On Feb. 8, 2021, Bill Whaley ’68 died of a heart attack while skiing in Taos Ski Valley with his granddaughter, Lili. His death occurred while he was doing one of the things he most loved to do, in a place he revered, with one of his favorite people on Earth.
In 1964, when Whaley arrived at Colorado College from Carson Valley, near Lake Tahoe, he found himself in an intellectually stimulating and socially exciting environment. He took political science classes, secured a spot on the school football team, and joined the Kappa Sigma fraternity. At a beer bust near Gold Camp Road in Colorado Springs, he met Susan Bisbee Reid ’68, who would become his first wife and mother of his son, Fitz.
Whaley struggled to complete his education amid the tumultuous times. In 1966, the Vietnam War claimed 6,000 Americans. Two years later, his friend and former CC classmate Jim Turner would die serving in the Marine Corps in Vietnam. He wrote a classmate that he “cried like a baby” when visiting Turner’s gravesite in Silver Cliff, Colorado. Whaley left Colorado College in 1966, returned in the Summer of 1968, then left for good that Fall.
“He had an academic bent at the wrong time, the wrong decade. The rest of the world at that time was just pulling in at the seams,” says Bisbee Reid, who remained friends with her ex-husband until his death.
After dropping out of CC, Whaley spent the next five decades in an on-and-off love affair with Taos, New Mexico, starting as a ski bum and parking lot attendant for Taos Ski Valley. He served in a Taos-based National Guard unit. Over the years, he operated numerous businesses there, notably the Plaza Theatre, the monthly news magazine Horse Fly, and the blog Taos Friction.
He resumed his academic journey at the University of Nevada, Reno. He was just a dissertation short of his PhD in philosophy, a subject he continued to pursue until the end of his life, when the siren call of Taos brought him back. That led to his teaching literature and writing at the University of New Mexico-Taos.
He authored Gringo Lessons: Twenty Years of Terror in Taos. In a review, his friend, the author John Nichols, who penned The Milagro Beanfield War, wrote, “This wonderful autobiography is as honest as the day is long, no holds barred, no punches pulled. Bill’s ability to make sense of his tangled life with clear and exhilarating prose is a real treat.”
His Colorado College friends remember him fondly.
Gary Knight ’67 explains that Plato in “The Apology” for the life of Socrates reminds us that all societies need a “gadfly” to sting the “steed” of state into acknowledging its proper duties and obligations. “Bill’s Horse Fly was like Socrates’ gadfly. Bill was always raising issues by asking questions. He wouldn’t take anything for granted. He wrote honestly about things going on politically,” says Knight.
“I got to know Bill when we both played Tiger football under Frank Flood in 1964. Those long bus rides to games were a chance to hear Bill talk about film and skiing: his two major interests,” says Thomas Wolf ’67.
“I first met Bill my sophomore year in the Fall of ’64 when he played football. He was a good football player — a guard who got a lot of playing time as a freshman, as I recall, ” says Lex Towns ’67, who was a dorm mate and later a roommate (with Jim Turner) of Whaley’s at an off-campus house.
Whaley shared a room in what is now South Hall with Lance Clarke ’68, who recalls his former roommate’s walking contradictions whenever he listens to “The Pilgrim” by Kris Kristofferson.
“I think he was the iconic character of CC — intelligent, impatient, insightful, irreverent, irritating when he thought you could do or think better, irascible, and lovable,” says Gordon Aoyagi ’67.
Known for his brilliant mind and big heart, for giving voice to the unheard, and for championing alternative viewpoints, throughout Whaley’s adventurous life, he endured financial failure and reinvented himself many times over.
He is survived by his son, William Fitzpatrick (Fitz) Whaley, granddaughter, Lili Hart Whaley, and two sisters.
Learn more about Bill Whaley
Listen to Bill Whaley read from Gringo Lessons.
Read the numerous tributes to Whaley which ran in Taos News:
