John George Benkelman

	Dundy County Nebraska Genealogy Trails

A Town's Namesake

Printed in the Benkelman, NE Post, January 2008

John George Benkelman

With the death of John George Benkelman at his home on Thursday night, one of the four or five remaining cattle barons of the Middle West took the long trail across the great divide.

Those left are Finis P. Ernest, Alfred Butters, Judd Brush and possibly one or two others of the men who, in their day, ran 20,000 cattle on 100,000 acres and forced the buffalo and the Indian to the will of a civilization which neither understood, exterminating the one and relegating the remnants of the other to reservations of a paternal government.

Mr. Benkelman was contemporaneous with Henry Cliff, the king of cattle barons of the West, who died leaving his widow, now the wife of Bishop Henry Warren, a couple of millions of dollar, and of W.B. Wilson, the brother of Andrew Wilson, who was shot and killed a year ago in the lobby of the Graymont Hotel.

Mr. Benkelman's wife died several years ago. His direct heirs are three sons, Harry, Charles and George, all of whom reside in Denver. -Denver Post, Jan. 19.

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