Background
Bowen was born on October 26, 1835, near Burlington, Iowa.
Bowen was born on October 26, 1835, near Burlington, Iowa.
Bowen was educated at an academy in the neighboring town of Mt. Pleasant.
Bowen was elected to the Iowa House of Representatives in 1856 from Wayne County. In 1858, he moved to Kansas where he engaged in the practise of law until the outbreak of the Civil War.
During the war, he was advanced from captain of the 1st Regiment of Nebraska Volunteers to colonel of the 13th Kansas Infantry and to the rank of brigadier-general by brevet. When the Confederacy collapsed he was stationed in Arkansas, and there he remained to take an active part in the reorganization of the state government; he was president of the constitutional convention held under the Reconstruction Act of 1867, and for four years served as a judge of the state supreme court.
In 1871, he was appointed governor of Idaho Territory, but after about a week in Boise he resigned, the work and environment not being to his liking. Again he busied himself in Arkansas reconstruction politics, only to be defeated in 1873 by Stephen W. Dorsey in an attempt to win a seat in the United States Senate.
In 1875, Bowen moved to Colorado; after a few months in Denver he went to Del Norte, a new town in the San Luis Valley, where he established a law office and became interested in mining ventures. So poor was he at this time that he is said to have walked over half the distance between Denver and Del Norte. He made friends easily, and in 1876, shortly after the organization of the new state government, was elected judge of the fourth judicial district of Colorado.
The most famous case that came before him was one that grew out of the rivalry between the Denver & Rio Grande and the Santa Fé railways for the control of the Royal Gorge. The struggle, legal and physical, had been in progress fully a year when attorneys for the Denver & Rio Grande appeared in Judge Bowen's court in the little Mexican village of San Luis and asked for an injunction restraining the Santa Fé from transacting business in Colorado on the ground that it was a foreign corporation. In spite of charges made in open court by the attorneys for the Santa Fé that the judge was biased, Bowen refused a change of venue and granted the injunction; a few days later his decision was set aside by Judge Moses Hallett in Denver, although the courts later, in effect, sustained Bowen's action.
He resigned his judgeship, was elected to the lower house of the Colorado legislature in 1882, and in the following year, after a prolonged fight in the Republican caucus, was elected to the United States Senate.
He served the full term of six years (1883 - 89) without distinction. When he retired from the Senate he was practically penniless; again he engaged in mining, and again he found a fortune.
His last years were spent in Pueblo, Colorado; at his death, he was survived by his wife. He is interred at Roselawn Cemetery in Pueblo.
As a judge, Bowen was fearless, but lacking in any sense of judicial dignity either on or off the bench. His knowledge of the law was not profound, but he was shrewd and clever if not always impartial. His most famous case was one that grew out of the rivalry between the Denver & Rio Grande and the Santa Fé railways for the control of the Royal Gorge. He was also successful in his military career being advanced from captain of the 1st Regiment of Nebraska Volunteers to colonel of the 13th Kansas Infantry and to the rank of brigadier-general by brevet. Promoted Colonel in 1863, he commanded a brigade with the Seventh Army Corps for the entire Frontier Campaign. After Bowen resigned his judgeship, he was elected to the lower house of the Colorado legislature in 1882. And then in 1883, after a prolonged fight in the Republican caucus, he was elected to the United States Senate, where he served the full term of six years (from 1883 until 1889). However, he found a fortune engaging in mining and serving as a chairman of the Committee on Mining (in the Forty-eighth Congress).
In his political affiliation Thomas Bowen was a Republican, and in 1883 he was elected to the United States Senate from the Republican side, serving until 1889.
After Bowen had established his own law office in Del Norte, a new town in the San Luis Valley, he became interested in mining ventures.
He was tall and slender, slovenly in dress, breezy in manner, open-handed, loyal to his friends, a boon companion. He had a ready tongue and a nimble wit.
Quotes from others about the person
In the words of one of his successors in the Senate, "Bowen achieved some distinctions but ignored or despised their responsibilities. "
Thomas Meade Bowen was married to Margaretta Thurston, while residing in Arkansas.
1780 - 18 July 1857
27 July 1790 - 20 October 1865
30 January 1832 - 14 June 1902
5 August 1809 - 23 June 1845
1825 - 14 February 1857
1813 - 17 November 1854
1819 - 22 July 1902
1836 - 19 April 1907
1839 - 2 February 1907
1857 - 28 December 1897
