Barbara Wootten

Barbara was born on June 3, 1935.  She was born to Robert Lawrence Stearns and Amy Pitkin Stearns.  She was the youngest of four sisters, born a full 14 years behind her oldest sister.  Her father called her the “best little mistake he ever made”.

Barbara grew up in Boulder where her father, Robert Lawrence Stearns, became President of the University of Colorado in 1937.  She literally grew up on the University campus, living in the President’s House and playing on the sidewalks and lawns.  She received her first notoriety when she was playing in the irrigation canals and lost her red rubber ball down a pipe for the water to go under a street.  It stopped up the system.  The rubber ball soon was contributed to the campaign for the War effort!

Barbara attended the Uni Hill school next to the campus and then Putney School in Putney, Vermont, graduating in 1952.  At the time, Putney was an unusual boarding school in that it was Co-ed.  (Boulder High was suffering from an influx of veterans after the War).  Then on to the University of Colorado where she joined the Kappa Kappa Gamma Fraternity.  Majoring in education, she graduated in 1957.

With her major and interest in children’s education, she took her first job as a kindergarten teacher with the Denver Public Schools.  She taught at a Bear Valley high growth school where she had 40 first year students aged 8 to 9.  Then another teacher came in for 40 more students aged from 9 to 10.  They kept adding 40 more students from that point forward, after Barb had started working there.  I told her I didn’t know how she could even remember half their names!

Barb met Rike Ditzler Wootten, a First Lieutenant in the U. S. Marine Corps just before Christmas, 1957.  After a whirlwind romance, they were engaged in early January and married that summer.  After a brief stint as a Marine wife, they moved to Boston where Rike was admitted to the Harvard Business School.  She went to the Boston Schools to apply for a teaching job and was told “They did not hire MARRIED WOMEN!”  So much for liberal Boston!

She did finally get a job at the Park School, a private school, where she had 14 kindergartners for the full year!  Barb literally worked Rike’s way through graduate school.  And became a mother the following spring – Rike Lawrence Wootten.

Graduating in Spring of 1960, the family moved back to Denver where Barb became a fulltime mother and volunteer and Rike joined the Colorado National Bank.  She joined the Junior League of Denver, furthering her interest in volunteering and community activities.  And incidentally birthing two more sons, Christopher Stearns and Thomas Hughes.  Rike L lives in Tokyo is married to Yuiko and have daughter named Lisa.  Tom lives in Oakland, CA is married to Louise and has one son, Spencer, who is a Senior at Washington University in St Louis.  Chris and Yoshi live in Littleton and have Kasina a recent graduate from the University of Colorado, Boulder, Kyler, a Senior at the University of California, Davis, and Maxine, who just graduated from Heritage High in Littleton, CO and heading to Arizona State University this fall.

Virtually all her life was spent in the Denver metro area, and she was a full-fledged native of the State of Colorado.  She is survived by her husband Rike Ditzler Wootten, and her three sons.

A Memorial Service will be held in Barbara’s honor on Tuesday, Aug. 2nd at 10:00 at St. John’s Cathedral (1350 N Washington St, Denver, CO 80203).

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