If there was an activity or an event that aimed to improve, protect or preserve the community and its residents’ quality of life in any way, it was likely that Donna Murphy was either spearheading the initiative or at least volunteering for the cause.
Murphy, who died June 26, has left a permanent mark across Fremont County. She was an avid environmentalist, always working to ensure clean air and pure water for future generations, and she broke the glass ceiling for women when she served as Fremont County’s first female county commissioner by appointment.
In an oral history with the Royal Gorge Regional Museum and History Center on Aug. 15, 2017, Murphy said she came to Colorado from Chicago to ski and ended up living in Denver, Manitou Springs and Colorado Springs before moving back to Chicago for a few years in the 1970s.
She graduated from the University of Denver with a BA in history in 1971 and moved to Cañon City with her former husband and their young children in 1978. She began working for the Department of Corrections at the women’s facility April 1, 1982, as a case manager. During her time at the Colorado Women’s Correctional Facility, Murphy took inmates on shopping trips in downtown Cañon City and one day while serving as the acting security captain on dayshift, she climbed the fence to show how easy it was for inmates to potentially scale the wall.
During her tenure with DOC, Murphy also helped open Arrowhead Correctional Facility.
She stepped away from DOC when the Democratic Central Committee selected her as the replacement for Fremont County Commissioner Tom Doyle, who died Dec. 2, 1995. She was sworn in on Dec. 12, 1995, becoming the first woman to sit on the commission. She served for 14 months alongside Commissioners Joe Rall and Myron “Smitty” Smith but went back to work for DOC after an unsuccessful campaign against Jim Shauer.
Murphy said that year in office was “very difficult” because she was a woman and an environmentalist and she had never owned a business. She said in her oral interview that she was reminded frequently that she “wasn’t elected.”
In the meantime, Murphy earned a master’s degree in public administration from the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs in 2002. She continued her work as a case manager at Colorado Territorial Correctional Facility and then for Colorado State Penitentiary until her retirement in 2007.
In her oral interview, Murphy, who majored in history and minored in art in college, said she got involved on so many boards through the years because it gave her a “life on the outside” of corrections.
Murphy was involved with the Fremont County Democratic Party since she moved to Cañon City in 1978, however, she stated in her oral history that she really “didn’t like either party” when she first began voting.
“I registered as an unaffiliated because I didn’t like either party actually,” she said. “But then, in the first primary, I realized I couldn’t vote so I had to choose one party or the other so I chose the Democrats.”
Murphy was honored with the Lifetime of Distinguished Service Award on Feb. 23, 2019, during the Fremont County Democrats annual banquet.
Murphy has been an officer or active member of The Rialto Theater, Fremont Center for the Arts, Fremont/Custer Historical Society, the Museum of Colorado Prisons, the Sierra Club, BLM Resource Advisory Council, Arkansas Headwaters Recreation Area’s Citizen Task Force, Fremont/Valdai Sister City Association, Fremont Economic Development Corporation, Community Advisory Group for the Cotter Corp. superfund mill site, The Jane Jeffersons, The Italian Festival, The Cousteau Society and Cañon City’s Energy Future. She also was a regional representative on Gov. Roy Romer’s “Smart Growth” forums and a founding member of Colorado Citizens Against Toxic Waste.
Murphy organized the first Fremont County Recycling Day and her 1997 local recycling event garnered statewide attention for her ability to organize a free drop-off of household waste at no cost to the county.
She wore a lot of hats and had many titles in all her affiliations, but to Jeri Fry, Murphy was a hero, a friend and a mentor.
“She was a force of nature,” Fry said. “She knew what was right – she had an innate sense of that. … She was driven to better the community in every way that she could think of. She filled her days and her life with those kinds of tasks.”
Goodbye “Mrs. Beasley”
Donna Murphy was known affectionately by those of us who worked with her at the Colorado Women’s Correctional Facility as “Mrs. Beasley” and to the county she passionately cared about as Donna Múrphy. A woman who was known as one who wore a “coat of many colors” uniquely known and remembered by those whose path she crossed, one who was unafraid to stand up for what she believed, loyal to her political beliefs embodied within the texture of the Democratic Party….A woman driven by passion throughout her life’s journey, a passion that touched many, leaving no doubt in anyone’s mind that you had met Donna Múrphy.
One of her friends treasured the day and the awe of watching the sun shining brightly as she came skiing down a Monarch slope, no poles, with her 3-year-old son on skis supporting him, not falling once…
Mrs. Beasley, you marched to your own drum, you did life your way….this song, “My Way,” many of its lyrics were written deep within your soul….we have chosen a few:
“I’ve lived a life that’s full
I’ve traveled each and every highway
and more, much more than this
I did it my way.
Regrets I’ve had a few
But then again too few to mention
I did what I had to do
And saw it through without exemption.
Yes, there were times
I’m sure you knew
When I bit off more than I could chew
But through it all when there was doubt
I ate it up and spit it out
I faced it all.
And now, as tears subside
I find it all so amusing
To think I did all that
And may I say, not in a shy way.
Oh no, oh no not me
I did it my way.”
(Song credits Claude Francois and Paul Anka)
Thank you “Mrs. Beasley,” Donna Murphy, for leaving a footprint in Fremont County that was uniquely yours, for all the causes you gave your soul to, sometimes financial support to ensure the “mission “ was accomplished….we shall always remember you and all that you did on your life’s journey.
–Submitted by friends from all seasons of Donna Murphy’s life
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Donna Murphy filled her days working to better the community - Canon City Daily Record
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