Richard “Dick” Monroe, who died Aug. 30 in Denver at age 77, was a devout old-school Colorado skier, relying on skis that were relics compared with the pricey high-tech version sported by today’s skiers.
Monroe was easy to pick out from a line of skiers and snowboarders dressed like models from extreme adventure magazines. He was the one wearing an enormous smile along with the outdated green ski jacket and black nylon britches, impatient for another run on the slopes.
Born in Michigan and raised in Colorado, he graduated from Denver’s South High School, spent two years in the Army and then began an apprenticeship as a printer.
It took six years to perfect the laborious, exacting science of setting lead type backward in the wood-and-metal sticks used for hot-type printing presses. He became expert at reading backward and upside down, a skill that sometimes came in handy when he was off-duty.
Upon becoming a journeyman printer in mid-1948, Monroe began working alongside his father, a printer at The Denver Post. He amiably weathered the early technological changes and happily worked a shift that traded one weekend day for a weekday.
Being off on Mondays meant fewer crowds on the highways and ski slopes.
First, automatic teletype machines, using paper tape filled with coded punches, appeared, replacing the Linotype operators whose keyboards assembled lead type in the composing sticks.
Then, by the late 1960s, hot type succumbed to cold type. Typesetters in darkrooms set headlines, one letter at a time, directly onto negative film that was developed, proofread and printed on photographic paper.
In 1989, when computer design replaced cold type, Monroe decided it was time to resign from the job that, in his view, no longer presented a tangible challenge.
With more time on his hands, he became a recreational athlete. Every day, until two weeks before his death, Monroe rode his bicycle – like his skis, an aging model more serviceable than ostentatious – on a circuit through his neighborhood.
He also ran marathons. He liked to boast that he became a grandfather the same year that he completed his first marathon.
A memorial service will be held at 8:30 a.m. Wednesday at Horan & McConaty Family Chapel, 3101 S. Wadsworth Blvd., followed by interment at Fort Logan National Cemetery.
Survivors include his wife, Jeanne Monroe of Denver; sons Richard Monroe Jr. and Mike Monroe, both of Denver; daughter Nan Kohart of Hill City, Kan.; sister Marylyn Waller of Parker; five grandchildren; and one great-grandson.
Staff writer Claire Martin can be reached at 303-820-1477 or cmartin@denverpost.com
