Wayne Lewis Shortridge

Wayne Shortridge, a collector of agates and a meticulous record keeper, died in Fort Collins, Colorado on March 28, 2025, aged 92 years, two days after his heart decided it had ticked enough and sent him sprawling while exercising on a stationary bicycle. Using CPR, a kind nurse working out nearby coaxed his heart back to life, thus granting his family a little extra time with their beloved husband, dad and grandpa.

Besides many family and friends, Wayne will be remembered by serious agate collectors because of the enormous Fairburn Agate he found in South Dakota exactly 65 years and one day prior to his death. That specimen, eventually known as The Shortridge Agate, became the namesake of a subset of the well-known Fairburn Agate type.

Everyone who knew him saw two sides to his personality: Both deeply serious and forthright, he was also exceptionally kind and caring. One minute he could cast the steely gaze of a hardened military officer, and the next minute tears would well up in his twinkling eyes as he described his love for his family, friends or a stray dog he just met.

Cats, however, were always a menace to him. He never met a cat he wanted to see again, likely because they intentionally ignored his good advice.

Wayne also never met a joke that he forgot, and he kept hundreds of them ready to insert in every conversation eliciting howls of laughter or groans of disbelief at every gathering of family and friends.

Wayne Lewis Shortridge was born in Denver Colorado on November 23rd, 1932, to D.&R.G. locomotive machinist Jessie Hugh (d. 1994) and Daisy Bell (McDonald) Shortridge (d. 1966). He was raised with his sister Lolita (Meyers, d. 2007) by his earnest and hard-working parents in north Denver through the tough years of the depression. He joined the Boy Scouts, spent summers hunting and fishing on his grandparent’s homestead near Oak Creek, Colorado and dreamed of becoming a cowboy with his own ranch.

He attended North High School in Denver where he was student council president, sang and played piano in theater and was an accomplished gymnast and wrestler. While there, he met the love of his life, Beverly Jo Riley, who while carrying an armful of books as a sophomore, collided with the well-known upper classman (undoubtedly intentionally!). They were married in 1954 and were rarely separated over 71 years of marriage.

Colorado A&M University (now Colorado State University) awarded the handsome, industrious and popular graduate an academic scholarship and he became the very first in a very long line of members of the Shortridge tobacco farming family to attend college.

At college, Wayne joined the Reserve Officer Training Corps and after graduation in 1955 with a degree in Animal Husbandry in hand, and lacking financial resources, delayed indefinitely his ranching dream and was commissioned in the Air Force as a 2nd Lieutenant, beginning a 21 year career that would take him and his growing family to stations and travel in the U.S., Asia, the Middle East and Europe. His career included stints as a Nuclear Weapons Supply Officer, an ICBM Missile Launch Control Officer during the height of the Cold War, and an Air Force attaché to the U.S. Embassy in Jordan among many other assignments.

While in the Air Force he began seriously collecting agates and other gemstones as well as amassing an incredible shell and coral collection, the result of two years of skin diving in Guam. But finding the aforementioned Shortridge Agate fostered a lifelong passion for agate hunting, and he devoted time every year to broadening his collection and connecting with like-minded individuals all over the world.

In 1971 he realized the need to renew his youthful interest in exercise and with the encouragement of an early military aerobics program, he began running. Over the next 30 years he ran countless 10k races and many marathons—while keeping careful track of every mile.

When he retired from the Air Force as a Major in 1977, he and Beverly returned to his college town of Fort Collins, Colorado where he worked a few “odd jobs” for the police department, the city and the school district and increased his rock collecting, elk hunting and fishing pace.

Over the ensuing decades, he and Bev regularly attended Harmony Presbyterian Church, and he endlessly volunteered—for the Boy Scouts, as a referee for many years with the Fort Collins Soccer Club, and with the Fort Collins Gem and Mineral Club. He also joined the Fort Collins (Health) Club and was still to be found there more than 47 years later. Upon arrival this year he’d announce, “It’s another day on the topside of the dirt, so I’ll give it a go”.

He also fostered and multiplied relationships with countless friends and family, becoming the trusted confidant and patriarch of many. HMFIC to the end.

Wayne is survived by his loving wife Bev, his daughters Karla Gee and Waydene Pixler, his son Randy Shortridge and his wife Heather, granddaughter Stephanie Pixler Kading and her husband Daniel, grandsons Cade and Evan Shortridge and Evan’s wife Emily, and great granddaughter Henley Pixler Kading.

In lieu of flowers, please donate in his name to the Disabled American Veterans, Vietnam Veterans of America or Harmony Presbyterian Church in Fort Collins. If you wish to send flowers, please have them delivered to the residence or the church for the service.

A memorial service for Wayne will be held Sunday, April 13, 2025 at 2:00 PM at Harmony Presbyterian Church, 400 Boardwalk Dr, Fort Collins, Colorado 80525.  A celebration of life will be planned at a later date.