Paul Roger Olsen

Paul Roger Olsen of Alpine, Texas, died Wednesday, January 8, 2025, in Midland, Texas. He was born on January 28, 1933, in Audubon, Iowa, the son of Lois (Mead) and Peter Olsen. Paul grew up in small-town Iowa and, after graduating as a Political Science major from the University of Iowa, served in the U.S. Army. He was stationed in Butzbach, Germany where he and newlywed Nan (Bray) started a family. In 1959, Paul and Nan returned to her hometown of Austin, Texas, and would later separate. 

Paul traveled to Alpine, where he met, fell in love with, and married Kathleen Holland Stradley. They shared almost 40 remarkable years together and built a life filled with good friends and family. Together, they traveled across the country and around the world. An avid photographer, their travels and lives together are wonderfully captured in Paul’s photos. One of his favorites stands next to his desk at the K-Gage ranch, a beautiful photograph of Kathleen in the markets of Barcelona. 

His friends recognized Paul — or “Pablo” — as a social animal. He really enjoyed meeting and talking to new and interesting people. He often regretted he was not a better listener, which opened the opportunity for him to say, “Do you have just another minute?” And he would launch into a story about their extraordinary family, friends or some intriguing person he and Kathleen had met. Paul would note that good stories could be, and should be, improved upon. He relied on Kathleen to help get the facts right, and she often did so with wry humor and a wink.

Paul was an enthusiast of the way of life that generations of pioneers and ranchers built from San Antonio west to the high plateau country surrounded by the Chisos and Davis Mountains. He was as proud of his Danish heritage, as well as the extended Olsen family who emigrated from Aero, Denmark. And Paul loved the friends he worked with at Sul Ross State University. He would note that the University’s namesake Lawrence Sullivan “Sul” Ross, was also Iowa-born.

Paul is survived by a loving family, including a brother-in-law, nieces, nephews and the six men he considered sons and their spouses and children. He was preceded in death by wife Kathleen, as well as Nan Bray Olsen, daughter Nancy Olsen Gregory, an infant son Mead, his brother Alan Olsen, and baby sister Carol Ann Jorgensen of Cedar Falls, Iowa.

A private burial will be held for Paul for immediate family, to be followed at a later date by a memorial service to celebrate his life. The Alpine Memorial Funeral Home in Alpine, Texas, is assisting the family with the arrangements.

Memorials may be directed to one of the several endowments established by Sul Ross State University or to the Midland Memorial Hospital whose many doctors, nurses and staff are truly remarkable.