Peter John Denker

Peter Denker died on Friday, October 27, 2017 in Dallas, surrounded by his loving and admiring family. Peter was born in 1936 to Peter and Edythe Denker of New York. Peter was raised on Long Island and loved boating. He sailed often as a young man, competed in the Newport-Bermuda Race, and crewed on the famed Stormy Weather for a Transatlantic crossing. Later in life, he enjoyed chartered cruises with friends and family on waterways worldwide — from Brazil to Alaska, from the Mediterranean to China’s Yangtze River. A passionate traveler, Peter toured extensively on every continent save Antarctica — always in the company of family and friends. He was a true bon vivant, loved food and wine, wrote restaurant reviews for Texas Monthly and served as a Grand Sénéchal of La Confrérie des Chevaliers du Tastevin.

Peter graduated from Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts in 1954 and from Duke University, five years later, with a degree in electrical engineering. Although he had an engineer’s mind for mathematics, it was his coursework in economics and finance that would ultimately determine his career. After Duke, and while serving in the National Guard on a Nike missile base, he began his financial career in the New York office of the venerable investment counseling firm of Scudder, Stevens & Clark. It was a career that would last without interruption, but with repeated reinvention, for the next 57 years.

In 1966, Scudder dispatched Peter to help staff their office in Dallas. In 1980, Peter and his associate and dear friend William J. Goodwin left Scudder to embark on the perilous adventure of setting up their own independent investment counseling firm: Denker & Goodwin. “D&G,” as it was affectionately known, flourished. A decade later, when US Trust wanted to establish an immediate presence in Dallas, it acquired D&G, making Peter and Bill Chairman and President of US Trust Company of Texas. Peter and Bill continued to grow the business through its sale to Charles Schwab in 2000. In 2006, shortly before the business would be sold again, Peter, at the age of 70, agreed to venture on yet another start-up, collaborating with two younger US Trust professionals and friends, Philip C.W. Kistler and R. Kevin Hardage, to found Turtle Creek Management, LLC. Over the next ten years, Turtle Creek would continue to grow, adding a Texas chartered trust company in 2009.

While always a lover of the arts — in the 1970s, Peter’s Camaro was full of Stravinsky 8-track tapes — Peter’s involvement deepened as his career progressed. He served on the Executive Committee of the Dallas Museum of Art and the Board of the Dallas Opera. He was a generous supporter of the Dallas Symphony, the Van Cliburn Piano Competition, and the Santa Fe Opera, which was also a client for many years. With his wife Charron, he was also an avid collector of art by Texan and southwestern artists, ranging from the neo-traditionalist Ford Ruthling to the post-Expressionist Gregory Horndeski. He was a talented amateur photographer who spent weeks editing the still-lifes and landscapes he had shot on his most recent trip. And as his Texan roots grew, he became an active supporter of arts and humanities in his adopted second home of Bosque County, Texas — not to mention an avid dove hunter.

Alacritous and utterly disinterested in retiring, Peter remained active to the end. He made his oncologist install his chemotherapy port near his left shoulder, needing the right one to accommodate the butt of his shotgun. Diagnosed with cancer a week after cruising from St. Tropez to Monaco, he was orchestrating trips to Sicily and Brazil in the last weeks of his life. The family is grateful to the compassionate and enlightened care he received from Dr. Steven Leach and the other scholars of the UT Southwestern Medical Center, as well as to his peerless caregiver Reyna Balleza.

Peter is survived by his wife and fellow-traveler of 50 years, Charron Ramsey Denker; by his son Patrick Denker; by his brothers Jeffrey Denker and Charles Cecil; by his in-laws Jennifer Denker, Lynn Denker and Joseph and Lynn Wynne; by his step-daughter Elizabeth David and step-son-in-law Richard David; and by his nieces and nephews who were able to tag along on some of his adventures. A memorial service will be held on Friday, November 3 at 4 p.m. at Saint Michael and All Angels Episcopal Church. Visitation will be Thursday, November 2 from 5-7 p.m. at Sparkman-Hillcrest. In lieu of flowers, memorials may be made in his honor to Phillips Academy, Office of Academy Resources, 180 Main St., Andover MA 01810. Online condolences may be made at www.Sparkman-Hillcrest.com.