158 
SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION 
To support my reference to Mr. Springer as a man of science, I ask you 
to inspect this shelf of works that would be a credit to one who had devoted his 
entire life to scientific pursuits. The majority of you have probably been igno- 
rant of the fact that this silent, modest next door neighbor of yours has been 
steadily publishing scientific contributions that have made him known through- 
out the world. 
So it is a many-sided man that we are honoring tonight. We are celebrating 
his achievements while he is still with us — achievements in science, in law, in 
business and in public affairs. It .seems fitting that one of his old neighbors, who 
has known intimately his legal activities almost from the beginning, should 
speak of Mr. Springer as a lawyer and of his career at the bar. Col. R. E. 
Twitchell has been invited to perform that service. He can speak with the 
authority of the historian. 
The Lawyer and Citizen 
Colonel Twitchell; Dr. Hewett, Ladies and Gentlemen: I consider my having been 
selected for this great privilege a most notable distinction. To be associated in this way in 
these exercises is an honor which seldom comes to a member of our profession. 
I first met IMr. Springer forty years ago, and there are only nine members of the bar 
today living who knew M r. .Springer during all that period. 
Early in the ’90s, I was twice honored with the presidency of the New Mexico Bar Asso- 
ciation, and soon realized that the constructive power in the then “ Territory of New Mexico,” 
the history makers in the development of a great commonwealth, remained largely with the 
legal profession, and became certain that there was no one among the members of the bar in 
the entire territory who would feel like giving his time to the work of recording, biographically 
and otherwise, the efforts and achievements of that constructive element; and so I began a 
series of papers for the Bar Association, dealing with the history of the bench and bar during 
the preceding years of American occupation. That early effort, more than thirty years ago, 
resulted finally in an amplification and concrete compilation which was published a few years 
since. 
In making a historical outline for these papers it became apparent that a certain classi- 
fication was necessary for the reader to properly understand the position which, in certain 
decades, had been filled by the members of the bench and bar. That classification was as to 
time, and it may be repeated here: Those who came with the American Army of Occupation 
in 1846; those who came with Carleton’s column from California during the Civil War 
period ; and those who came shortly before and at the time of the coming of the railways into 
the southwest. Mr. Springer belongs in the last named classification, having come to New 
Mexico in 1873, anticipating the coming of the railways and the creation in a few years of a 
great state in the American Union. 
Had it not been for the panic of 1873, and the failure of the great banking firm of 
Jay Cooke & Co., of Philadelphia, the geography and the history of the states of Colorado 
and New Mexico would not be such as we find it today. Had the efforts which were being- 
made at that time by Mr. Springer and his eastern associates borne fruit, the city of Pueblo 
with all of its industries, all of its environment, in all probability would be located where the 
town of Cimarron, New Mexico, was then situated. The entire proposition of financing of 
the transcontinental I'ailway into the southwest at that time had been consummated, but the 
failure of Jay Cooke & Co. in the panic of 1873 changed the entire status of affairs, and it was 
