America knows Edward Tipper for his daring sacrifices as a 23-year-old Easy Company soldier who parachuted into Normandy on D-Day and was immortalized in the book and HBO series “Band of Brothers.” But in Lakewood, he will be remembered as the English literature teacher who changed students’ lives.
One of only a handful of the original 140 Easy Company soldiers remaining, Tipper died Feb. 1 in Lakewood. He was 95.
Tipper received a Purple Heart and the Bronze Star for his service during World War II and D-Day. In 2011, the French government bestowed on him the French Legion of Honor medal, the country’s highest honor.
“We didn’t talk about the war,” his daughter, Kerry Tipper, wrote on Facebook on Feb. 3. “This is the piece I want those of you that didn’t know him personally to understand. His greatest sense of pride and accomplishment came from being a loving son to his mother. It came from his near 30 years of teaching. From his years traveling the world. And finally, from the 34 years he gave to his small, but adoring family.”
Born in Detroit in 1921, Edward Tipper was raised in one of the city’s working-class neighborhoods, although he spent a brief period living in Ireland with his parents. After the attack on Pearl Harbor, he tried to enlist in the Marine Corps but was denied because he had an overbite. So he volunteered for the 506th parachute Infantry Regiment, 101st Airborne Division. The adventures of the Easy Company became the basis of “Band of Brothers.”
On June 12, 1944, Tipper was clearing a house when a mortar shell exploded near him, injuring his right eye and breaking his legs. He spent a year in army hospitals.
“(Easy Company was) in a way a little embarrassed that their group got attention, that theirs was spotlighted when there were so many other groups that did incredible things and made sacrifices,” Kerry Tipper said during a phone interview.
When her father was discharged, he was severely injured and obviously disfigured, she said. Doctors gave him a list of activities he couldn’t do, such as driving and sports requiring depth perception. But for Edward Tipper, that became a checklist.
“He was defiant above all,” Kerry Tipper said. “He just refused to accept people’s limitations.”
As an undergraduate at the University of Michigan, Edward Tipper became an avid handball player. “He didn’t really care about handball,” she said. “He just wanted to be able to do it.”
Tipper earned a master’s degree in education at the University of Northern Colorado, then the Colorado State Teachers College. Kerry Tipper said her father loved Colorado and was an avid skier well into his 80s.
He had a nearly 30-year teaching career — starting in Iowa and then returning to Colorado, where he taught English literature and ran drama programs at schools in Jefferson County, including Wheat Ridge High School, Lakewood High School, Alameda High School and Arvada High School. He received the John Hay Fellowship from the University of California Berkeley in 1961.
“So much of what people talk about with him is what he did in the war. That was two years and really six days starting on D-Day,” Kerry Tipper said. “Teaching was 30 years.”
She said her father was always invited to high school class reunions. Without fail, former students would approach to tell him he changed their lives or to say he was the reason they did this or that.
After retirement in 1979, Edward Tipper began traveling and three years later he met and married his wife, Rosalina, in Costa Rica.
“He would want to be remembered as someone that changed lives, that brought meaning to people’s lives,” Kerry Tipper said. “He would want to be remembered as the incredible father and husband he was.”
In addition to his daughter, Edward Tipper is survived by his wife and son-in-law Blake Holloway. The family will have a private burial this month at Fort Logan with full military honors. A public ceremony will be held June 1 in Lakewood. Those interested in attending are asked to send an e-mail tippercelebration@gmail.com.
