- MALONE, Booth M., lawyer; jurist; city attorney, Beloit,
Wisconsin, 1885-1890; president of
- school board, 1882-1885; superintendent of schools, 1882-1885;
and, mayor of Beloit, 1883-1885; district attorney, Rock county,
Wisconsin, 1885-1892; assistant district attorney (Denver), second
judicial district of Colorado, 1892-1897; district attorney of
the same district, 1897-1901; judge of the second judicial district
(Denver) of Colorado, 1901-1907; was president of the Colorado
Republican State League for the years 1894 and 1895; born in
Benton county, Mississippi, and is the son of Richard H. and
Mary (COSSITT) MALONE.
- The town of La Grange, Illinois, and that of the same name
in Tennessee, were founded by his
- mother's brother, F. D. COSSITT. In the list of well known
philanthropists is her cousin, F. H. COSSITT, of New York city,
liberal in his donations to public institutions, and the founder
of several libraries. Mary COSSITT was born in Granby, Connecticut.
- He has one sister, Mrs. Frank W. CROCKER, and three brothers,
William H. and Richard H.
- MALONE and Robert E. MacCRACKEN, all living in Denver, Colorado.
- Richard H. MALONE, the father of the subject of this biography,
was born in Alabama and was
- a southern planter, but was educated for the ministry. He
died at the outbreak of the Civil war, and when Booth M. was
still a small child his mother removed with him and three other
children to Chicago. In the latter city our subject spent his
boyhood and early youth, and was there educated in the public
schools and received his preparatory training. He matriculated
in 1873, at Beloit College, from which he was graduated in 1877,
with the degree of A. B. After one year as a law student in the
office of Thomas S. McCELLAND of Chicago, Mr. MALONE entered
the Albany Law School, New York, graduating from that institution
in 1880, with the degree of LL. B. He was then admitted to the
bar in New York state.
- Forming a partnership with Samuel J. TODD, Mr. MALONE entered
upon the practice of his
- profession at Beloit, Wisconsin. In three years he succeeded
to the large practice they had already established. In addition
to his legal business, Mr. MALONE soon became known as a political
leader and man of affairs, and especially active in the municipal
government. During his term of six years, from 1885 until 1890,
as city attorney of Beloit, the city charter and ordinances were
revised under his administration, and two hundred thousand dollars
in bonds negotiated in funding the city debt. He was elected
mayor of Beloit in 1883 and reelected to that office in 1885.
and during his official life in that position was known as one
of the most public-spirited and progressive chief executives
of that city. He helped to procure railroad sidetracks for factories,
secured streetcars and water works and was the efficient means
of bringing several large "factories to the city, the Berlin
Machine Works. Beloit Iron Works and Fairbanks. Morse & Company
being among the number. The experience obtained in his official
career in Beloit, as well as his thorough study of such questions,
has made Mr. MALONE an active leader, in later years, in the
municipal reform movements in the city and county of Denver.
While a resident of Beloit, IIP also held the position for several
years as superintendent of public schools, also serving as president
of the school board.
- In the meantime his brother, W. H. MALONE, had become a resident
of Denver and was
- established in the practice of the law with Robert W. STEELE,
the late lamented chief justice of the Colorado supreme court.
Through the flattering inducements then offered, Mr. MALONE came
to Denver in 1892 and became assistant district attorney to Robert
W. STEELE, who was elected to that office in 1892. In November,
1897, Mr. MALONE was elected district attorney for Arapahoe (Denver)
county, Colorado, for both the short and long terms. As assistant,
and as district attorney, he won for himself the reputation of
being one of the most brilliant prosecutors in the history of
the state. As a jury lawyer, and in the cross examination of
witnesses in criminal prosecutions, he had no superior in the
state. Out of forty-seven murder cases, some of them, causes
celebres in the west, Mr. MALONE obtained convictions in thirty-nine.
He attained a front rank as a public speaker and orator. Although
engaged In an extensive criminal practice, yet Mr. Malone also
became a prominent attorney in civil suits, including railway,
mining, and other litigation. He loves justice as a man, demands
it as a lawyer and administered it as a judge.
- In 1900, Mr. MALONE was elected judge of the district court
(Denver) of Colorado, displaying
- the same ability on the bench that had characterized his
career in public life and the practice of law. In the many criminal
cases over which Judge MALONE presided not one was ever reversed
on appeal. He was noted as a strong, fair-minded, fearless and
just judge.
- Since his retirement from the bench, Judge MALONE has been
engaged in the general practice
- of the law. In 1907 he was employed to go to Goldfield, Nevada,
and take charge of the prosecution of the celebrated case of
the people vs. Smith and Preston, members of the I.W.W. charged
with murder, and at a time of the intensest excitement in that
state he secured the conviction of both men and followed the
case successfully through the Nevada supreme court. He is a member
of the bar of the supreme court of the United States. His latest
noted case was, associated with Thomas S. Ward, Jr., in defense
of Mrs. Stella Moore Smith, charged with killing her husband.
The case attracted nation-wide attention and lasted several"
weeks. The jury acquitted Mrs. Smith within eleven minutes from
the time the case was submitted to them. Mr. MALONE's closing
speech in that case was said to be "one of the greatest
forensic efforts ever delivered in a courtroom in Colorado."
- Judge MALONE is a Knight Templar, a thirty-second degree
Scottish Rite Mason, a member of
- the Knights of Pythias, and of the Ancient Order of United
Workmen. He attends the Plymouth Congregational church and assists
in its support. He is a republican but stands for the best men
and the best things regardless of party.
- He married, July 1, 1878, Miss Alma M. BENNETT, of Beloit,
Wisconsin, daughter of Almon
- and Calista (PECK) BENNETT, her father being a merchant and
lumber dealer of that city. She was a member of the Daughters
of the American Revolution and of the Plymouth Congregational
church. Mrs. Malone died May 1, 1918. She was a woman of strong
character and beautiful life. Her sweet personality was an inspiration
to all who knew her. She was a filial daughter and a model wife,
mother and friend. Who could be more? Mr. MALONE ascribes most
of whatever of success, or good he achieved in his life, to his
wife's good judgment, wise counsel and sweet companionship.
- To Judge and Mrs. Malone were born the following children,
all natives of Beloit. Wisconsin:
- Mary Louise, Helen Cossitt, William Bennett and Alma E. MALONE.
The three daughters are all married, Mary Louise, who was queen
of the Colorado Festival of Mountain and Plain in the year 1901,
to the distinguished young civil and hydraulic engineer, Elbert
E. LOCHRIDGE, who built the present water works of Springfield,
Massachusetts, where they are at present residing. Helen Cossitt,
who attended Bradford College, married Emerson G. GAYLORD, a
banker, of an old and influential family of Chicopee, Massachusetts;
and Alma E., who attended Smith College, is married to Paul Robertson
JONES, of New York city, general auditor of the Doherty Gas Syndicate.
William Bennett graduated from Yale College in 1909 and has since
been the general manager of the credit department of the Knight
Campbell Music Company but is now associated with the Doherty
Gas & Electric Company as new business manager and is also
president of the Chamber of Commerce of Sedalia, Missouri. William
B. MALONE married Miss Ada GOLDSMITH, of Wheaton, Illinois.
-
- [Taken from "History of Colorado, Vol. II" by
Wilbur Fiske Stone; (c)1918 S. J. Clarke Publishing Co., Chicago;
pp. 184 & 186]
|