David Leroy Banks
Obituaries
Steamboat Pilot - August 16, 2019
David LeRoy Banks DDS, of Steamboat Springs and Lake John, CO, passed away on August 12, 2019, age 66.
Born on August 19, 1952 in Witchita, KS, David spent his childhood in Littleton, Colorado, later attending UC Boulder and UC Dental School.
He Joined the Air Force working as a dentist and began his civilian career providing mobile dentistry in rural Colorado before starting Alpine Family Dentistry in downtown Steamboat Springs, where he practiced for decades in his beloved mountain community and home.
He provided excellent care and regularly donated services to many in need. With his skillful hands and jolly ways he helped many come to enjoy their trips to the dentist.
He was a gentle spirit, an avid hunter, fisherman, and a deeply caring steward of wild lands. He relished many summers at his treasured acreage overlooking Lake John in North Park, Colorado.
Many remember David’s mix of sensible precaution and adventurous spirit, his dry sense of humor, wonderful giant grin, strawberry hair, and his love of Colorado, music, helping others, and dark beer. As a kid, he read the dictionary and encyclopedia for enjoyment, and as an adult, he would share the scientific explanation of just about any phenomenon or subject matter, in the course of casual conversation. Throughout his life he loved geology and could not pass by a great looking rock without stopping to finger and admire it. He delighted in artisan food crafting with the fruits of his hunting and fishing. If you were lucky, you may have sampled his home-smoked trout and duck, or had some of his decadent elk lasagna, venison sausage or jerky.
He was predeceased by father Herbert Leroy Banks, his first fishing buddy, and is survived by mother Alice Banks, sisters Charlotte Grace and Susan Doty, nephew and close friend Troy Cone, nephews Aaron Sanchez, John Gibson, nieces Shonda Sanchez and Erin Doty, cousins, great-nieces and nephews, neighbors, friends, and most importantly Nibbles, his dog and best companion to the very end.
We will celebrate David’s life and scatter his ashes on his land at Lake John on September 21, 2019 at noon with lunch following. Memorial donations: made in Davids name to The Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation (rmef.org).
