Ernest Richard AKA Dickie we will miss you

Dickie with his women, his favorite place to be!

He ran for 3 hours. It was a hot spring day on Cedar Mesa in Utah and a group of male cross-country runners in the environmental studies class had made the steep canyon ascent more quickly than the rest of the group. When they hit the open desert at the top and finally a fence demarking BLM land, they abandoned their maps and campuses and went right when they should have gone left. Dick would say for years after, “It is always the boys that get lost; they are too certain of themselves and always confidently select the exact wrong direction.” And that day was no exception. Dick, strong from years of coaching and marathon running, ran for 3 hours to catch that group of boys and compassionately led them in the right direction.

Born on April 3rd, 1943, to Mabel and William Boggs, Dick was the third of five children, junior to Lloyd and Bill, senior to Forest and Gwen. Together with his brothers and sister, Dick grew up picking apples, making Boggs’ Family Chocolates, playing football, running on the track team and befriending every lonely kid in the Fort Collins School District. Gay, straight, rich or poor, Dick Boggs was the friend every kid wished they could have. Dick loved to learn but was as much a student of life as of school. The learning that he did working at a Ranch outside of Walden, CO was as much a teacher to him as was his formal education. It was as a ranch hand that he became mother to a tiny chick that had lost its leg and learned to appreciate the curiosity of the crow. After his senior year in high school, Dick biked across Europe on a 1-speed, ascended the Matter horn in a day and learned that strangers often underestimate the abilities of young people.

It was 1965 when Dick was working on a Forest Service trail crew that he met the woman who would become his best friend and wife of 60 years. Their love was solidified the day that Dick happened to encounter an aggressive rattle snake; sad to have had to kill it, Dick carried it in one hand while riding his motorcycle, a gift, frozen in a heart-shaped valentine’s box, to Evelyn. She fried it up and they ate it for dinner! Together, Dick and Evelyn completed their Bachelor’s degrees at Colorado State University. Dick’s degree in Physical Education was the root of his passion for environmental, and outdoor education. With each experience in higher education, Dick gained steam, learning how to work around his own barriers to learning. He earned two Master’s degrees, one from CSU and one from Slippery Rock University, in Biology and Special Education.

In 1968, Dick’s first daughter, Christi was born and Dick, once again, fell in love. He adored everything about having a daughter and was elated in 1971 to have another. Holly’s arrival meant not just one but two little girls pulling on his beard while they sat on his lap and somehow he also managed to play the guitar and sing a song he wrote for them, “I’m daddy, I’m so gladdy”.

Dick was a teacher. For over 30 years, he taught Physical Education, Environmental Studies, Biology, and special education. A cornerstone of the Leadville teacher’s network, Dick was an advocate for students and for faculty. Dick was a coach. Hundreds of Leadville Track and Field athletes realized their potential under the tutelage of Coach Boggs. 

Dick taught Evelyn, Christi and Holly how to be in nature. Each summer, he mapped and navigated backpacking, canyoneering, bicycling, and kayaking journeys. To name just a few, they forged Alaska’s inner passage, lived for months in a Utah Canyon, biked the hills of the Yorkshire Dales, and climbed Hawaiian volcanoes. Dick was happiest with a map, a compass and the company of his women!

Dick was a news junkie. He could often be found with a hand radio, headphones and whatever project he was working to complete. Whether there was a fence to be built, a bike to be repaired or passive solar to be installed, no task was too big, or too small for Dick to take on. In fact, on the one summer that the Boggs family decided to stay in Leadville, he built the entire second story sunroom on the house. His work seemed to be fueled by the flow of change in the news. Nothing speaks more transparently to Dick’s strength than his resolve to listen to news from across political parties. Whether he agreed or disagreed, he would listen. But Dick was never so busy listening to news that he would not take a break to be with his family. He would glow with pride whenever Christi or Holly achieved a new feat. Beaming, he would say, “That’s a my girl!”!

In 1998, Dick became the grandfather of the University of Wyoming Nordic Ski Team. And later, the Jeffco Nordic Team. He opened his home to hundreds of skiers and for each, he facilitated the Slow Twitch Versus Fast Twitch Muscle Fiber Hair Test. The skiers would put their hairs in a dish of water and look very closely at how the hair responded to the water. Dick would compel them to look ever closer until BANG, he hit the table, and the water would leap onto their faces. He taught generations of skiers how to place a dollop of whip cream on the back of their hand, hit the hand with the other hand and catch the whip cream in their mouths. Dick gave everyone in his life the gift of laughter and there is arguably no gift more precious.

In 2021, Dick and Evelyn moved to Laramie and settled into the other half of Christi and Rachel’s duplex. Dick spent years caring for Evelyn in every stage of dementia. One would think that his exhaustion from this long and devastating journey would prevent him from ever wanting to be a caretaker again. Yet, only months after Evelyn passed, Dick began volunteering at the Senior Center. He washed dishes and delivered Meals on Wheels. If he could have, he would have delivered each and every one of those meals using his bicycle!

Dick passed on April 5th, just less than 1-year after losing Evelyn. I saw him for the last time on Zoom, on his 82nd Birthday. He saw only my hand as I gave the patented “Dick” wave, pulling on my elbow shirt sleeve and pretending that it caused my hand to lift like the hand of a puppet. Dick’s tricks, jokes, love for learning, passion for adventure and capacity for laughter will live on in his brothers, their family, his daughters, son in-law, his many ‘ski team babies’, their babies and even Christi, Rachel, Becca, Tobias, Holly, and Holly’s furry babies.