Dearfield: J.H.P Westbrook

Dr. Joseph H.P. Westbrook was born in 1878 in Mississippi, graduating from Fisk College and Meharry Medical College in Nashville. He moved to Denver in 1907 to start his medical practice, quickly becoming a prominent African American leader of the state. He served the local National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) chapter, the YMCA, and Denver’s Interracial Commission, to name a few. Westbrook was one of the original supporters of the Colorado Negro Business League's work to establish a colony, and filed one of the first 16 claims at Dearfield. He also is quoted as having named the townsite. In a community meeting planning the homestead colony, he said that the fields would “be very dear to us, so why not incorporate that sentiment in the name we select and call our colony Dearfield?" He relinquished his claim at Dearfield in 1914. After his involvement in Dearfield, Westbrook was drawn to action by rising Ku Klux Klan attacks in Denver. In the 1930’s he infiltrated the Klan as a light-skinned Black man to warn the community of the groups upcoming actions. Westbrook passed in 1939, at age 61, allegedly worn out by the stress that going undercover caused him.