Fred Holzer truthful man who had a way with kids

Fred Holzer of Coeur d’Alene was an officer and a gentleman.

Holzer, 89, died Jan. 10 but will be remembered as a soft-spoken role model for his children and the many other kids in North Idaho he met.

“Anybody that’s lived here long enough pretty much knows who he is,” said his son, Dick.

Fred graduated from Coeur d’Alene High School in 1933, then graduated the Kelsey Baird Business College in 1935. In 1944, he joined the Coeur d’Alene Police Department and worked until his retirement 25 years later.

His nights as a policeman were spent walking the streets downtown, checking to make sure merchants’ doors were locked.

His wife of 64 years, Rita, said sometimes he’d come across someone who had a little too much to drink. But instead of putting them in jail, he’d get them a cup of coffee, take them home and tell them he didn’t want to see them on the streets again.

“And he wouldn’t,” Rita said. “He was so nice they’d listen.”

Rita still has people stop her to tell her he was one of the best cops around. When he retired, he started the security department at North Idaho College.

Soon after, he transferred to the athletic department, where he worked part time for the next 25 years and helped students he met along the way.

“He got along great with kids,” Dick said. “He had a really great gift.”

While a police officer in the late ‘50s and early ‘60s, he coached football and baseball for the Immaculate Heart of Mary Academy. His house would often be packed with 10 or 15 kids at a time. Rita rarely remembers a batch of cookies making it past the cookie sheet and onto a serving plate. During his time as football coach, he earned a reputation with 33 wins and one loss.

Fred didn’t travel much, and spent his vacations fly-fishing the rivers of North Idaho or bird hunting with one of his bird dogs. He volunteered on the Coeur d’Alene Parks and Recreation Board from 1978 to 1994. He saw his position in work or play as a role model for the kids he coached, and he lived as truthfully as he could.

“He was so honest that he went way overboard,” Dick said. Fred always kept his finances in order, paying cash instead of using credit cards or a bank account. When his bank made a $100,000 error in his favor on his savings account, he went straight to the bank to make it right. The bank manager didn’t believe him and said it was his money, but Fred pushed the mistake, and it was eventually corrected. Dick said it took Fred several trips to correct the error, where most people would have just left it or spent the money.

“He didn’t think he should have it,” Rita said. “Somebody else was short.”

Dick said Fred’s honesty came from his childhood. He was raised on a ranch in Montana before moving to a truck farm in Hayden. But his family didn’t have much while growing up and, as he got older, he was always willing to lend a hand to people in need. Dick said Fred had a soft spot for hitchhikers because Fred’s family didn’t have a car when he was young and he had to hitch rides into Coeur d’Alene.

On one road trip to see Dick in Seattle, he picked up a young, scruffy hitchhiker outside Spokane. The man started talking about how he hated policemen and kept talking about them until they got to Ellensburg.

Fred stopped to get something to eat and when the man said he didn’t have the money for a meal, Fred paid. After they left, the conversation continued until the man asked what Fred did for a living.

At the time, Fred was a security guard for the North Idaho College, but the man didn’t believe him until he showed his badge.

“That’s just the way he was,” Dick said.

When troubled kids needed a place to go, Fred and Rita’s doors were open. Some kids, now grown, returned decades later to thank him for helping put their lives on a better path.

“He never expected anything in return,” Dick said. “He was a real giver.”