Interpretive center gets surprise gift

GREAT FALLS, Mont. – A Lewis and Clark Interpretive Center volunteer who often greeted callers on the telephone bequeathed $100,000 to help support the center’s mission.

Caspar “Chuck” Garrigues III died last September, of complications from lung cancer.

“I think of him as the voice of the interpretive center,” Jane Weber, its director, said recently.

The center, overlooking the Missouri River in Great Falls, attracts about 80,000 visitors a year and draws on volunteers to help provide services for them.

Features of the center include exhibits about the 19th-century exploration of the West by explorers Meriwether Lewis and William Clark, and their party.

Garrigues, 63 when he died, retired from the Air Force in Great Falls after a 20-year career.

In 1999 he began volunteering at the center managed by the U.S. Forest Service.

A year later he became the first interpretive center volunteer honored for 1,000 hours of service.

Besides answering the telephone, Garrigues’ work included scheduling tours and handling questions about the center’s programs.

“Chuck was a tremendous volunteer” Weber said. At the time of his death, he had contributed 6,431 hours of work at the center.

Fellow volunteer Darlene Fasler said it seemed Garrigues was so dedicated that “his bed was in the next room.”

Garrigues was born in Chatham, N.J. He earned a master’s degree in English literature at New York University, and held a degree from Columbia University.

Besides his work at the interpretive center, his interests included music and computers.

At the time of his death survivors included his wife of more than 30 years, Martha, of Great Falls; sister Suzanne Garrigues of Baltimore; and brother Jonathan Garrigues of Honduras.