Danny Ramsey

For those of you who don't know me, I'm Steve, Danny's son. Thank you all for joining us here today to remember my dad and reflect a little on his life. All of us here knew him in varying degrees, maybe only in one particular context. Those are the personal memories and anecdotes I hope we can all share with each other today.

Dad was born in 1935 in a small town in Indiana and his early years were shaped by the Great Depression. Although he was only six at the time, he retained memories of the attack on Pearl Harbor and the news of the war's end a few years later.

By the time he was in high school he had formed a close friendship with three buddies with whom he adventured through the woods of Canada, camping and traveling by canoe. He loved talking about this experience; I believe it was the first time in his life that he felt independent and carefree.

It wasn't long after high school that he joined the military, becoming a member of an artillery unit, attending officers' training school and becoming a lieutenant. I don't recall him telling any stories about his time in the military or any of the people he knew.

To be sure, Dad related very few stories about his life experiences. It's no surprise to anyone here that my dad was a very private, quiet, introverted man, even shy. He was fond of saying that books were his friends, and if you've been to his home, then you know he had thousands of friends. There was never a time when I didn't remember him deep into a book, mainly current events, history, and politics, subjects that fascinated him immensely.

Upon leaving the military, he got a job working for the telephone company in Ilinois and was soon offered a position in Colorado working with a crazy new machine for handling billing and payroll. It was called a computer. In 1960 he was truly getting in on the ground floor of a technology that literally took up several floors of an office building in Denver.

These were in the days of vacuum tubes and tape drives and he learned to code by reading manuals. Monitors weren't even a thing. Pretty sure he was basically programming using stone knives and bearskins. Data appealed to Dad's analytical brain. He had a strong desire for there to be order, routine, and consistency in his life and in the world. He was always learning. In fact he decided to get a business degree from Regis University when he was 48.

From a very early age, I sensed that Dad was smart because I had no idea exactly what it was, he did. But he drew zeros with a line through them...that was so cool. In fourth grade I had one of those, "What does your parent do?" assignments and had to interview my dad. It was then that I learned he was a "Systems Analyst", a kind of fancier computer programmer, I think. I remember him trying to explain his job by drawing out an if/then logic flow chart, because in order to explain programming to a child, he felt he needed to explain how a computer works. I understood none of this and to be honest, I still don't exactly know what a Systems Analyst does.

One day he gave me a big ream of used dot matrix printer paper with code and green stripes on one side to take to school. The other side was blank, and the entire ream had perforations for detaching individual sheets, kind of like toilet paper. I took this to class, and it became a hit with the teacher who would tear off sheets all year long for coloring, glittering, and macaroni art. Dad also donated a stack of plastic magnetic tape containers that the school used for crayons and other sundries. Clearly, my school was thriving due to technology.

After he met Marilyn, the two of them embarked on new adventures including hiking and cross-country skiing throughout the mountains of this beautiful state. It's important to point out here that Dad loved Colorado, often talking about it with great pride and a reverence for its natural resources, plus he was amused by altitude and how much of a light weight I became whenever he pushed one of his single malt scotches on me. Scotch. In this altitude. Here's a life hack; never drink too much scotch a mile above sea level the night before an early flight to California.

Speaking of scotch, Dad became very interested in his Scottish heritage and formed a lot of friends within the St. Andrews Society. He and Marilyn worked a booth at a few of the Scottish Festivals, and the two of them traveled to Scotland to explore even more. He adored this trip so much and talked about it more then any trip he had ever taken. He even took bagpipe lessons for a while. I'm guessing the neighbors are probably glad that he used a practice chanter rather than an actual bagpipes.

One of the most random adventures he and Marilyn got involved with was hot air ballooning. They got their pilots licenses and bought a balloon and everything! And they were able to take other people for rides, providing them with their own lifetime memories. But seriously, how cool is it to have "He was a hot air balloon pilot" in your eulogy?!

Always passionate about his local natural resources. Dad became a volunteer at Chatfield and Roxborough Parks. Every time I came out for a visit, he loved guiding me on his favorite hikes and reminding me that rattlesnakes are more afraid of me than I am of them.

It's hard to sum up a man's life in such a short time, but his life continues with all of us and everyone else who knew him. It's often the smallest anecdotes and moments that we will carry with us. I remember being a small child and trying to keep up with dad because he walked at an incredibly fast pace, I remember him coaching my baseball team because no other dad could be bothered, I remember helping him adjust the timing on his 1971 station wagon even though I had no idea what that meant. Actually, now that I think about it, I don't remember talking to him about why he loved A Midsummer Night's Dream, and I remember when he bought one of the first CD players so he could listen to his classical music. I will always remember his charming habit of whistling when he was happy and tap dancing in the kitchen. l'll bet a lot of you are trying to picture that right now!

If you have any specific fond memories of my dad, I'd love to hear them when we're all gathering for food.