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Jori Johnson was in her office in January 2025 when a History Colorado volunteer appeared at her door, holding a photo that didn’t seem to make sense. The picture was taken in 1902 and showed two unnamed couples dressed in traditional Japanese attire. It had been filed in a folder labeled “Boettchers,” yet that famous socialite couple wasn’t in the shot.
Another one, however, was. Johnson, who helps oversee the museum’s collections, immediately recognized Margaret “Molly” Brown and her husband, J.J. She couldn’t place the other couple, though the inscription offered a clue: “From Mr. and Mrs. J.C. Drayton to Their Esteemed Friend Mrs. C. Boettcher. Yokohama.” Rather than solve the mystery, however, these words only added to the intrigue.
Through months of research, Johnson discovered that J.C. Drayton was a real person who had married into the Astor dynasty—he just wasn’t in that photo. Sitting opposite the Browns, it turned out, was a man named Harry Silverberg, an infamous conman whose schemes ensnared some of Colorado’s most notable turn-of-the-century families. “He was good at sliding his way into whatever group of people he was in,” Johnson says. “It gives me a little bit of the Catch Me If You Can vibes.”
Born in Georgia around 1870, Silverberg lived comfortably with his businessman father and siblings in Arkansas until he embezzled from the family’s chain of stores. He skipped town for California, later making his way to Europe, where in the late 1890s he assumed Drayton’s identity. Silverberg eventually got caught in Germany for stealing jewels and was deported back to America.
Still going as Drayton, he married a Texas ranch owner and relocated to Colorado in his early 30s. Silverberg worked an honest advertising job in Denver and ingratiated himself with the city’s wealthy and powerful; Governor Charles S. Thomas even tasked him with raising funds for a statue that would feature in a mining display at the Paris Exhibition. Silverberg took off with the money in 1900 and set out for Asia with a mysterious “Ms. Susette.” They were entertained there by Indian socialites and dignitaries and even hobnobbed with the king of Siam. In Japan, Silverberg and Ms. Susette met the Browns, who were unaware of his criminal exploits. They found out soon enough: Silverberg claimed to be J.J. at the Browns’ hotel and wired himself $5,000.
By 1904, he’d returned to Colorado. Working under Polly Pry, the Denver Post reporter who had helped prospector turned cannibal Alfred Packer win a retrial, Silverberg tried to squeeze $1,000 out of a Colorado Springs socialite by telling her he could swing public opinion in her favor during her divorce. She contacted the paper, which dispelled the ruse. Silverberg fled to South America, where he convinced the Chilean president to let him build a railroad and instead bilked investors out of hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Johnson could find no mention of Silverberg after the 1920s and believes he died under an assumed name. Despite his misdeeds, the historian feels a type of affinity for him. “This man was walking in glorified society,” Johnson says. “No wonder he wanted to keep scamming and not just be an advertising agent.”
Read More: Meet the Con Artist Who Deceived the Front Range Tech Community
More Notorious Denver Con Artists
Jefferson “Soapy” Smith
The late 19th-century grifter sold soaps (he claimed a $100 bill was hidden in some wrappers) in Denver and charged admission to see a prehistoric man (a 10-foot-tall statue) in Creede.
Lou Blonger
His syndicate, which from the 1890s to the 1920s used everything from loaded dice to phony stock schemes to prey on Denver tourists, inspired Paul Newman and Robert Redford’s The Sting.
Eli Regalado
A Denver pastor, Regalado and his wife recently swindled followers out of $3.3 million through a cryptocurrency scam, spending thousands on home renovations because “the Lord told us to.”
Read More: The Most Infamous Criminals at ADX Florence, Colorado
