Globeville's Ben Dreith - NFL Referee

        As the 2024/25 NFL season is nearing its conclusion, fans have cheered their home-town teams, followed their favorite players and paid attention to certain officials. For many years, NFL referee Ben Dreith was recognized for his knowledge, fairness and adherence to the rules. Former director of NFL officials Art McNally said, "When Ben stepped onto the field the game was under control, no ifs, ands or buts about it. He was an outstanding referee."
        Benjamin Dreith was born in Globeville February 1, 1925 to Anna Marie and Johannes Dreith, who emigrated from the village of Beideck on the Volga River. With his three brothers and three sisters, he grew up in the neighborhood, attended Garden Place School and then North High School, where he excelled as an athlete.
        In World War II, he enlisted in the United States Navy, serving from June 1943 to March 1946 on the USS Teak in the Philippines. After the war, he graduated from the University of Northern Colorado (then known as Colorado State College) with a BA in Education, and lettered in three sports: football, basketball and baseball. In the 1950s Dreith played both semipro baseball and basketball in Denver.
        After college, Dreith taught physical education for 38 years in the Denver Public Schools, most of those at Lincoln High School His officiating career began at the high school level, and then the college ranks in the Skyline Conference, which became the Western Athletic Conference.
        In an article in the Rocky Mountain News Spotlight, January 25th, 1998, Dreith remembered, "In 1960 a friend called me and said 'How would you like to wrok professional football?' I said yeah and signed up with the American Football League (AFL). That's how things worked. Friends would call friends."
        When Dreith went to the professional ranks in the AFL, he was also teaching high school, and officiating high school and college level games. In 1996, the AFL merged with the National Football League (NFL), and the NFL restricted its officials to pro games only.
        During his NFL career, Dreith was awarded 27 post-season games, including eight Conference Championships, 13 Divisional Playoffs and two Pro Bowl games.        Getting to the Super Bowl was a mark of achievement for officials because the appearance was based on a rating system from the entire season. The officials with the highest ratings went to the Super Bowl, a coveted assignment awarded to Dreith four times.
        Dreith was not a fan of instant replay, which was introduced in 1986. "We'd stand there and wait and wait and wait, and then 96 percent of the time our call would stand." Also in 1986, Dreith issued one colorful, no-nonsense penalty call that was forever tied to his name. In a game between the Jets and the Bill, Jets' defensive tackle Marty started punching Bill's quarterback Jim Kelly after the play was over. Dreith threw his penalty flag, and with his robust baritone voice echoling through the stadium, he announced the most famous call in NFL history, "There's a personal foul on number 99 of the defense. After he tackled the quarterback, he's giving him the business down there. That's a 15-yard penalty."
        Dreith retired from both the NFL and from teaching in 1990. He was inducted in the Colorado Sports Hall of Fame in 2007. When he died on April 25, 2021, many of his former high school students posted memories to his obituary.
        "What an amazing guy. I loved his gym classes and his gruff exterior, but he had a funny side too. His officiating in the NFL was great to watch as well. I can't help but think of the many young lives he influenced over those many years, including mine." Roger Colburn, May 07, 2021

Former NFL referee Ben Dreith
Photo: Denver Public Library

Both Ben Dreith and the Denver Broncos made it
to the big leagues in 1960. Dreith wore number 53
and worked as a Line Judge in the 1960 season.
Mary Lou Egan, personal collection

Globeville Did Its Part

In the decade before World War II, Globeville’s population had struggled to find jobs, but the demands of war now created a labor shortage. Women filled vacancies at factories and foundries when men left for the service. June Jackson Egan rode the streetcar to 10th and Inca to make fuses for PT boats at Slack-Horner Foundry; Carol Christenson worked on aircraft, (including Eleanor Roosevelt’s plane), at McClellan Field near Sacramento.

 Mary Reed, left and Carol Christenson
® Mary Lou Egan

The Globeville community offered support in the way it always had: through its churches and lodges. Members of the First German Congregational Church formed the Blue Star Letter Writing Committee to keep the congregation’s 175 members in the service informed about church activities, and a newsletter called “The Minister’s Mailbag” kept the men in contact with each other as well.

The children at Garden Place School collected scrap and contributed to bond drives, while the young women of Holy Rosary Young Ladies’ Sodality volunteered at the Catholic USO at 16th and Logan. The Polish Harmony Club, a young-people’s social group affiliated with Polish National Alliance, entertained servicemen who were recovering at Fitzsimons Army Hospital and sponsored weekly dances at the Polish hall for military personnel of Polish descent. Paul Goreski recalls, “During the war my folks used to go out to Lowry and invite a Polish serviceman over for dinner. He had to be Polish.” 

Mary Canjar joined the Red Cross and attended classes to become an Air Raid warden.
She was issued a uniform with a shirt, pants, helmet and armband, and made sure that windows were covered and lights turned off during blackout periods. Canjar also won an award for persuading every family on Logan Street to purchase War Bonds. Residents were rewarded with a bus tour of Lowry field, a lunch and serenade by a marching band. 

                   Mary Canjar, photo used with permission from Father John Canjar

Victory Gardens became the name for the substantial gardens Globeville’s citizens had always planted. The community’s traditional frugality and resourcefulness made the
war rationing of gas, sugar, meat, and cooking oil, easier.

 Fathers Robert and Joseph Meznar's 1940 Ford
with its "A" gas sticker (highlighted in red).
Photo ® Mary Lou Egan

On both V-E Day and V-J Day, church bells rang, factory whistles and car horns blared. Twelve young men from Globeville lost their lives in the conflict; the nation and the neighborhood were forever changed by the experience.

African Americans in Globeville - Charles Lilburn Cousins

 

4200 block of North Broadway, ® Mary Lou Egan

Today the site is occupied by nondescript warehouse and distribution structures, but Sarah Cousins Sims remembered when North Broadway was a block of small family homes. “We came to Denver from Kansas. My father decided he could progress more in Denver than he could in Atcheson so we came out here in 1909 and he purchased a house at 4229 North Broadway. North Denver at that time was a mixture of all nationalities: we had an Italian family on the south side of us and, on the north side, we had a German husband and wife.
“We went to Garden Place School. . . I think we were the only Negroes, at least around there. But there were all nationalities there at that time, and nobody really thought anything about whether we were white, Negro or what. We were all just sort of one family then.” 1. 
Sarah’s family was part of the great western migration of African Americans in the years following the Civil War. These newcomers were seeking economic opportunity, homestead land, a healthy climate and less racial oppression than in the South or Midwest. Sarah’s father, Charles L. Cousins worked as a porter for the Pullman Company for thirty-three years and raised a large family. By saving ten percent of every dollar he made and teaching himself construction skills, he was able to purchase run-down buildings in the Whittier Neighborhood and repair them with salvaged material. Cousins walked from his home in Globeville to the building site and worked on the restorations on his days off from the railroad. The renovated properties were then rented at modest rates, and Cousins acquired more projects while teaching construction and repair skills to his son and other young men in the neighborhood. 2.
The family would move from Globeville to the Whittier Neighborhood in 1917. Cousins continued to build and rent properties, making housing available to his people at a time when covenants and lending practices restricted African Americans. A leader in the African American community, Cousins passed away in 1962, and his wife Alta in 1971. The Cousins family continues to operate many of the properties he built. 3.

 Charles Lilburn and Alta Cousins, Denver Public Library

Alta Cousins Terrace, 725 East Twenty Sixth Avenue

1. Sarah Sims. Transcript of OH0107. Recorded on January 25, 1977
2. Denver Neighborhood History Project, 1993-94. Five Points Neighborhood, Denver, CO
3. Denver Neighborhood History Project, 1993-94. Whittier Neighborhood, Denver, CO

Citizenship

Immigrants who settled in Globeville from the 1880s to the 1920s were mostly farmers from Eastern Europe and Russia with little education, few urban skills and no knowledge of the English language. Working in the smelters, railroads and meat packing plants made newcomers realize that better jobs and a better life came to those who could speak English and were American citizens. 

To become an American citizen a person had to be of "good moral character, have the ability to read, write, speak, and understand English, and have knowledge of the fundamentals of U.S. history and government," (also required today).
The first step was the easiest since the immigrant's sponsor (perhaps Maximilian Malich or John Wolf) would vouch for his "good moral character." But how could anyone learn to read and write English while working 12 hour days, six days a week? Schools, lodges and some churches came to the rescue. Principal Matthew Eagleton instituted night classes in English at Garden Place School, the "Slavonian" Lodge, St. Jacob's Croatian Society also held English-language lessons for members, and (after 1916) Denver's Opportunity School. As children learned English in school, they taught their parents, and, by the 1920s, there were radio programs, movies at Globeville's Cozy Theatre and baseball. Once the language was mastered, the study of U.S. history and government could be tackled with the aid of pamphlets containing the questions likely to be asked, such as ""Name the original 13 colonies, How can the president prevent a bill from becoming a law? What is the term of office of a U.S. Representative?" (The Questionnaire shown below was prepared for a Volga-German congregation in Nebraska during the 1900s).
Today's immigrants face the same challenges: a new language, different culture, unfamiliar customs, separation from family and little time to learn English and the fundamentals of U.S. history. There are classes nearby at El Centro San Juan Diego, Trevista Elementary School, Emily Griffith Opportunity School and Holy Rosary Parish Center.

Clases de Ingles: Las Clases de Inglés reinician el día lunes 14 de enero de 10:00 a.m a 12:00 p.m. en el Centro Parroquial. ¡Te esperamos!

Holy Rosary Church
Emily Griffith Opportunity School

Used with written permission from John Werner

English learner at Holy Rosary Parish Center

ESL class at Holy Rosary