Dipsea Demon Dishonored at Death

On last Tuesday's Muir Woods hike, we learned that Jack Kirk had run the Dipsea Race 68 straight times (1930-2003; the race wasn't run every year), the last when he was age 98. (He died in January of 2007 at the age of 100). Kirk won the race twice and was known as "The Dipsea Demon".

In Sunday's I-J Spots Section, editor Dave Albee reports that on the way home from Fresno on Monday he pulled off Highway 99 to visit Kirk's grave site and was appalled to see that there was no stone maker --- "no recognition that the man ever lived or died. Nothing but a cold and empty patch of brown grass." Albee talked to the caretaker of the Plainview Cemetery where Kirk is buried and learned that it would cost $400 to give Kirk's burial plot a standard headstone. Albee suggested that if each of the 1,500 runners in the annual race gave $1 to a "Dipsea Demon Dignity Fund", money for the gravestone could easily be raised. If you feel moved to contribute, send your donation to Dipsea Race, P.O. Box 30, Mill Valley, CA 94942. (The 99th Dipsea Race will take place on June 14, 2009).