Harold Payte
February 15, 1930 - August 11, 2023
Harold Payte, 93, of Golden, Colorado, passed away peacefully on Friday, August 11. Harold was born February 15, 1930, on a farm near Mariana, Arkansas, to Sina Belle and Fred Payte. The family eventually settled in Colorado where he lived for the rest of his life.
Born the tenth of thirteen siblings provided ample teasing, playing, and learning from older brothers and sisters. He spent his childhood days exploring the woods with his older brothers where they lunched on the food of the season: blackberries, grapes, persimmons, pecans, walnuts, and hickory nuts to name a few. He said that he lived a very happy childhood, and even though he was one in a very large family, always felt loved.
Harold went to Wheat Ridge High School, but became bored and impatient with school, so dropped out to start making a living. He and Betty married in 1948 when he was eighteen and she was seventeen. In his opinion, that was old enough to know everything there was to know.
His first job at eight years old was picking strawberries and raspberries for neighbor farmers. As his skills improved, he was given the bigger jobs, like irrigating crops. Harold went on to drive a dog food route for Purina Chows, transitioning to management of Purina’s Farmer’s Feed and Garden Supply in Arvada. Following twenty-one years in the animal feed business, he was presented with an opportunity to purchase a different kind of feed store – a Dairy Queen/Brazier store.
In his memoirs, Harold mentioned that for the first 25 years of his working life he was so busy making a living that he never learned how to play. After purchasing the Dairy Queen, though, annual conventions launched Harold and Betty into world travel with memorable trips to Spain, Italy, Portugal, and, of course, across the US and Canada. Eventually their Dairy Queen legacy was built to a chain of four stores.
In 1970 Harold started his 42-year run with the Arvada Rotary Club, which not only allowed him to give back to his community, but also brought with it dozens of life-long friends, and more international travel.
Many of Harold’s interests and hobbies – which he attributed to Betty’s desire to learn something new -- piled up to include jogging, race-walking, quilting, scuba diving, cross-country skiing, snowshoeing, geocaching, square dancing, wood carving, and flying single engine airplanes. He said that he initially was not interested in any of these, but that he was grateful to Betty for introducing them because he learned to enjoy every one of them. He also designed and created exquisite furnishings from hardwood, enjoyed fishing with friends and family, and was an avid reader, passionate about western literature. He was a renowned jokester, thrilling on making people laugh—multiple times per joke---first out of discomfort and then when they got the punch line. He was also always the first to laugh at himself.
At age 67, to celebrate their 50th wedding anniversary, he and Betty, despite never having biked before, joined an eight-day trip from Germany to Vienna. That was the catalyst for them starting a cycling club with friends, and for ten years they led long bike trips, including the Katy Trail through Missouri and the Mickelson Trail through the Black Hills of South Dakota. Every fall for ten years, they toured by bike, creating some of their most treasured memories, and building friendship bonds that spanned the remainder of their lifetimes.
One of Harold and Betty’s later passions was their love of walking. (Harold won numerous Bolder Boulder races in his age categorie(s)). For five years, he and Betty led community Golden Walks in their beloved hometown—the very town where they were married. That love of community and walking earned them the Mayor’s Award of Golden in 2016 for serving as inspiring role models and ambassadors “for healthy living and walking in Golden.”
In his memoir, Family, Friends, and Fun Harold reflects that he had a very happy life. He mentioned that he and Betty often reflected on how lucky they felt, that after 74 years together they felt a closer bond than ever. He even respected the rough times in life and marriage in that they came with very valuable lessons, noting, “I am a better man today than the one Betty married.”
Harold is survived by daughter Amy (Jim) Clark, granddaughters Jamie (Kenny Lee) Clark and Kellie Clark, grandson Aaron Dierks, and sisters, Mary Moran and Nelline Kornock.
He was preceded in death by his wife of 74 years, Betty (Klein) Payte, daughter, Patty Dierks, his grandson, Eric Hans Dierks, and his brothers and many of his sisters.
Memorial Contributions
In lieu of flowers, please consider a donation in Harold’s name to Flatirons Chamber Music Festival: Crossing the Divide.
https://www.flatironscmf.org/support
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