RIP Eddie B.

While I didn't know Eddie very well on a personal level, I would see him out at almost every single event I've been to over the last 3+ years... probably longer than that though but wasn't aware of him much until I had met his acquaintance. The man was a dancing maniac, a lady's man, and the life of the party. He wasn't necessarily the type that I could ever see myself relating to closely, but knowing how deeply he touched so many of my friends and also knowing how great it was to say what's up to him every time I saw him... I know that I'll miss his presence in the scene.

Eddie B

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BENNETT, EDWARD Edward "Eddie" Angelo Bennett, 25, of Denver, passed away June 15, 2008. Son of Frank and Carla Bennett; brother of Heather (Larry) Reeder, Rachel (Chris) Barnes, and Sean Bennett. Also survived by wife Candice Clark and by two nephews and a niece, as well as many other relatives and friends. Service: Saturday, June 21, 10am, First Mennonite Church, 430 West 9th Ave., Denver. In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to Colorado CASA, 1490 Lafayette St. Suite 207, Denver, CO 80218 or Colorado Coalition of Adoptive Families, P.O. Box 270398 Louisville, CO 80027-0398.

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http://www.rockymountainnews.com/new...e-underground/

JOHNSON: Eddie B. - king of the underground

By Bill Johnson
Friday, June 20, 2008

It was late Tuesday night and they were all standing on the sidewalk, the overflow spilling onto 15th Street downtown, their still-saddened faces lit by the soft glow of dozens of flickering candles.
Now and then, someone would walk up to place a small bouquet of flowers - roses, carnations, a lily or two - in the spaces between the candles, before bowing their heads and muttering a few words.
Clearly, someone had died. Such memorial displays have become commonplace these days, mostly at the scene of car wrecks, fatal shootings and the like. Few, though, are ever assembled at such a late hour.

What I learned, having pulled over to inquire into it, was there could not have been a better hour scheduled.
This was, I found out, Eddie Bennett's hour, the near-midnight hour of the day when he and those he surrounded himself with came alive, the hour when for years he went to work pulling varied groups of young people together for a long night's revelry.
Very few of those standing in the street that night to mourn Eddie Bennett were over 30. Make it 25. Some, I'd hazard, were this close to violating curfew.

Yet there they stood, candle wax oozing and bubbling on the pavement, more than a few staring up at the tall building that loomed before them, undoubtedly envisioning the long drop Eddie Bennett took that night.
Denver police say they still have not figured out whether the 25-year-old man's fall from the top floors of the 42- story Brooks Tower at 15th and Champa last weekend was intentional or accidental, only that he was the second person to die from a fall from the landmark high-rise in three years.
Either way, to those who came to mourn him it does not matter. Eddie mattered, they said. And his life should not be remarked upon publicly or remembered solely by the manner in which he died.
"Eddie B." is how they all called him. Oddly, few knew much of his personal and family life, even Jeremy Hoff, 25, of Denver, who was a partner with Eddie Bennett for three years in Skywire Production Co., a lighting and concert promotion firm.

All that he knew of his personal life was that he was adopted when he was young. He never much brought up his family, he said.
No, Eddie Bennett's life, it was explained, was devoted to Denver's night scene. It was something that I, admittedly - or, for that matter, anyone else who can remember Ronald Reagan first taking office - could possibly know little about.
"I met him in the scene," Jeremy Hoff explained. "We got close. We had a tight crew of friends who hung out and ran together."
The scene? Your crew?
"You know," he tried to explain, "the ravers, club kids - all the people who like electronic music and the clubs."
He might have well been speaking Russian. He clearly understood this.
"I'm talking about the electronic party scene," Jeremy Hoff said slowly. "Eddie was the king of it, who made people, whether they were 15 or 50 years old, a part of that world, a man who was accepting of all races, all types of people."

If you went to a club, an underground party, a rave, well, you would immediately know Eddie Bennett, he said.
"He would walk into a room full of people and put a smile on everyone's face," Eric Soderlund, 20, explained. "He was an artist, a very unique person, a guy who touched a lot of lives."
This was apparent in the sea of faces that swarmed 15th Street Tuesday night: white kids, black, Hispanic and Asian. To them, those who frequented this unfamiliar-to-a-middle-aged-man world with its night-owl hours and language, he was a welcoming, pied-piper king.
"Look, you are never going to understand," Leah Hlewko finally said. Eighteen years old, she had worked as a go-go dancer at a variety of events Eddie Bennett staged.

"He was the glue that kept the whole crew together," she explained. "He united so many people who you would think would never party or even be seen together. Because of him, I have met a million people I would never have met, ever."
He was visiting a friend that night, Jeremy Hoff said softly.
"Did he kill himself? That's the rumor going around. And yeah, he had his problems, here and there," he said.
What he and everyone else has heard, he said, is that Eddie knocked on the door of his friend's home on the 39th floor, that when he was let in, he eased through and dived off the balcony.

"To the people close to him, who knew him, that story is skeptical," Jeremy Hoff said. "We're just not sure. It would make me feel better knowing, but that story sounds just too simple."
As the last of the candles began to flicker out, the few remaining mourners began making plans to host a free underground party in Eddie B.'s memory.
Though I understood half of what they were trying to explain to me, I left feeling glad that I had stopped.
I'm happy to be able share a few words about the king of underground Denver.

© Rocky Mountain News

Mr Edward "Eddie" Bennett

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