Roberta Denham was always game for life and “whenever fun reached out she embraced it,” said the Rev. Sandy Blake, associate pastor at Denham’s church.
Denham was on a trip she’d planned for months when she suffered a heart attack and died in a hospital in Gettysburg, Pa.
A service is planned at 2 p.m. today at St. Timothy’s Episcopal Church in Centennial.
Denham, 65, and her son, Scott Denham, were on a motor trip to see historic sites when she took ill while they were watching a parade. She died Oct. 26 of a heart attack.
She had often mentioned to friends that she always wanted to sit on the back of a pickup, riding in a parade and waving to the people. The two were watching a Halloween parade. “She was talking and laughing, having a good time when she started feeling ‘woozy,’ ” he said.
It was going to be a six-month trip when they left Sept. 30, said her daughter, Sharon Denham of Englewood.
They planned to finish at Disney World and, after returning to Colorado, Roberta Denham planned to move to Montrose. She’d already packed her things.
The trip wasn’t first class. Sometimes they slept in the car and bought groceries to make their meals, said Scott Denham. Friends had given them gift cards for motels, said Denham, of Buena Vista.
Lack of money never bothered Roberta Denham, said her daughter. “She did whatever she set out to do.”
Denham and her son had visited Dodge City, the Great Lakes, Niagara Falls and the Gettysburg National Military Park and were planning to go through New England and Washington, D.C.
“You never knew where she would go,” said another son, Steve Denham of Clark Fork, Idaho.
“Roberta was a possibility person,” said Blake.
She rode a camel when she visited Israel last year and told a friend that she wanted to “dance with Mickey Mouse at Disney World on Christmas.”
Denham worked for 27 years in the Colorado Department of Agriculture, but she gave huge amounts of time to her church and as a volunteer at the state Capitol, where she helped plan and lead tour groups, said Edna Pelzmann, who was in charge of volunteers
“She was incredible, very bubbly and friendly,” said Pelzmann of Westminster. “She made it fun for everyone.”
Pelzmann will read a tribute from the General Assembly at the service.
Roberta Ann Hessler was born on July 1, 1945, in Hudson and graduated from Fort Collins High School.
She married Geoffrey Denham on Oct. 11, 1963. They divorced in 1974.
In addition to her children she is survived by five grandchildren and her sister, Rosemary Muse of Fort Lupton.
Virginia Culver: 303-954-1223 or vculver@denverpost.com
