Richard Joe Tibbits

RICHARD TIBBITS On the morning of October 5, 2015, Richard passed away peacefully in his home surrounded by his family. Richard was 92 years old. A celebration of Richard's life will be held at the Dolores Community Center in Dolores Colorado at 2:00 pm on October 17, 2015. Richard was born June 28, 1923 up the Dolores River Valley on the Joe Tam place across from the Stapleton Bridge to Fred Leroy Tibbits and Lena Edith (Tam) Tibbits. Richard graduated from Dolores High School in May 1941. Self admittedly, Richard was ornery, mischievous and a practical joker. He shared many stories of all his exploits when he was growing up in Dolores. On Richard's 18th birthday he joined the United States Army Air Corps, with two of his Dolores buddies, Gordon Smith and Victor Sundquist. He served with the 449th Air Service Group. On July 27, 1943 halfway through his stint in service, Richard married his beautiful sweetheart Evelyn Fern Prichett whose family was from Rico but had later relocated to Dolores. Richard and Evelyn went on to share 72 glorious years together. Following their wedding they moved to Albany Georgia, where they lived for the better part of a year. Then Richard was shipped overseas and his bride came back to Dolores to wait for him while working as a telephone operator. Richard was discharged on November 15, 1945 when the war and his four-year commitment ended. Richard lived a full rewarding life with many ventures he was proud of. Throughout Richard's life he met many different people, shook countless hands and was honored to call so many his friends. He liked to tell people he had friends from A to Z, in fact he had so many special friendships it is to hard to list them all. However, two people that Richard and Evelyn truly shared a genuine friendship with were Swede and Kathleen Ferando. Much of their free time was spent together. His family however, was his number one priority. He was a true FAMILY man. Richard was smart and kind and always had a smile on his face. Richard had a passion for cooking. He never followed recipes for he loved to make up his own. He took special care to include everyone in the preparations of the meals as well as in the enjoyment of eating them. He had a gift for bringing people together whether it was his family or friends throughout his life. Richard's family shares so many joyous memories of the picnics they shared together. Richard also liked to say the blessings before meals. Each blessing was spoken with genuine and sincere tidings. Richard loved the great outdoors, fishing, hunting or just walking. He enjoyed spending time with Evelyn improving their home, working in the yard or caring for the garden. Richard had a green thumb especially when it came to growing cabbages. Richard was never idle. He always stayed busy. He liked carpentry work and masonry work. He was proud of the beautiful walls he built around their home. Richard always had a knack for finding the best way to do a job, a skill that served him well when he started his own businesses. As a young man Richard worked in the potato cellars where he was noted for being very fast at cutting potatoes for planting. The area around Dolores provided a wealth of timber and Richard went to work for his Dad who was a foreman of Montezuma Lumber Company where he readied trees for harvest with crosscut or two-man saws. When the first power saws arrived, work became much more efficient. Meanwhile, there was an apple orchard in the Lebanon area that belonged to Richard's in-laws and later became part of the Tibbits Brothers Holdings. The orchard later became a place for the family cattle operation. Richard built the first Colorado Dairy Queen in Cortez. The franchise was the first to offer food in addition to ice cream and beverages. Somewhere he found time to build the Sportsman Center, which he hardly opened before it sold to Swede and Kathleen Ferando, providing a lucrative business for many years to come. Richard along with Charles Johnson established a slaughterhouse at Many Farms, Arizona. Later on Richard began a logging business. During Richard's time in the logging business he started bidding on forest service contracts to build roads into the woods. In addition to logging Richard began a business called Dolores Post and Pole. Richard then purchased a crusher from Montezuma County. This is when Mountain Gravel was formed in 1967. The establishment of Mountain Gravel & Construction Company was Richard's final career change. In the early years, Richard had partners that were instrumental in making the company grow and then in the later years it transitioned into a family owned and operated business. Richard always appreciated every employee and their specific talents and skills and knew that the company was strong because of everyone's efforts. Mountain Gravel went on to work in five states, working for many government agencies as well as private work. Building roads, working on the Colorado River, and subdivision development were among some of the work performed by Mountain Gravel. In 1989 following heart surgery Richard retired from day-to-day operations of Mountain Gravel. Richard enjoyed helping his community. He was an active contributor to the Joe Rowell Park, and the Dolores Community Center. He was a member of the local Masons, the Shriners, the Elks of Cortez, and the United Methodist Church. He was also affiliated with the VFW and the American Legion. Richard and Evelyn were blessed with four children, seven grandchildren and four great-grandchildren. After Richard retired he enjoyed spending time with his family at the Pump Pasture. He and Evelyn would go for walks everyday at the Pump Pasture and often times stopped to feed the wild turkeys. In the last few years of Richard's life he was blessed to have health care workers whom he loved except on those rare occasions when he was trying to be the boss and fire them. The health care workers have expressed their genuine affection toward him as well. Richard is survived by his beautiful wife Evelyn; his son Gary and Carol Tibbits; his son Richard L. (Dick) and Bonnie; his daughter Connie and Thurl Boyd; and daughter Darlene and Joe Burns; his grandkids, Kirby and Leah Boyd; Kyan and Shalun Maloney; Tyler Tibbits; Sheena and Jason Groff; Whitney Tibbits; Kameron Burns; and Kienan Tibbits; and his great-grandchildren, Bailey Boyd; Braden Boyd; Rylan Maloney; and Kale Groff and several nieces and nephews. Richard was preceded in death by his mother and father and his brother Everette Tibbits and his sister Angie Jones. Memorial contributions can be made in Richard's name at the Dolores State Bank. The contributions will be divided and given to the Dolores Community Center and the Dolores Methodist Church.