People knew Alan “Big Al” Phillips as athletic and seemingly tireless, the sort of man who addressed both physical and metaphysical problems by putting down his head and working harder.
Phillips, a Denver stockbroker and financial adviser, died Feb. 13 at age 78 after a long struggle with complications from severe injuries — including a skull fracture and brain trauma. He sustained the injuries during a bicycle accident several years ago.
He loved cycling and was a three-time participant in the MS 150, a two-day fundraiser for multiple-sclerosis research. One year, Phillips was on the MS 150 with his son, Reid, a bicycle racer, fighting a stubborn headwind.
“I’ll never forget how he just kept pounding out a pace,” Reid Phillips said. “My dad’s attitude was that if something hurt a little bit, then he’d grit his teeth, buckle down and try harder.”
The great-grandson of a Union Army veteran who settled in Grenada in 1873, Phillips grew up in Denver. Throughout his youth and college years, he played basketball and baseball, and was recruited after college to play in the minor leagues for the Denver Bears baseball team.
Instead, he joined the Marine Corps, and played ball for the Marines before leaving the Marines as a major. He remained involved with the Marines, including rallying fellow Marines to attend the annual Marine Corps Birthday Bash at the University Club.
For 10 years, Phillips owned Catamount Ranch and Cattle Co., a working ranch with 600 head of cattle near Vail. On weekends and during the summer, Phillips rounded up his four children and left the family’s Denver home for the ranch.
“The ranch, to him, was a perfect opportunity to introduce his kids to the Western cowboy lifestyle he’d always wanted to have,” Reid Phillips said. “It was never a profitable business, but it was a place near and dear to all of us. I remember one cattle drive that started very, very early in the morning and didn’t finish till way after dark. When we finally made it back to the ranch, I was ready to nod off into my beans.
” ‘You still want to be a rancher, Reid?’ ” he remembers Phillips asking.
“Yeah, Dad,” Reid Phillips, then 11, replied.
Phillips told and re-told that story for years. When finances forced the family to sell the ranch in 1978, Phillips grieved but found solace in long-distance running.
His training runs included a route from the Phillips’ Cheesman Park home to his sister Judi Phillips’ office at County Line Road and Broadway. He often competed in the Bolder Boulder, ran the Mount Evans Marathon one year and enjoyed competing in the party-like atmosphere of the Bay to Breakers race in San Francisco.
Phillips also was a dedicated skier, whose ambition sometimes outpaced his ability, leaving him with even odds of falling when attempting a double-black diamond run.
Survivors include his wife, Sandra Griswold Phillips of Denver; daughter Andrea Phillips of Denver; sons Barclay Phillips of Potomac, Md., Reid Phillips of Vail and Lincoln Phillips of Denver; sisters Judi Phillips of Denver and Barbara Strange of Wickenburg, Ariz.; brothers Don Phillips and Brian Phillips of Scottsdale, Ariz., Hugh Phillips of Porter, Maine, and David Phillips of Phoenix; and six grandchildren.
A memorial will be held at 5 p.m. Monday at the University Club, 1673 Sherman St., Denver.
Claire Martin: 303-954-1477 or cmartin@denverpost.com
