Richard Lee Kent

Richard Lee (Dick) Kent (86) was a son, brother, uncle, friend, Sooner, accountant, photographer and avid hiker of the Southwest.   While Dick never married, he courted the world – traveling to 72 countries; ultimately Dick fell in love with Utah where he spent countless nights under the stars in his Tacoma truck and traversed thousands of miles, taking breathtaking pictures of arches, canyons and deep red landscapes.  In 1994 on a visit to the famous rock formation The Wave, he ventured further and discovered an undocumented arch which now bears his name, Dick’s Arch.

Born February 11, 1938 in Oklahoma City, Dick’s family moved to a small town, Seiling, before he attended Oklahoma Southwestern University, and then graduated with a Business degree from the University of Oklahoma.   He served as a CPA for various oil companies in Houston, Oklahoma City, and Denver, CO.  

Dick was unassuming, chivalrous and quietly generous.  He put his meticulous attention to detail to planning and documenting each of his trips and shared these adventures with those around him.  Prior to his death, Dick established an endowed fund at the University of Oklahoma to support entrepreneurial students in the Business school; and an endowed fund at Children’s Hospital Colorado Foundation supporting patients with Down Syndrome. 

A friend described Dick as a “creature of the desert dawn.”  A gritty explorer searching for the perfect lighting for landscape photos, seeking “the untrodden, the hard-to-reach, the grand emptiness of secret places.”  Dick is now free to explore the grandeur of the beyond, the lightness in every corner of the universe, passing on his tenacious pursuit of beautiful, wild places to his friends and family.

Dick passed away on Friday, May 31.  He was preceded in death by his father, Wilbur Kent, and his mother, Margery Dunham Kent.  He is survived by his sister, Carol Sue Friedman (David), nephew Jason Friedman (Jennifer) and niece Tara Friedman (Jeffrey) and four grand-nephews and grandnieces.

Donations may be made to Children’s Hospital Colorado Foundation - Richard L. Kent Fund for Down Syndrome, or the Alzheimer’s Association.