Ben Myer Bernalillo County, New Mexico

Ben Myer, now a member of the real estate firm of Wootton & Myer, is one of the oldest and most widely known among the pioneer inhabitants of Albuquerque. He was born in Germany, and at the age of seventeen years came to the United States. In 1862 he was a resident of Louisville. Kentucky, but soon after his arrival his relatives in that city sent him to California to prevent him from following his inclination to enlist in the Confederate army. In Solano County, California, he was engaged in merchandising for twelve years, and during his residence there was married in San Francisco in 1872. In the fall of that year the gold excitement at Denver attracted him to the latter city, where he established a grocery store. Soon afterward he sold this business and went to Trinidad, where for a few months he bought wool for the firm of Nusbaum & Epstein. In the summer of 1874 he drove to Santa Fe and thence made his way to Old Albuquerque in August of that year. For several years he continued to buy wool for the Trinidad firm, and in the meantime, in 1876, he established a general store on the Rio Puerco, twenty-five miles west of Albuquerque, where he remained until 1882, being the first of the eastern men to locate in business in that vicinity.

In the fall of 1882 Mr. Myer returned to Albuquerque and entered the real estate business in the growing new town, and four years later began acting as attorney for numerous individuals who had claims against the United States government on account of Indian depredations. Since that time he has handled about six hundred thousand dollars in claims of this character, and has secured many adjustments in favor of his clients. Claims aggregating about two hundred thousand dollars are still pending before the United States court of claims.

Mr. Myer is a charter member of the Masonic lodge, in which he is a past master.

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Source: History of New Mexico, Its Resources and People, Volume II, Pacific States Publishing Co., 1907.