate to accommodate the hundreds attending.






A EULOGY UPON THE LIFE AND
CHARACTER OF GEORGE J. KINDEL
By Winthrop Bosley

    For the past five years I enjoyed confidential relations, both professionally and personally, with our deceased fiend, and a sufficient intimacy that I shared innumerable midday meals with him at his home.  Our last meal together was not three hours before his fatal mishap, and at that meal he produced a paper from his pocket -- which the day before he had also shown to the secretary to Mr. F. B. Bonfils - and on which he had written, with his own hand, what he had early in life understood to be the golden thread running through the life and conduct of Abraham Lincoln, therein also stating how his own aim had been to emulate the rule or principle that made the thread golden, and which -- after he should be no more -- he hoped that all his community might understand.  That now appears to have been a prophetic shadow cast just before the oncoming need, and it therefore seems a fitting and proper extension of his own wishes that here -- where we have met as a mark of respect and tribute to the departed friend and benefactor of this city and state -- I should make some short pronouncement typical of the life and great character of him we mourn.

    In the accepted Christian belief, Mr. Kindel has merely laid aside his surging labors to enjoy their fruits.

    The result of those labors, in the public mind, may, perhaps, appear mainly as the denial of political supremacy for Mr. Kindel's preachments, but such denial does happen at times to distinguish great men.  I shall not allude further to his ruling passion than to say it is true that powerful selfish interests therefor never ceased to dig a vast pit for him, and it is not less true that the electorate usually helped with some zeal without at all considering the truth in that ancient proverb which says:  "Beware how thou diggest a pit for another, let you fall into it thyself."

    His understanding was that the guiding principle of Abraham Lincoln's life was to do and to say the right, regardless of the odds or consequences; speaking the truth at all events.  Towards this end he said that he had often done many things which induced "fights" he would have preferred to avoid, and this appeared to him to have been most true in respect of public matters.  He understood that Lincoln belonged to no church and said that the results of his own aim at Lincoln's ideal was about all the religion he had, adding that he was not ashamed of it.

    I now repeat that his own words were "to do and to say the right, regardless of the odds or consequences."  That rule of immutable law, of itself, is alone sufficient for a man of good understanding if he has the resolute courage to so govern himself, and, in the preaching of universal law "enforcement" today it is monumental to note that him we mourn carried the immutable law around with him, and that explains why no man's power, position or wealth could ever quail his spontaneous and fearless use of that rule, without stint or deviation of any kind.  Thus the chiefest elements of honesty, right and courage were so planted in his heart by he Finger of his Maker that one might stand up and say to all the world: "This was a man."

    To illustrate his own private use of the immutable law just mentioned -- and that best shows the character of the man -- I trust that I may be permitted to trespass here to relate to you a story as I related it to him one Monday morning in January last, when Mr. Kindel had visited my office at an unusually early hour, because [he was] feeling unwell and dispirited at the vanity of life.  A Scottish Rite masonic friend of mine happened to be present at that time.

    After repeating to him what a railroad lawyer had said of him some days before -- and it had been intended as an estimate, without flattery -- I continued:
    "Of course you do know about the temptress who visited you in Washington at the height of your express rate fight, even though do not know who sent her, but you never knew what I am going to tell you now.

    "A certain powerful factor in the political life of this city with whom you once clashed on a public matter was thereafter discussing you and your character with a friend when he said:

    "`Well, whatever else we think about Kindel, we are compelled to admit that all his acts are honest, sincere and incorruptible.  I know.  I tried him.  But Kindel don't know that I tried him.'"
    Mr. Kindel's eyes really glistened as he asked: "Mr. Bosley, who was that man?"  I told him.  His eyes widened and then he remarked:  "I now see why in his late life that man's cordiality seemed to say that I had deserved better than I had gotten, and it explains some other things his widow has said to me, too."  Then, saying, "Well, Bosley, perhaps my life has been not in vain after all." and that he had never won more gratification in any victory than what had just been told him, he left the office with renewed hope to make renewed effort, to the very day of his mishap, as I know.

    Of course the virtue we see in others is as much ours as theirs, for we see only so much as we possess, and be it said that his tempter -- who himself had a very human side and really a great heart -- had, ever so clearly and almost solely, seen Kindel actually carrying the immutable law under his own hat, in secret just as he professed it in public.  I refer to that law which Antigone expressed as "those unfailing mandates which are not of today or yesterday, but ever live, and no one knows their birthtide."

    Now, when the immutable law was first reduced to written form and carried down from Mount Sinai for the better use of the brotherhood of man, Holy Writ tells us that "Moses wist not that his face shone," and behold!  Mr. Kindel wist not that the face of his incorruptible integrity shone with that "great wakening light" and resplendent grandeur which found admiration in the soul of his adversary to help exalt him!

    The victories of peace are not less renowned than those of war, and than this enduring victory of Mr. Kindel over the turbulent warrior with whom he contended, there is none higher.  Such a pattern, unique in type, can of course only be found in a man truly great!

    I speak not of intellect, or learning, which sometimes is said to polish pebbles and dim diamonds, but if this community affords a character higher than that of him we mourn, it is my misfortune to be ignorant of it.  And I only wish that the youth of our high schools today might understand -- and to be taught, if that were possible -- the imperishable foundation of such a great character.  Moreover, I can testify to a wish of his to be of advantage and benefit to high school students, as Governor Adams and the State superintendent of Public Instruction can also testify.  A letter written for him by Governor Adams during the week of his death, though under a heavy rubber band with other papers beside him just before the wreck, was, with the ditch mud plainly on one side of it, found in his outside overcoat pocket afterwards.  This shows the strength, unto death, of his cherished aims for the public weal.

    The Denver Post has said, and it has well said, that if this community had more men of Mr. Kindel's type it would be much better off.  But, realizing full well the truth in the assertion that the "authority of religion is superior to all other authority," I say, and I say it constructively, that even if some of the ministers of the gospel with us had the noble roughness of George J. Kindel's fearless truth at all times, though they uttered it as he shed it, without its being obscured by varnish of any kind, or tact, we should indeed have a community of wonderful excellence!

    That Mr. Kindel's aim to emulate Lincoln's rule of conduct found mark within that realm, it may be seen without stretching the vision that both had the same truth; the one, perhaps polished in the similitude of a palace, while the other's had a not less noble roughness, and each progressed in instruction and wisdom daily with age.  It requires no effort to picture them both as courageous and even headstrong for the right as each saw it, and lastly, their great aims in life were for the public weal; yet only to end in tragedy.

    The law, as Saint Paul told us, is "to render to every man according to his deeds."  Without coercion -- for Mr. Kindel was not acquainted with that -- I repeat that he was an earnest doer of that law, relative to which Saint Paul Further told us:

    "For not the hearers of the law are just before God, but the doers of the law shall be justified."

    Thus religion appears to aim at results, the substance rather than the form, and to further justify, by results, the religion of Mr. Kindel, without hypocrisy or apology, I turn again to Abraham Lincoln's closest associate, John Hay, and adopt the award confidently made to his immortal character, Jim Bludsoe, as not less richly earned by good faith unto death here:
"He weren't no saint -- but at jedgment
    I'll take my chances with Jim,
'Longside of some pious gentlemen,
    Who wouldn't shook hands with him."
    After life's fitful fever, may his noble spirit rest in an exalted peace!


* * *


IN THE PUBLIC EYE
GEORGE J. KINDEL IS DEAD
By Charles J. Munz
    He was a friend of the masses.  The writer knew him and was his friend and admirer for thirty years.

    He was strong in body, brilliant in mind and courageous in spirit.  He loved that which was right and despised any form of wrong.

    It was those attributes of manhood that led him into many battles for the rights of others.

    His constant fight for fair freight and passenger rates for the state of Colorado and other portions of the West will immortalize his name in the state of Colorado.

    The results of one of these battles before the World War on the reduction of freight and express rates resulted in a rate to the shippers of the state which returned to them nearly a million dollars, saying nothing of the continued benefits to the shippers under the new rates established by his efforts.

    He was ever ready to sacrifice himself for any cause that would enable him to educate the masses upon the subject of freight rates.  He had but one thought -- not for himself, but how can I help others?

    Politically he knew no party; religiously he was associated with no church -- yet he possessed the highest ideals of government; had a spirituality all his own -- that which might be emulated by those who desire no error.  Honesty and fair dealing characterized his every move.

    In the year 1912 the writer had the honor to nominate him in the Democratic Congressional Assembly for Congress.  He was elected by a vote of five thousand more than was cast for President Wilson in he same election in his district.

    He was much disappointed and disgusted with the workings of Congress and many of his political associations.  His ideals were for results and benefits to his constituents; he was not versed in the thought of simply holding office for party gain and thereby sacrificing that which belonged to the country, and for that reason he was not popular with some of his party partisans, all to his credit.  More men such as George J. Kindel was would result in the administration of governmental affairs with justice and impartiality.

    In the death of George J. Kindel the family loses a kind and loving husband and father, the community a good neighbor, the state a valuable citizen.





"To live in the presence of great truths and eternal laws -- that is what keeps a man patient when the world ignores him, and calm and unsoiled when the world praises him."