{"id":801463,"date":"2019-11-17T16:30:05","date_gmt":"2019-11-17T23:30:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.summitdaily.com\/?p=373441"},"modified":"2019-11-17T16:30:05","modified_gmt":"2019-11-17T23:30:05","slug":"marie-zdechlik-was-a-frisco-local-for-more-than-half-a-century","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/local-news\/marie-zdechlik-was-a-frisco-local-for-more-than-half-a-century\/","title":{"rendered":"Marie Zdechlik was a Frisco local for more than half a century"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
Marie Zdelchik Tuesday, Jan. 30, 2018, in Frisco.<\/strong>
Hugh Carey \/ hcarey@summitdaily.com<\/em><\/figcaption><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n

FRISCO \u2014 When the Summit Daily spoke to Marie Zdechlik in January of last year, she was as spry as a 92-year-old could be, residing at her red-tiled roof home near the corner of Pitkin Street and Fifth Avenue in Frisco. Zdechlik had been a widow since 1991, when her husband, Bob Zdechlik, passed after battling multiple sclerosis.<\/p>\n

She did all of the housework by herself \u2014 shoveling and blowing snow off her walkway, mowing her lawn in the summer, driving her own car around town for errands, and taking care of herself as well as she could at 92.<\/p>\n

Marie Alice Renner Zdechlik always believed in self-reliance. She was born on Feb. 23, 1925, to parents Ignatius and Anna Renner. Growing up on a farm near Alexandria, Minnesota, during the Great Depression, her family didn\u2019t have much but they knew to do the most with what they had. Zdechlik went on to the University of Minnesota, where she trained to be a nurse in the Nurse Corps.<\/p>\n

Her skills came to great use in the years following World War II, when polio epidemics hit Minnesota and then later Denver. She learned how to use the iron lung to keep polio-afflicted patients who had lost the muscle control required to breathe alive. After polio hit Denver, she came out to the Front Range with the Red Cross and got to work saving lives in Colorado.<\/p>\n

After her work in Denver was done, she went back to Minnesota, but returned to Colorado in 1947 to work as a nurse at Climax Mine. Zdechlik worked to mend wounded miners and skiers, and on occasion she was the only thing standing between them and death.<\/p>\n

Her healing hands touched many lives up at Climax. Longtime friend Scott Pyles eulogized Zdechlik at her memorial service after her passing on Oct. 14<\/a>, recounting how she had helped so many during a time when there was little in the way of medical services in the area.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs one of the head nurses at the Climax hospital, she cared for virtually all of us at one time or another, as a nurse in the hospital or as a ski patrol on the ski hill,\u201d Pyles said. \u201cThrough many broken bones and other ailments, she was there.\u201d<\/p>\n

But even more than patching people up, Zdechlik\u2019s steel-strong fortitude and ever-caring heart comforted Pyles\u2019 family through some of the toughest moments of their lives.<\/p>\n

\u201cMarie sat with our grandmother, Zella, as she spent her last months in a losing fight with cancer,\u201d Pyles wrote. \u201cMarie was also there on occasion as our great grandmother, Gran Emmert, spent her last living years. While our mother Jackie was in hospice, Marie was there visiting and comforting her until her passing.\u201d<\/p>\n

While at Climax, she met Bob Zdechlik, a school teacher and ski instructor. They married and started building a home in the then-fledgling town of Frisco in 1954, built with materials salvaged from Climax Mine. They cut trees for lumber and even hand-dug their own well \u2014 the town did not have plumbing, let alone actual streets or other amenities.<\/p>\n

\u201cI recall riding my bicycle over to see them one summer day in the mid 1950s,\u201d Pyles said. \u201cMarie was about 15 feet or more deep in the ground loading mostly rocks and some dirt into buckets that Bob would hoist out of the well. Marie would then place the wood cribbing and fasten them together with spikes. She knew all about well digging as her father, a professional well digger in Minnesota, frequently enlisted his daughters to help.\u201d<\/p>\n

Marie stopped working at the mine that same year, having had her first child in October. Marie and Bob went on to have six children: Kristine, Joel, Lisa, Jon, David and Matt. <\/p>\n

Frisco Lodge owner Susan Anderson was very close with Zdechlik for much of her life growing up in Frisco. During the latter years took Zdechlik to her doctor\u2019s appointments. She said Marie was \u201ca second mother, nurse, mentor, teacher and an advocate to many of the children and parents living in the town of Climax.\u201d<\/p>\n

Anderson also shared some of her childhood tales of Zdechlik\u2019s grit and unwavering can-do attitude that made her larger than life in Frisco.<\/p>\n

\u201cA popular story regarding (her red-tiled roof) is about how Marie nailed her young son John\u2019s overalls to the sub-roof so she could keep an eye on him and continue laying the tiles on the roof,\u201d Anderson said.<\/p>\n

Marie and Bob finished building their house in 1958, and settled into a quiet, purposeful life, raising their children, who played in the Frisco meadows. They lived mountain life the way it was back then \u2014 went to church, golfed and skied whenever they could, watching as Frisco rapidly changed into the resort town it is today.<\/p>\n

Anderson recalled how Zdechlik went out of her way to ensure that the kids had something to do in the days when Frisco was truly a tiny mountain town, with little in the way of activities for the children.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn the early 1960s, Marie decided we needed a softball field, so she collected all the kids and moms up and took us out in a field of sagebrush just south of the Zdechlik yard and the village built a field,\u201d Anderson said. \u201cMarie became the softball coach and kept us all busy and out of trouble.\u201d<\/p>\n

Margaret Smith, another friend who had known Zdechlik and her family since 1972, remembered Marie as perpetually kind person always looking to help, and never turned down a game of golf with her friends \u2014 no matter the conditions.<\/p>\n

\u201cOne time we went over to Vail to play golf,\u201d Smith said. \u201cIt was the early fall, and it started snowing and getting cold. But we decided, we\u2019re still playing. We kept playing until our fingers almost froze off. She loved her golf. She\u2019d tell us a lot of times, if I fall down and have a heart attack, do not resuscitate, just step over my body and keep playing.\u201d<\/p>\n

Marie lived in her family\u2019s house for over 50 years, dutifully living a disciplined life with next to no health issues. She left a lasting impact on the many Summit County residents who knew her, a wise matriarch presiding with a wry wit and lively spirit.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor so many of us, she was our last mother standing,\u201d Anderson said. \u201cShe is loved and will be missed by all of us.\u201d<\/p>\n

When speaking last year for the first Longevity Project<\/a>, Zdechlik said that she didn\u2019t know how she managed to live as long and well as she did. But one thing she said that seemed integral to her longevity of life and strength of will was living without regret.<\/p>\n

\u201cI haven\u2019t figured out what has caused people to have this attitude, \u2018I\u2019ve done everything in life,\u2019\u201d Zdechlik said. \u201cNo they haven\u2019t. Absolutely, you can never do everything in life. Be happy and go do the things you want to do. If there\u2019s something you really want to see, see it. Don\u2019t have any remorse for things you should or shouldn\u2019t have done.\u201d<\/p>\n

via:: Summit Daily<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Marie Zdelchik Tuesday, Jan. 30, 2018, in Frisco.Hugh Carey \/ hcarey@summitdaily.com FRISCO \u2014 When the Summit Daily spoke to Marie Zdechlik in January of last year, she was as spry as a 92-year-old could be, residing at her red-tiled roof home near the corner of Pitkin Street and Fifth Avenue in Frisco. Zdechlik had been […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[99],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-801463","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-local-news"},"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-08-01 18:39:48","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KSMT The Mountain","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/801463","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=801463"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/801463\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=801463"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=801463"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=801463"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}