Ron Antonation

Ron Antonation passed away in his home on June, 17, 2023, at the age of 87. He is survived by his wife, Roxanne Hrytsak Antonation, his children, Kim Ellington and Mark Antonation, his children in-law, Steven Ellington and Amy (Steelman) Antonation, and his grandchildren, Jason and Erin Ellington. He also leaves behind sisters Melvyne Schurko and Lesia Muzylowski and brothers-in-law John Schurko and Mike Muzylowksi.

Ron was born in the small town of Olha, Manitoba, Canada, where his parents, Stanley and Helen, ran a general store. After graduating from high school in Oakburn, Manitoba, he earned a Bachelor of Science degree from the University of Manitoba in Winnipeg, where he studied geology and physics. 

He began his long career in geophysics performing surveys in remote locations for the Canadian government, where he sometimes also volunteered as camp cook out of necessity. His work took him to Kenya, the Northwest Territories (where he and his crew unearthed a fossilized mammoth tusk), and other areas of the U.S. and Canada.

In 1964, he married Roxanne, a nurse from Oakburn, Manitoba, and they moved to Fairbanks, Alaska, for Ron’s job. Work soon took them to Dallas, Texas, where Kim was born in 1965, and then to Los Angeles, California, where Mark was born in 1967.

The family also lived in Malta, Libya, and London in the 1970s, before returning to Dallas in 1974. GSI was Ron’s employer for most of his career, an oil exploration company that became part of Phillips Petroleum in the early 1980s. In 1983, the family moved to Denver, and then Ron and Roxanne moved to Houston, Texas, in 1989, after Kim and Mark had graduated from high school. Ron retired in 1999 and he and Roxanne returned to Denver to be closer to their children and grandchildren.

Ron had many hobbies throughout his life, including cooking, carpentry, automobile repair, skiing, mountain biking, boating and navigation (Ron and Roxanne were members of the Galveston Bay Power Squadron), and reading books on quantum physics and the origins of the universe. He and Roxanne could often be found in the kitchen together, and they also loved to travel, visiting friends and family in Canada, taking cruises around South America and northern Europe, and fishing in British Columbia.

Ron valued his family and tradition, and he kept in touch with distant family members by phone and email. Holidays and other gatherings often featured a roast beef that Ron labored over for hours, while Roxanne prepared other dishes, sometimes including Ukrainian specialties like borscht and cabbage rolls. His family will miss his warmth, humor, and generous spirit.

The family will have a private dedication of a memorial flagstone at Horan & McConaty in Centennial, where Ron will be laid to rest with views of the Colorado Rocky Mountains and the golf course just blocks from the Antonation’s first Denver home.