Lou Blonger (May 13, 1849 – April 20, 1924), born Louis Herbert Belonger, was a Wild West saloonkeeper, gambling-house owner, and mine speculator, but is best known as the kingpin of an extensive ring of confidence tricksters that operated for more than 25 years in Denver, Colorado.

The goal of the con was to convince tourists to put up large sums of cash in order to secure delivery of stock profits or winning bets.

In 1922, however, District Attorney Philip S. Van Cise bypassed the Denver police and used his own force, funded by donations solicited in secret from local citizens, to arrest 33 con men, including Blonger, and bring the ring to justice.

Following the path of the newly completed Transcontinental Railroad, they briefly ran a hotel and saloon in Red Oak, Iowa, before moving on to Salt Lake City, Utah and the nearby mining towns of Stockton and Dry Canyon.

In a pattern that repeated itself at many of their stops, Lou owned and operated saloons with assorted entertainments while Sam developed mining claims in the surrounding mountains, served occasionally as a peace officer and, in his spare time, raced horses.

[2] Moving to Colorado in 1879, Lou Blonger took a shot at running a vaudeville theater in Georgetown,[5] while Sam made an unsuccessful bid to become the first mayor of nearby Leadville.

[8] Newspaper accounts indicate that while the brothers engaged in a few shootouts and jailed their share of vagrants, they also took plenty of time off to pursue other interests: prospecting, horse racing, and even running a brothel.

[9] For a couple of months the Blongers were toasted as the solution to the town's law enforcement problem (a previous marshal, Milt Yarberry, had murdered two citizens).

[13] Lou spent the next few years in the New Mexico towns of Silver City, Deming, and Kingston, living at least part of the time with Frank Thurmond, a well-known gambler, and his wife, Carlotta Thompkins (better known as Lottie Deno).

[16] In addition to hosting the typical array of poker and faro tables, the Blongers' operation also branched out into the "policy racket" (also known as the "numbers game"), an illegal lottery that paid out on a daily basis.

In addition to making direct payments to authorities, Sam and Lou Blonger also engaged in election fraud for candidates from both parties, from Denver mayor Wolfe Londoner in 1890[17] to Congressman Robert W. Bonynge in 1902.

[23] A third partner of note was J. W. McCulloch, manufacturer of Green River Whiskey, who supposedly traded 20 barrels of his product for a piece of Lou Blonger's stake.

[23] Lou and Sam Blonger claimed, bought, traded, and sold several mines in their lives, but both held onto the Forest Queen to the end, leaving their interest to their wives.

[25] As his gang branched out into bigger and more complicated "big cons" that attracted a more well-to-do clientele, Lou Blonger found he no longer needed his saloon and the relatively small take it provided from card and dice games.

[26] With Duff handling the details of coordinating gang members and scheduling locations for the scams, Blonger was free to conduct the business of schmoozing public officials and bribing law enforcement, all while cultivating the image of a model citizen.

Gang members were specifically instructed not to solicit victims from Colorado, concentrating instead on out-of-state tourists who would find it difficult to help prosecute a criminal case.

[30] Meanwhile, Lou Blonger expanded the gang's home base from Denver, where it operated only during the warmest months, southward to Miami and Havana, Cuba.

[31] During the 1920 primary election for Denver district attorney, Blonger approached Republican Party candidate Philip S. Van Cise and offered assistance in the way of campaign contributions and votes.

Van Cise monitored Blonger's trash, spied on him from a building across the street, and had a Dictaphone installed surreptitiously inside his office (an action that did not require a search warrant at the time).

[35] While the con men plied their trade openly on the streets of Denver, Van Cise and his assistants plotted a huge roundup that required a willing victim to help catch the gang in the act.

Entering the lobby of the Brown Palace Hotel, Norfleet was hooked by unwitting gang members who saw him as an easy mark, and the plan was set in motion.

[36][37] The posse assembled early on the morning of August 24, 1922: eighteen Colorado Rangers to arrest the gang members and several private citizens to chauffeur them to a holding cell in the basement of the First Universalist Church.

Co-publisher Harry Heye Tammen was a close friend of Blonger's, but his partner Fred Bonfils ordered the paper's editors to end the embargo and support Van Cise and the prosecution of the "Million-Dollar Bunco Ring".

After four days of deliberations, with three jurors still favoring acquittal, Okuly played his ace, telling the holdouts "the difference between me and you is that I got my five hundred dollars, but turned it over to the Judge, and you've still got yours.

In the days after his conviction, while he was still battling to stay out of prison, Blonger received a final blow when the Denver Post revealed that he had led a double life for 20 years, living with his wife, Nola, on weekends and a mistress, Iola Readon, during the week.

Blonger received an uncontested divorce in 1889 on the grounds of desertion and quickly married 30-year-old Cora "Nola" Lyons (née Morehouse), who was said in younger days to have been a "successful variety actress.

Upon Nola's death the remainder of Blonger's estate, including his interest in the Forest Queen Mine, passed to her fourth husband, William J.