Nederland Residents Arden and Betsy Buck first met in Boulder in 1961. They were both attending a picnic near Betsy’s house with a young adults’ club, when it started to rain. Betsy invited the group into her house.

After a while, everyone but Arden left. He liked a picture of the moon that Betsy had painted, which hung on her wall and asked if she would sell it. She said it wasn’t for sale. So there was only one way he could have it – to marry her! Two years later, they did.

Today, after 58 years of marriage, the Bucks are still learning things about each other, adjusting to life together, and enjoying their adventures together.

“We are different from each other in many ways, finding it challenging, but it keeps it interesting!” Betsy said. Arden said “We are looking for new adventures (getting older is definitely a new adventure). We don’t stop dancing, hiking and getting together with old and new friends.”

Arden Buck was born and raised in Illinois. He attended Cornell College in Iowa and Michigan State University for one year before joining the army for two years. He was stationed in Korea. He finished undergraduate college in Tucson, Arizona, then worked in California before deciding to go to graduate school. In 1960, he asked a friend about Boulder. The friend said “It’s a nice town, kind of dusty and not much traffic. Arden came to look, got trapped by Niwot’s curse, and never left.

After earning his bachelor’s degree, he worked for the U.S. Bureau of Standards (NBS) and NCAR, developing instruments to measure water vapor in the stratosphere. He built the first laser in Colorado.

Betsy was born in Hinsdale, Illinois. When she was three years old, her father joined the U. S. Air Force, so she and her mother and brother traveled all over the Eastern United States, living near Air Force bases. After two years of traveling, the family ended up in Dallas, Texas, where they rented a home on land that belonged to a burnt down estate, called White Rock Ranch. They enjoyed chickens, sheep, a horse, and a pet alligator. Then they moved to Idaho, then on to Ohio. Betsy had gone through 12 moves before she was in fifth grade.

“My folks made it exciting and adventurous, even fun!” Betsy said. She graduated from high school in Bay Village, a small suburb of Cleveland on Lake Erie.

She wanted to be an artist, so she attended Ontario College of Art in Toronto. Betsy found out about Boulder and moved to Colorado and attended the University of Colorado. Later she worked as a draftsman for an oil company in Denver. She also continued her art at the Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center, then went to work at NBS in Boulder. She worked part time, leaving time to start an art business. That’s when she met Arden.

After their marriage, Arden and Betsy lived in Boulder and did a lot of hiking in Colorado and Utah, exploring remote canyons. All through the years, international folk dancing was a big part of their lives.

In 1969 Arden was offered a position as a visiting professor at a university in Seoul, Korea. They lived there for a year while he set up a graduate program in modern optics. They traveled around the country visiting other universities and lecturing. They also took many trips into the remote mountains, staying in small inns and sometimes Buddhist monasteries.

Betsy worked in the Seoul Hospital for Abandoned Children and Babies, and a small orphanage where she was in charge of the ten youngest babies. One day, a twelve-day-old baby girl was left outside at the gate. That baby ended up becoming their adopted daughter. Then they found a 3 ½ year old boy in an orphanage and included him in their new family. After returning to Boulder, another boy, this time home-made, joined the family.

They lived in a house in East Boulder, on an acre, where they raised their children, Dina, Jim and Todd. “Living in the country near Boulder was our favorite life there for 25 years – a little farm with goats, chickens, ducks, huge cottonwoods, and Boulder Creek.”

Having experienced the difficulties with foreign adoption, they started the Foreign Adoption Center to help people who wanted to adopt foreign children. Betsy started the “Foreign Adoption Report,” which continued to provide information and advice for many years and was updated annually.

Betsy also worked as an Occupational Therapist Aide for the public schools. In her spare time she was a clown in parades, and marched as a fuzzy duck in Nederland July 4th parades.

When the Bucks moved to Nederland, it was just another adventure, but it has turned out to be a great joy.

They love the town people here, and have been involved with the Mountain Forum for Peace and other groups in Nederland. Through the years, they have continued to enjoy International Folk Dancing, the Utah Canyon, skiing, hiking, backpacking, music, travel, road trips, and the people around the world that they have come to know. They like to say “we’re here to stay!”