Dick Hewetson Memorials

Honorary member Dick Hewetson died on July 19, 2025, at the age of 95. Dick lived a long, productive and active life. Dick was a trusted advisor when we incorporated and started forming Minnesota Atheists, helping to write both our Constitution and bylaws.  At a 1992 Spring Equinox gathering, we presented Dick with honorary membership recognizing his past Minnesota Atheists involvement. When Dick accepted the honorary membership, he also announced to all he was following a lifelong dream to move to San Francisco, California. This disappointed many in attendance, but then he announced he was donating his first retirement check from his years working as a minister. That brought down the house with applause, laughter and joy!

Dick Hewetson Obituary

– written by the deceased

On July 19, 2025, Richard Walton “Dick” Hewetson died by doctor-assisted suicide at Brookdale Senior Living in San Jose, California. He had a wonderful life but was discouraged by the state of the world and the USA.  At the age of 95, he was ready to go.

Born in a suburb of Chicago on March 31, 1930, he grew up in a world where homosexuality was considered illegal, immoral, and an illness. For the first 42 years of his life, he did everything to appear normal. Two outstanding examples:

• From ages 16 to 20, he had a steady girlfriend, even though he was never in love with her.
• Eventually, he chose the Episcopal priesthood as his career. As an Episcopal clergyman, he thought he would be accepted as an unmarried man.

At the age of 42, he became involved in the budding gay rights movement.  He emerged from the closet (“ripping the door off its hinges,” according to a friend). He was instrumental in getting a gay rights ordinance passed in St. Paul, MN in 1977. Because lesbian Carla Messman and he were active union members, Minnesota state employees had the first union contract protection for LGBTQ+ employees in the nation.

He helped his partner David Irwin, (an avid reader and book collector), in establishing Quatrefoil Library. Opening to the public in February 1986, it is one of the largest LGBTQ+ lending libraries in the country, and it has become the de facto LGBTQ+ Center for the Twin Cities.

We soon reached the conclusion that the greatest enemy of LGBTQ+ people was religion.

In 1978, David and he joined the Freedom From Religion Foundation, an organization that upholds the separation of state and church.

Dick continued a life of activism including mental health issues, women’s rights, LGBTQ+ rights, and the separation of state and church.

At the age of eighty, he met the love of his life, “John,” a Vietnamese refugee. Dick is also survived by his beloved niece and nephew, Kim and Ron Spawn, and countless cherished friends.

Please remember the good times we had together.

Memory by August Berkshire

I knew Dick Hewetson since the beginning of our current local atheist movement in 1984. Even back then he was an out-of-the closet gay atheist. Forty years later I still remember him telling me that it was harder for him to come out as an atheist in the gay community than it was to come out as a gay person in the atheist community. Even back then our atheist community in Minnesota supported same-sex marriage. I am proud, but not surprised, that our rejection of religious dogma enabled us to be so far ahead of the rest of the country, and that Dick felt totally comfortable supporting us.

Memory by Marilyn Nienkerk

Two years ago, I was in Redwood City for a family party which Dick and John were able to attend.  We had a delightful time. And in June I was back for a family graduation. Dana Treadwell, FFRF leader in San Francisco, was kind enough to shuttle me from the airport to Sunnyvale where Dick was a resident and under hospice care. We had an hour visit reminiscing over all of the old organizing days in Minnesota. During that visit, I told him of Shirley Moll‘s hobby of making blankets for anyone who wanted one and he said he would love a rainbow colored one. Subsequently she made that. It was mailed out and delivered to him by Dana.

Dick never lost his sense of humor.  We will treasure his memory forever.

Memory by Steve Petersen

When Dick entered hospice a few months back, I sent him a message using an Ingersoll quote: “Happiness is the only good. The time to be happy is now; the place to be happy is here; and the way to be happy is to make others happy.” My message to Dick was that this quote reminds me of how Dick lived his life. Dick was a regular at FFRF conventions and he was quick with a smile and a hearty laugh. At the same time, he was an activist who made a difference.