Dr. Ida Fasel

Ida Fasel

Among the faculty at the University of Colorado at Denver (UCD), former students and the local writers’ community, Ida is known as a Professor Emerita of English, a recognized Milton scholar and an often published, widely honored poet. Born and raised a New Englander, Ida and her husband came to Denver in 1959 to continue their teaching careers. A graduate of Boston University, Ida completed her Ph.D. at the University of Denver, joined the UCD faculty and as Ida says, “never stopped learning or writing.”

While Ida’s broad intellectual curiosity might have first drawn her to the Denver Museum of Nature & Science, it was actually “an affinity for rocks” that captured her imagination. As Ida so lyrically puts it, “After we came to Denver, I discovered the Museum. I walked its halls like a canyon trail, dating the stages of life by layers of rock taking me back to Big Bang, still in time and memory, and from there into the timeless, where learning leaves off for the wisdom of the holy and blessings of faith.”

Ida has been a loyal supporter of the Museum for years and has a personalized planetarium seat and skyview terrace tile to prove it. She has also remembered the Museum in her will. The bequest reflects her gracious generosity, but according to Ida “does not nearly represent all that Colorado and Denver have meant to me.”