Speiden fought in both World Wars, attended Yale and received a letter for football while playing on the hockey team, taught in China, worked on Wall Street, and bought a ranch.
Charlie Ohrel, who inherited most of the information about Speiden after his death, summed up Spieden's life with a humorous understatement: "He sure did give it a good shot".
The ranch played host to political figures like the young brothers Joseph & John F. Kennedy, and to senior statesman Barry Goldwater.
After a trip to Honduras that same year, he caught a mysterious virus and was told to head west to the dry heat until his ailment was cured.
A chance meeting with Arthur Brisbane, the famous Hearst newspaper editor, in the spring of 1933 convinced him that he should make the American West his home.
Brisbane told young Speiden that the country was rounding out the bottom of a business cycle, and the smart thing to do was to invest in land commodities.
He acquired a small registered herd of 60 cows which, with the aid of one cowboy, he ran as part of the 76 Ranch in Cochise County.
His cows were raised strictly for breeding purposes and not for the show ring, although they could have undoubtedly held their own against some of the blue ribbon winners of the day.
This method of keeping the grass so high was both aesthetically pleasing and practical, as soil erosion was kept to a minimum and no deep gullies marred the landscape.
The tall pine trees and cooler temperatures made a perfect summer retreat from the exhausting sun.
[6] Speiden was made a member of the National Cowboy Hall of Fame and for a time was the head of the Arizona Hereford Association.
According to an obituary printed in the New York Times on August 2, 1970, John G. F. Speiden ("Arizona Ranchman") died the previous Thursday, July 30, 1970, at the age of 70.
The newspaper noted that "survivors include Caroline Stevens Speiden, a Leith Klauber of Montreal, two sisters Countess Eleanor Davico of Milan, Italy and Dr. Katherine Caddick of London, England and a grand-son".