ED Denson: “A good guy who saw it all, did it all, and died with his boots on”

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It’s been over two months since ED Denson left us and, well, we can’t say we didn’t see it coming, as he had supplied us with the play-by-play of his health issues on Facebook, as well as a lot of other things going on in his life over the last few years, months, and weeks, always sprinkled with humor. (When he mentioned the motels he stayed in near the hospitals, for health checkups and medical procedures, he gave us a look into our futures and I made a note of the names and addresses.)

When he was hospitalized for the last time he announced that he wouldn’t be able to eat normally for the next six months, they had given him a feeding tube and, ever the optimist, he was already planning to resume his court appearances, tube included.

ED had many interesting and illustrious careers during his full life of eighty-four years, at least three involving music, and he’ll be missed for his social activism and much more. During the last couple decades he drove hundreds of miles daily, thousands monthly, on the law circuit from Ukiah to Weaverville, listening to informative books along the way and describing the trips to his readers.

He was our local hero, spokesman, universal neighbor, champion of medical marijuana, defender of every weed farmer and backwoods dweller under attack from the overzealous forces of abatement, and a fervent homeless advocate. He shared his opinions and knowledge with anyone who asked, either on the street or on his call-in talk show The Rights Organization. On one of his shows he informed his listeners that it was illegal for the county supervisors to increase taxes on the voter-passed cannabis tax (Measure S), and suggested someone should sue to make them stop. When no one stepped up, ED sued and after a few years he won!

(Yeah, the county tried to weasel out of it, and it made me realize how the system worked: official government can do anything they want, break any rule or law, and if no one puts in the time and energy to call them on it, convince a judge to rule that what they’re doing is illegal, then they can just go ahead and keep breaking the law, but not on ED’s watch.)

He was an irreplaceable force of intelligence and advocacy, the person to call if you were being harassed by government bureaucracy and the planning department. Diplomatic and courteous, with integrity and grace, he made his points calmly in that folksy Maryland fashion, leaving the hysterics to others.

He was a humorist, writer, and entertainer, as well as groundskeeper for his orchard, fields, and weeds at the 10 Springs Ranch homestead in Alderpoint, where he was a mower, weed-whacker, waterline-fixer, and firebreak-maker. ED was a lover of food and drink, both fine and fast, and relaxed at cocktail hour on the veranda with his beloved sweetheart, Mary Alice Denson.

After he came home from the hospital he went silent, we all wondered, and a good friend messaged him. “I feel you’re leaving us ED, please tell me I’m wrong,” she said.

“You’re wrong,” he answered and soon after signed off with his final public message, the quote: “That government is best which governs least.”

We’ll be thinking about Eugene ED Denson, beloved icon, for a long time. He was a good guy who saw it all, did it all, and died with his boots on.

Eugene Denson: March 3 1940, Washington D.C.– April 12 2024, Alderpoint, at home.

(Memorial is July 27^th at the Community Park in the afternoon. More details forthcoming.)

By Paul Modic

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