Name Hubert Newell Posthumous style none | Religious style Monsignor Spoken style Your Excellency Died September 8, 1987 | |
 | ||
Reference style The Most Reverend | ||
Hubert Michael Newell (February 16, 1904 – September 8, 1987) was an American prelate of the Roman Catholic Church. He served as Bishop of Cheyenne from 1951 to 1978.
Biography
Hubert Newell was born in Denver, Colorado, to Thomas and Ellen (née Taney) Newell; his parents were Irish immigrants from County Galway. A twin himself, he had a total of five siblings, including two sisters and three brothers. Newell studied under the Sisters of Charity of Leavenworth before attending Sacred Heart High School and Regis College. After deciding to embark on an ecclesiastical career, he entered St. Thomas Aquinas Seminary and was ordained to the priesthood by Bishop John Tihen on June 15, 1930.
Newell served as assistant pastor at Our Lady of Sorrows Church in Walsenburg and at Immaculate Conception Cathedral in Denver. He was assistant principal of Cathedral High School from 1933 to 1937, whence he entered the Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C. He there obtained a Master's degree in educational administration in 1938, and was named superintendent of parochial schools upon returning to Denver.
On August 2, 1947, Newell was appointed Coadjutor Bishop of Cheyenne, Wyoming, and Titular Bishop of Zapara by Pope Pius XII. He received episcopal consecration on the following September 24 from Archbishop Urban Vehr, with Bishops Scannel and Philip Garrigan serving as co-consecrators; he was the first native Denverite to become a Catholic bishop. Among those present at Newell's reception was Senator Joseph O'Mahoney.
Newell succeeded Patrick McGovern as the fifth Bishop of Cheyenne upon the latter's death on November 8, 1951. He established the diocesan newspaper, The Wyoming Catholic Register, in 1952 and the Wyoming Council of Catholic Women in 1953. Newell was also a member of the National Catholic Welfare Conference, where he served on the committee for the Confraternity of Christian Doctrine.
He suffered a minor heart attack in April 1961, and attended the Second Vatican Council from 1962 to 1965. On January 3, 1978, after twenty-six years of service, he resigned as Cheyenne's ordinary.
Newell later died at age 83.