Dick Kreck was born in San Francisco in 1941 and grew up in Glendale, Calif. After earning a bachelor’s degree in journalism from San Francisco State College, he worked as a reporter and copy editor at the San Francisco Examiner and the Los Angeles Times.

Kreck joined The Denver Post in 1968 and held various jobs, writing a city column for 18 years and covering television and radio before his June 2007 retirement. His books include Colorado’s Scenic Railroads (1997); Denver in Flames (2000); Murder at the Brown Palace (2003), which was on The Denver Post best-seller list for 22 weeks; Anton Woode: The Boy Murderer (2006); and Smaldone: The Untold Story of an American Crime Family.