FRIENDS RECALL EDITOR'S DRIVE, WARMTH

Governors, members of Congress, journalists, political junkies,
neighbors and friends gathered Saturday for a final farewell to Sue
O'Brien, the editor of The Denver Post editorial page who died of
cancer Aug. 6. Interspersed with the bagpipes, choirs and trumpets was
praise for O'Brien's frankness, fairness and political insights.
Former Colorado first lady Dottie Lamm called her a woman "who
transmitted love and energy into everything she touched."

More than 600 people attended the funeral for O'Brien, 64, at St.
John's Episcopal Cathedral on Capitol Hill.

"You can look at this room and really tell how important Sue was to
Colorado," said William Dean Singleton, publisher of The Post.

O'Brien will leave a void, said Buie Seawell, former head of the
Colorado Democratic Party, a former congressional candidate and now a
teacher at the University of Denver. Seawell gave one of the eulogies.

"For years we will bump into edges of that void," he said. Lamm, who
gave the other eulogy, brought levity to the nearly two-hour service
with a story that "might have ended the careers" of both her husband,
former Gov. Dick Lamm, and O'Brien.

In 1981, when Dottie Lamm was battling breast cancer, O'Brien - then
Lamm's press secretary - was not pleased with the traditional
anti-nausea medication for cancer patients. So O'Brien, going right
past security, brought a "plastic bag of ... marijuana" into the
Governor's Mansion for her, Dottie said.

The dean of the cathedral, the Very Rev. Peter Eaton, responded with,
"now we have the wife of a former governor who admits to possession of
a controlled substance."

The crowd roared.

"We will finish the sacrament (of confession) later, Dottie," he
said.

O'Brien was a Denver journalist for 35 years, working first in radio
(primarily for KOA-AM) and then in television. She worked for Lamm for
five years, then managed former Gov. Roy Romer's first campaign for
governor. She also was an assistant city editor at The Post, taught
journalism at the University of Colorado at Boulder and returned to
The Post in 1995 to head the editorial page.