October 26, 1933 – March 6, 2026

James Howard Severson, an industrious, community loving Midwesterner who loved a good joke and became a corporate executive who raised five children before settling into a Rocky Mountain life filled with skiing, hunting and fishing, died March 6, 2026 in Steamboat Springs, Colorado. He was 92.
Jim went home for one last martini after a brief hospitalization for pneumonia and heart issues. He died surrounded by three of his children, a grandchild and beloved caretakers.
Jim was born on Oct. 26, 1933 and grew up in a modest house his father, Harold, built in Eau Claire, Wis. Although he would go on to live in much grander houses, embrace bigger cities and travel to countries his father could only imagine, Jim carried his childhood lessons of thrift, honesty and hard work throughout his life.
Jim’s father taught him to ski jump when he was 5 and he became a national champion. He passed his love of the sport to his youngest son, Kris, who also became a US Ski Team member, and whose sons became competitive international slopestyle skiers.
While a member of the Army’s 10th Mountain Division in Colorado, he married Anne Marie Zappa on July 30, 1955. They met at a college dance in Eau Claire when Jim was a student and Anne was working as a beautician. Their marriage lasted more than 62 years, ending when Anne died from Parkinson’s Disease in 2016.
Jim joined the ski team at the University of Denver and graduated in 1958. The couple’s first two sons, Keith and Kent, were born in Colorado. The family moved back to Eau Claire and he began his career with Uniroyal. Their daughter, Kim, was born there.
The family moved to Los Angeles, where their daughter Keely was born, and then Detroit where their son Kris was born. They them moved to Houston and back to Detroit.
The couple moved to Steamboat Springs in 1979, when Jim accepted a job at Colowyo Coal Company. The pair quickly became part of the civic fabric and their home was the site of neighborhood gatherings, community meetings and a raucous Christmas Eve party the pair hosted for decades.
He was a regular at the Howlsen Hill ski jumps and was a starter in the 2008 Salt Lake City Olympics.
After he retired, he worked as a handyman for the senior apartments where his mother, Beatrice, lived. He fished Steamboat Lake and hunted elk, even surviving a stroke during a hunt by pulling himself down the side of a hill with the butt of his gun.
When Anne entered a nursing home in 2014, he spent every day with her. He caught his last fish when he was 90.
Jim is survived by his five children and their partners, eight grandchildren and two great grandchildren.
In lieu of a service, the family will hold a memorial service at Steamboat Lake in the summer.