James Vila Dexter: Leadville’s other millionaire

Article by Lynda La Rocca

Photos by Steve Voynick

Local history – September 2000 – Colorado Central Magazine –

THE OLD SAW, “You can’t judge a book by looking at its cover,” could have been the motto of James V. Dexter.

This wildly successful entrepreneur, financier, and mining investor was one of frontier Colorado’s earliest millionaires. But you’d never guess that from the exterior of his Leadville home, the rough-hewn 1879 log structure known today as the Dexter Cabin Museum.

The inside, however, tells a different story.

The plush interior of Dexter’s 576-square-foot mountain hideaway is fit for, well, a king. That crown, of course, was worn by Dexter’s Leadville contemporary, the flamboyant, scandal-plagued silver magnate H.A.W. Tabor.

But while Tabor was financially ruined by the 1893 repeal of the Sherman Silver Purchase Act, which eliminated federal price supports for silver, Dexter emerged with his fortune intact.

Dexter also maintained decorum in his personal life, remarrying several years after his first wife’s death, not with the soap opera atmosphere of illegal divorce and adultery that surrounded Tabor’s second union.

And while Tabor died nearly penniless in April, 1899, Dexter was still flush at his own death less than two months later.

So just who was James V. Dexter?

“He was a very private person in the way that he handled things,” suggests Larry Frank, director of Leadville’s Healy House and Dexter Cabin Museum. “And he was obviously quite a savvy businessman.”

That’s an understatement.

Born at sea near New Orleans on August 14, 1836, James V. Dexter was, like Tabor, a New Englander at heart. This descendant of a 17th-century Boston colonist entered the Union Army as a First Lieutenant of Artillery at the start of the Civil War. Three years later, he married Lisette Maria DeBar who, by 1869, had borne him four daughters, including twins Adda Maria and Harriet.

At war’s end, the family headed to Illinois, where Dexter worked as a bank president. But word of rich Colorado mineral strikes soon lured them to Denver, where Dexter helped establish the Union Bank, which operated the city’s first safe-deposit business.

IN 1874, Dexter organized two large mining pools in the town of Alma in Park County, where he also acquired a controlling interest in the Moose silver mine, and bought into the James G. Blaine Lode, the Confidence Lode, and the North London mine.

At the height of the Leadville silver rush, Dexter purchased a lot at 110 West Third Street, where in 1879 he built the cabin that would serve as his Leadville residence for the next 16 years.

Dexter’s domicile soon became known as Leadville’s “stiffest and most exclusive private poker club.” And cardplayers would be hard-pressed to find swankier surroundings in which to hold ’em and fold ’em than the Dexter Cabin.

The parlor’s original wall covering, bearing designs of birds, leaves and flowers, was stamped from hand-cut wood blocks made in England. The floors of the three-room cabin are planked with alternating black walnut and white oak in the style of a ship captain’s quarters, reflecting Dexter’s seafaring heritage.

The cabin’s elegance extends to the bedroom, with its Italian-tiled stove and large, built-in wardrobe fronted with the same patterned walnut and oak as the floors. It’s even evident in the bathroom, where wood paneling accents a large, tinned-copper bathtub equipped with the 19th-century luxury of running water.

Curios like a snuffbox made from an elephant’s tooth and an antelope’s-hoof letter opener reflect Dexter’s passion for hunting. Assorted walking sticks, which Dexter could have admired while reclining in his mahogany rocking chair inlaid with mother-of-pearl, represent another of his passions — collecting.

Dexter amassed large quantities of Chinese ivories, jade, oil paintings, and etchings, and spent more than 20 years assembling a magnificent gem collection, making most of his purchases through Tiffany’s in New York City. After Dexter’s death, The Field Museum in Chicago acquired this gem collection for the then-exorbitant sum of $150,000.

HIS EXTENSIVE COIN COLLECTION included a rare 1804 silver dollar, purchased in 1885 for $1,000 and known today as the “Dexter Dollar.”

Minted in late 1834 or early 1835 in Philadelphia, this coin was originally part of one of several complete sets of mint-condition U.S. coins that President Andrew Jackson presented to foreign leaders in recognition of trade agreements.

[Dexter cabin bedroom]

Since silver dollars were not in production at that time, to complete the sets the U.S. Mint produced new coins from new dies bearing the year when the silver dollar was last struck. That, according to Mint records, was 1804.

In reality, however, the 19,570 silver dollars struck in 1804 had actually been dated “1803” or earlier, following a U.S. Mint practice of using dies from previous years if they were still in good condition.

After learning that several U.S. Mint employees had minted a handful of unauthorized 1804 silver dollars to sell for personal profit, Dexter sued the sellers of his coin, demanding proof of its authenticity. He settled the suit in 1887 after obtaining affidavits from top-ranking U.S. Mint officials attesting to the coin’s genuineness.

Today, only fifteen 1804 silver dollars are known to exist. Dexter’s set a record price for a rare coin when it was sold in 1989 — for $990,000.

Literally speaking, Dexter’s properties and mining interests were his most extensive collections. He was a stockholder in more than two dozen Colorado mines and mining companies, including the Climax Lode on Leadville’s Fryer Hill, Gilpin County’s Dexter Lode, and the Southern Boy in Teller County.

DEXTER WAS ALSO a great believer in diversification, owning a ranch on the Conejos River where he raised cattle and horses, a second cattle ranch in Douglas County, and property in Denver, Pagosa Springs, and Oakland, California. He built an opulent, three-story home on Champa Street in Denver in 1881, where he and his family frequently summoned guests to soirées with invitations printed by Tiffany’s.

The San Luis Valley provided Dexter with additional opportunities: there he owned property in Crestone, Moffat and Alamosa, leased part of the Medano Ranch near the Great Sand Dunes as private hunting grounds, and purchased the Valley View Springs near Villa Grove, a mineral hot springs that became one of his favorite rest and relaxation retreats.

But Dexter’s prize possession was Inter-Laken in the village of Twin Lakes south of Leadville, which he acquired for $3,250 on May 9, 1881, and proceeded to turn into one of the West’s most luxurious year-round resorts. [See the following article] Between 1883 and 1890, Dexter continued adding to his original 80-acre purchase until the Inter-Laken property sprawled over 2,147 acres.

Dexter died at Valley View Springs on May 23, 1899, at age 62, an immensely wealthy man who left behind $10,000 in his personal checking account alone — when a good annual wage was $1,000.

So while James V. Dexter’s name may not be as famous as H.A.W. Tabor’s, his achievements are certainly no less impressive.

Lynda La Rocca lives near Leadville, and also writes for some of the many magazines which pay better than Colorado Central.