Ike Pendergraff “knew he wanted to study people,” so he got a bachelor’s degree in sociology and anthropology, said his wife, Sandra Diggs Pendergraff.
But Ike Pendergraff, who died of a heart attack at 61, found his niche in studying people in another way: being a school counselor.
Pendergraff, of Louisville, was an ordained American Baptist Church minister “but he decided he liked the one-on- one” relationship rather than having a congregation, his wife said.
“He was fabulous at his job,” said co-worker Andrea Dirck, special education teacher at Bear Creek Elementary School, where Pendergraff worked until retiring in 2003.
“He cared about kids and treated them with dignity and compassion,” Dirck said.
She said Pendergraff was so good that sometimes staff members “went to him too.”
Pendergraff worked with special-needs kids, including those who were homeless, victims of abuse or from broken homes.
“There are always kids in a crisis mode,” Dirck said. “The kids felt safe and comfortable with him. They never dreaded going to see him.”
Isaac Beverly Pendergraff Jr. was born in Brenham, Texas, on April 15, 1947, and graduated from Pickard High School there.
He attended Paine College in Augusta, Ga., for two years and then transferred to Colorado State University in Fort Collins, earning bachelor’s and master’s degrees in sociology and anthropology.
He earned a doctor of ministry degree at the University of Chicago and was certified to do clinical pastoral work.
He was an Army chaplain and spent nearly three years at Hunter Army Airfield in Savannah, Ga.
His doctoral dissertation was “The Military Chaplain as Clarifier, Mediator and Soldier’s Advocate: The Case of Conscientious Objection Within the Military.”
He married Sandra Elizabeth Diggs on Sept. 22, 1974. They had met in graduate school.
He earned a master’s in social work at the University of Denver, and was a school social worker in the St. Vrain Valley School District and at an Englewood mental health center before going to Jefferson County.
“He thought he could be more helpful to young people,” his wife said.
In addition to his wife, he is survived his daughter, Erika Jewel Pendergraff of Westminster, his mother, Lois Wright, of Boulder and his sister, Veronica Pendergraff-Woods of Corpus Christi, Texas.
Virginia Culver: 303-954-1223 or vculver@denverpost.com
