George O’Malley, who spearheaded the building of 27 new parks in Colorado, died in Porter Hospice on Oct. 31. He was 95.
As director of Colorado State Parks, O’Malley increased the acreage of Colorado parks from 8,000 to more than 150,000, said his daughter Leeann Schott of Englewood.
Among the parks he started were Cherry Creek, Chatfield, Golden Gate and Roxborough. The Roxborough visitors’ center is named for him. He was parks director from 1962 until 1986.
“He took an acorn and made an oak tree,” said Max Bezzani, who was assistant parks director under O’Malley. “Parks were not much more than an idea when he came to Colorado. Parks was a stepchild of the Game, Fish and Parks Department then.
“He was the kind of boss you could only dream of,” said Bezzani, who lives on a ranch in Huerfano County in southern Colorado. “He was a jovial person and a wonderful gentleman.”
O’Malley understood the need for diversity in parks, said his son Brian O’Malley of Centennial. He made sure there was a variety, from walking trails to marinas to parks “just for tranquility.”
O’Malley himself wasn’t a dedicated outdoorsman, though he loved parks.
“He and I went fishing, and Dad said, ‘The only thing that would spoil this is if we caught a fish,’ ” Brian O’Malley said. His dad appreciated the quietness more than cleaning fish.
“We went to a lot of parks, but it was often to make sure the toilet facilities were working,” said Brian O’Malley, laughing.
Before retiring, George O’Malley started another years-long project: reading to elementary school kids in Littleton schools. Because of his knowledge in the natural world, art and science, he was often called on to teach some classes.
He was known as “Grandpa O’Malley” to the children who heard him read. One day he was in a first-grade classroom, bending his 5-foot-10, 250-pound frame onto a small chair, recalled his son Tom O’Malley of Denver.
George O’Malley apparently looked uncomfortable because a little boy next to him patted him on the knee reassuringly and said, “It’s OK. First grade’s a lot like kindergarten.”
At Franklin Elementary School in Littleton, a corridor is named “O’Malley’s Alley” after him.
George O’Malley’s artistic bent included watercolors and hundreds of little drawings, some like caricatures, he put on every memo he sent.
“They were hilarious,” said Brian O’Malley, adding that his dad was particularly good at drawing an arrogant person and putting a funny outfit on the person.
He taught his kids about constellations, cloud formations and scientific names of plants, and had an “uncanny ability to laugh at himself,” Leeann Schott said.
George T. O’Malley Jr. was born in Cleveland on Aug. 6, 1915, and earned a landscape architecture degree at Ohio State University.
He married Nadine Parrish in 1942. They moved to Colorado in 1960. She died last year.
In addition to his sons and daughter, he is survived by another son, Mike O’Malley of Watkins, and another daughter, Molly O’Malley of Littleton; 11 grandchildren; nine great-grandchildren; and his sister, Lois Simon of Centerville, Ohio.
Virginia Culver: 303-954-1223 or vculver@denverpost.com
