If Frederick G. Bonfils and Harry H. Tammen were responsible for half of the things ascribed to them in Timberline, they were two of the most notorious scamps in the history of journalism. They turned the failing Evening Post into Denver’s most successful newspaper at the turn of the 20th century, leaving a 40-year trail of screaming headlines and colorful hijinks in their wake.
Their paper was not always exactly respectable. Both owners were horsewhipped and shot by angry readers. But they knew how to give their readers what they wanted (or how to make their readers want what they were selling). Unabashed promoters, their philosophy of journalism was, “a dogfight on a Denver street is more important than a war in Europe.”
By 1895, when they bought the Evening Post, the Wild West was beginning to settle down. But the wildest days of American newspapering were just beginning and Bonfils and Tammen rode them for all they were worth. It is not a coincidence that during their heyday they also owned the Sells-Floto Circus.
Something in the water
Denver has a long history of colorful newspapermen. There were, of course, Gene Fowler, the author of Timberline, and his biographer H. Allen Smith, whom I have written about already. One of the best known was Bat Masterson, who became well known as a gunfighter and lawman in Dodge City before moving to Denver to try his hand at gambling and writing. By the time he died in 1921 he was a celebrated New York sports reporter and columnist.
Damon Runyon, best known for his Broadway reporting and the short stories that inspired Guys and Dolls, worked at the Denver Post, before moving on to New York. Lowell Thomas, who made T.E. Lawrence a household name as Lawrence of Arabia, graduated from the University of Denver before going to work for the Chicago Journal. Harold Ross, founding editor of the New Yorker, was born in Aspen and worked at the Denver Post before helping to found the Stars and Stripes during World War I.
Whether it was something in the water or just the fact that Denver was a rich city in the 1890s, it attracted journalists, tramp reporters and opportunists. Bonfils and Tamen saw the Evening Post as an opportunity to make their fortunes.
Yellow journalism and red ink
Tammen was working as a bartender and putting out a small weekly paper of his own when he sought out Bonfils as a partner to buy the Post. Bonfils was a shady real estate and lottery promoter in Kansas City. Attracted by the generation of millionaires being minted in the Colorado mines, Bonfils agreed to put up the $12,500 to buy the failing paper with the understanding that Tammen would provide the publishing know-how.
There was a lot they didn’t know, but they were both good at thinking on their feet. When Tammen asked Bonfils for money to meet the payroll at the end of their first week in business, Bonfils refused. “Harry, when we bought this paper, I expected it to make money from the grass up,” Fowler wrote. “And it will have to do just that. Not one cent more do I put in from my capital. The Post has got to earn its own way.”
It did earn its way, with crusades against corruption, real or invented. “Let’s make ’em sit up,” Tammen said. “Half the town is good, and half is bad. The good ones will read the Post to congratulate themselves on being so holy; the bad ones to see what we’ve found out about ’em.”
The only red ink in the Post was in its screaming headlines. And when an editor complained that a headline was not good grammar, Tammen replied, “that’s the trouble with tis paper—too God damned much grammar. Let’s can the grammar and get out a live sheet.”
The Denver Post is still publishing today, and after several changes in ownership has come full-circle, once again under a management that is focused more on profit than journalism. Not that the staff isn’t still doing award-winning work in spite of budget handicaps. But a modern hedge fund isn’t nearly as entertaining as a couple of 19th century mountebanks.
Unfortunately, I don’t believe Timberline is currently in print, but you can probably find a copy at a used bookstore or your local library.