Platt Rogers (1850 – December 25, 1928) was an American politician who served as the mayor of

Denver Denver ( ) is a List of municipalities in Colorado#Consolidated city and county, consolidated city and county, the List of capitals in the United States, capital and List of municipalities in Colorado, most populous city of the U.S. state of ...

Colorado Colorado is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States. It is one of the Mountain states, sharing the Four Corners region with Arizona, New Mexico, and Utah. It is also bordered by Wyoming to the north, Nebraska to the northeast, Kansas ...

from 1891 to 1893.

Life

He was born in 1850 in

Newton, New Jersey Newton, officially the ''Town of Newton'', is an Local government in the United States, incorporated municipality in and the county seat of Sussex County, New Jersey, Sussex County New York City New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive w ...

. He later graduated from

Columbia University Columbia University in the City of New York, commonly referred to as Columbia University, is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Churc ...

in 1873, before moving west with his family, while passing through

Greeley, Colorado Greeley is the home rule municipality city that is the county seat and the most populous municipality of Weld County, Colorado, United States. The city population was 108,795 at the 2020 United States census, an increase of 17.12% since the ...

he was so impressed with the town he decided he would remain in the state. He became a practicing attorney, specializing in Irrigation Law. In 1884 litigation arose regarding the High Line Canal and he was called to Denver to represent the English group who constructed it. He served as a District Court Judge in Colorado's Second Judicial District (Denver) from 1882 to 1887. From 1891 to 1893 he served as Mayor of Denver, during this time he became known as the Iron Handed Mayor, due to his strict enforcement of the law. Unfortunately his time in office became tarred by the disastrous redevelopment of the disused City Cemetery (now Cheesman Park). Problems arose when an unscrupulous undertaker, contracted by the City of Denver to remove the long buried corpses and relocate them to another more suitable site, was discovered to be stuffing adult corpses into child sized coffins and other nefarious activities. Due to much media pressure Mayor Rogers then canceled the contract and instigated an investigation into the work. He continued to live in

until his death on 25 December 1928, when after years of ill health a severe cold developed into a fatal bout of

pneumonia Pneumonia is an Inflammation, inflammatory condition of the lung primarily affecting the small air sacs known as Pulmonary alveolus, alveoli. Symptoms typically include some combination of Cough#Classification, productive or dry cough, ches ...

. He was survived by his wife and two daughters.

References

Mayors of Denver 1860 births 1928 deaths Deaths from pneumonia in Colorado {{Colorado-mayor-stub