Mr. Shawn Raymond Hagist

Shawn Raymond Hagist was born in Nevada, Iowa on December 4, 1969, grew up in Colo and Mt. Pleasant, and graduated from Mt. Pleasant High School in 1988. From there he went to Indian Hills Community College and earned an associates degree in Criminal Justice. He then attend the University of Iowa (Go Hawks!) and graduated with a BA in Political Science and Government. He worked at the Iowa River Power Company and often spoke of the fun high jinks he and his co-workers got into. He would stop by to eat there on occasion throughout the years and most recently in 2018 with his family (Damn COVID). He wanted those he loved that didn’t know him in those days to know about the places he held dear because of the good times he associated with them.

RAGBRAI and the friendships made in those years of riding were everlasting. For those unfamiliar with RAGBRAI, it is an annual bicycle ride from the western Iowa state border to the eastern state border and takes place in July. Shawn started riding RAGBRAI in the early 1990’s with Team Mosquito. He quickly realized he needed a cooler team and decided, despite the mosquito tattoo on his leg, that Team Emu was that team. (Maybe if Axe had been a Mosquito back then, he wouldn’t have switched teams?)

As one of the OGs of Team Emu, Shawn oversaw making the shirts for each year’s ride, including the classic “Slow Children Playing” reflective shirts in 2003. He also coordinated the RV and trailer that would take the team to the start of the ride as well as supporting the team along the way. Shawn’s brother Dan drove the RV for many of the prime Team Emu years.

The idea for postal shirts came about because we always camped at the post office. Before cell phones, the only way to find the camp was for Dan to put a note on the post office door letting us know where the RV was parked. Simple in its genius because every local knew where the post office was when we rolled into town at 2 a.m. Shawn was instrumental in tackling the postal shirt concept and without him, Team Emu wouldn’t be known for its distinctive attire.

With Shawn at the forefront, Team Emu went on the ride with support for 20 consecutive years - from 1993 to 2012. So many miles ridden, so many beer slides, so many overhangs slept under, so many beer bongs, and so many times he sang “Mother” by Danzig at karaoke. (He was so dang good at that!)

Beginning in 2013, the team went self-contained, meaning that we carry all of our gear on the bikes with us, without support. With Team Emu converting to bagger status, it was headed to a new era. While Shawn wasn’t able to do every ride after 2013, he did quite a few and was able to enjoy the new bagger “Ride Out” trend that was beginning to catch on and lives on to this day.

Shortly after graduating from the University of Iowa, he moved to Denver, working for Old Chicago Restaurants until he began working for Business Equipment Consultants (BEC) where he predominantly worked with Aloha Systems. Denver is where he began his long career with restaurant software solutions.

For a very brief time he lived in Beltsville, Maryland working for MICROS Systems, Inc. and then quickly moved to Irving, Texas to be near his beloved Dallas Cowboys. (His first place was right next to their practice facility.)

He has resided in the Las Colinas, Euless and Grapevine area since arriving in Texas in 2000 where he began working for Radiant Systems. He survived the Radiant Systems acquisition by NCR - and many of you understand the word “survived” within that statement. He has a vast collection of lifelong friends from his many years within these companies.

In 2020, he took a short sabbatical from his career and enjoyed playing lots of golf with friends and tinkering around the house until he got restless and returned to the workforce because let’s face it, being a “Real House Husband of Grapevine” wasn’t in his nature, but he sure did love some reality TV, didn’t he?

In 2021 he began working remotely for HungerRush (based in Houston, Texas) and was there until 2022 when he left to work a for start up company based out of Australia known as Me&U. During his short time at each of these companies he made some great friendships and spoke highly of many of his colleagues.

Shortly after moving to Texas, he met his first wife, Kelly Roberts, and together they had a daughter, Bronwyn in 2003. After their divorce, they remained friends, living less than 3 miles from each other, so they could easily co-parent and give Bronwyn the very best of both of them at all times.

Shawn and Kelly were both very active in all of Bronwyn’s activities in and out of school sports. The longest activity was “select” softball which was filled with long weekends of play from sun up to well past sun down where seasons began in the cold of February through the scorching heat of summer - melting cleats on the turf fields - and back to the cold days into the later part of the year. Bronwyn wants you to know that Shawn was the most dedicated father. He spent hours with her taking her to softball tournaments, sitting in the stands, and spending one-on-one time practicing with her. During these times there were team cookouts during tournament weekends and pre and post season parties. Many of these people became an extended family for each other as there wasn’t much free time for anything else.

Upon graduating high school, Bronwyn decided to attend the University of North Texas and although it wasn’t the University of Iowa, he was thrilled to have her close enough to see her on a regular basis. He was happy to have his buddy close by.

In 2015, he married his wife Christina and became a step-father to Isabella. I’m not sure he planned to have two young girls in the house who were barely two months apart in age, a wife, and a menagerie of female animals, but he survived it and we got to the point where we were “empty nesters”. Who knew a house could get so quiet, am I right?

He loved to bake, grow herbs and plants, use the Big Green Egg to feed the ones he loved, and he loved to love on lots and lots of animals, big and small (Reagan, Miss Kitty, Greta, Pepper, Pancake, Orion, Elvis, Jersey, Fritz and Hazel).

If you knew him in the slightest then you knew he loved his sports. He loved his Iowa Hawkeyes and Dallas Cowboys and taught Bronwyn to love them just as much as he did. He would also watch Mavericks, Rangers, Stars, NASCAR, golf, UFC, dirt track racing, TFS and Colleyville Heritage Softball (along with a little football and basketball from time to time). He spent a lot of time on the golf course and if he couldn’t get out there, he was on the couch playing golf on his phone or iPad (Great Shot!).

He is survived by his daughter, Bronwyn Hagist, his wife Christina and step-daughter Isabella of Grapevine, Texas, his mother, Pat Hagist of Brighton, Iowa, his father, Gene Hagist (Cathy) of Altoona, Iowa, his brothers, Mark Hagist (Andrea) of Ottumwa, Iowa, Daniel Hagist (Nicole Dickel) of Washington, Iowa, and his sister Angie Ackles (Brad Ringold) of Burlington, Iowa.

Shawn was preceded in death by his sister Sandy Carr, grandparents, and uncles Gary, Phil, Jack, aunt Marilyn, and several cousins.

He was greatly loved and his passing has left a hole in the hearts of many.

He was a great husband, a wonderful and honorable man and my best friend. He was smart, talented in so many different ways, and determined to figure out how to master just about any task to the best of his ability. There was a competitive streak in him, a compulsion to do things a certain and correct way - for example, you, and to be fair nor he, were allowed to open a birthday present before your actual birthdate - and he was always ready to bring the fun. He could be pesky (probably because he was the youngest child), but somehow that made him more endearing and lovable and was a part of his charm. He was steadfast, loyal, and one of the hardest working people I have known. Although he could anger quickly, he was quick to forgive and move on - sometimes so fast that my brain and heart couldn’t process it. Living through that time and time again with him taught me to be better about those things. He and his extended family have taught me so much about life, the value of just being together and wading through the hard stuff to get to the other side. He was big energy in so many different ways and at times I feel like he is still right there, so I reach for him, but he isn’t there and my brain doesn’t understand how a man full of such life is just gone in an instant. He was sensitive and especially careful to protect his heart. He was thoughtful, listened at times I didn’t realize he was listening, and then would surprise me later with a gift about something I had said in passing and never would have expected something to come out of my offhanded comment. Of course, when I really wanted him to listen, either he wouldn’t or was just acting like he wasn’t just to play a joke on me. If you knew him well, then you know he liked being a trickster. He was a good son-in-law to my parents. He would usually be one of the first to respond to their texts and was always willing to go by their place and help them if there was something they were struggling with. He was a wonderful uncle to my three rambunctious nephews, but time with them - although it was great to have someone to discuss the ins and outs of sports - always lead him to say that he was so happy to be a “girl dad”. He was a good father - a tough one at times, but I think only because he wanted to make sure that he passed on life skills so Bronwyn’s journey would be easier than his had been along the way. She means everything to him and I watched him grow and do things differently than he might have wanted to because his heart was so full of love for his beautiful daughter. She reminds me of him in so many ways and she got him to bend in ways that I doubt she even knows about. He was the type of step-father that taught Isabella to ride a bike within minutes after she and I were tired, frustrated and in tears with each other over the process. He had this way of watching, stepping back, and analyzing things to get to the heart of the problem. This in turn would mean that he would come up with unique solutions that usually worked despite if it made sense to me or not. He was a great travel partner with the best sense of direction. He was specific and decisive especially when it came to where to eat when we went out, and what we watched on TV, and although it was sometimes frustrating, it also meant the rest of us didn’t have to think about those things - often one less decision in the day was just fine by me - although I couldn’t let him think it was always the case. We could be tough on each other in that way, but I think it was just how two different people who were used to being the ones in control managed the give and take required to be able to spend a lifetime together - a lifetime that was cut too short too fast.

In lieu of flowers, donations can be made in his name through GoFundMe at https://www.gofundme.com/f/shawn-hagist to assist with unexpected expenses.

A visitation for Shawn will be held Friday, August 25, 2023 at 1:00 PM at Bluebonnet Hills Funeral Home, 5725 Colleyville Blvd., Colleyville, Texas 76034, followed by a funeral at 2:00 PM.

Fond memories and expressions of sympathy may be shared at www.bluebonnethills.com for the Hagist family.