Orvil G. McKenzie

After years of fighting with health challenges and battling them so well, Orvil Gerald McKenzie passed away on May 19th, 2025, at the age of 83 in Fort Collins, Colorado. Orvil leaves behind Linda (Coates), his wife of almost 60 years, and their three daughters. Trisha (Kevin) LeBaron with their three children, Parker (Emily), Chase (Alyssa) and Aislynn LeBaron (Mason) Tenge. Nicole McKenzie-Biggs (Paul) with their children, Colin and Lucas McKenzie. Angie McKenzie with her three children, Shea, Ava and Dean Ryan. He is also survived by his daughter, Skye, from a previous marriage, as well as his siblings, Lee (Barbara) McKenzie, Sherrie Cummings, and Cleo (Mark) Cohen. Family meant everything to him, and he proved it with his lifetime of loving acts of kindness and his devotion to them. He was an active life-long member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints with a strong testimony of Jesus Christ and a history of serving people by loving them and helping them become better fathers and husbands. In his younger years Orvil was an athlete, adventurer and amateur mechanic. He served young teens in his church as a Scoutmaster, taking the boys on weeklong hiking adventures at Philmont Scout Ranch, as a basketball coach, softball coach, and regional athletic director in New Mexico, as a CES missionary and in the Bishopric of his family ward and in the YSA ward. His lifelong love of sports spawned generations of Broncos fans and encouraged all his children and grandchildren to participate in sports including basketball (we weren’t tall enough, but he made us try), softball, soccer, baseball, tackle football and volleyball which his daughter, Angie, still participates in as an adult. He made us all try golf, but none of us had the talent for what became his favorite sport later in life. Later in life according to his daughter’s nephew, he “came in soft and gentle at a time when we lost our grandpa. A daunting task, not to replace but to fill in where needed. I will be forever grateful for his love and support through all those years. He was a great example to me.” This was a common sentiment from men who spent time with Orvil. He would take them on hunting trips where the only thing caught was great conversation, pull them on tubes behind a speeding boat to teach them a little humility, and serve as an example of how to be a father. He was always generous with his time and talents. He loved hunting, snow skiing (in general and as a ski patrol member in his younger years), boating (scary tube rides were his specialty), water skiing (he could single ski step start off a dock), camping, golf and off-road vehicles (he brought the first homemade sand rail to a camping trip where we laughed from our 4-wheelers at the start of the trip and all went home and bought sand rails for our next trip.) He also could fix up most anything and loved to teach those skills to his family and friends. You might be amazed to find out that Orvil had four daughters and no sons. It will not surprise you that he taught his girls to drive boats, motorcycles and stick shift cars and, by example, the type of man they should marry. And, in doing so, he got sons by marriage. Orvil loved work and was willing to try new jobs. He was a restaurant fry cook, car wash manager, sold women’s foundations (bras and underwear), automobile salesman, Cartridges for Kids school program representative, and a lawn care service owner happy to employ young men who needed a summer job. Although he had many occupations, the most significant one was in the automotive paint business, starting out as a salesman for the Dupont Automotive Paint Division and later opening Car Color Specialists, a business in Fort Collins, Colorado, where he supplied the body shop community with automotive paint and supplies and provided them with workshops and training to help them be more successful. And, yes, we had cool paint jobs on our cars as a result. He loved our mother fiercely. There was never a moment when we doubted his love for her, and we watched as he smiled and adored her even as he struggled to remember other things. He loved her all his life. He provided for all of us in every way possible. We were amazed by the many comments we received on social media about his passing. He was remembered fondly by so many. Each of us has received phone calls and visits from people wanting to talk about Orvil. He touched the lives of those we never knew. We loved hearing stories about him that we had never heard before. He will be missed terribly, but he understood how to build a legacy that will continue in his absence. A celebration of Orvil’s life will be held on Saturday, June 7th at 2pm, 1320 W Harmony Rd, Fort Collins, Colorado. All who knew him are invited. Please bring your memories of Orvil to share; we would love to hear them.

Orvil G. McKenzie

May 19, 2025