Environmental Protector, Humanitarian, Humorist
Larry Kolczak’s wife, Betty Petersen, was an artist who was so drawn to Ajijic that, when Larry retired in 2009, they already had a home here waiting for them. When Betty died three years ago, after a marriage to Larry of 35 years, which brought the gift of four stepchildren, one of her friends pulled him into the Ajijic Writers Group and on into writing for El Ojo del Lago. If you are reading this, you have very likely had a good laugh over Larry’s pieces – dog drags chair around mall (July, 2025), being stuck in traffic behind a truckload of exotic dancers partying after the solar eclipse in Mazatlán (July, 2024), a youthful stint strumming guitar and singing about bridges over troubled water, sounds of silence, and desperados in European youth hostels (September, 2025).
Larry was born in Chicago in 1945; he studied biology and zoology at the University of Illinois, Urbana. After graduation, with the gift of a high draft board lottery number, he decided to spend the two years he wouldn’t be in Vietnam backpacking around Europe and beyond – thus the funny story about adventures in youth hostels. He also entertained in the bar of a fancy hotel in Zermatt, Switzerland, with view of the Matterhorn, and around the campfire for a photo safari company in Kenya. He says he probably scared away the wild animals.
He made his career working in environmental protection – water pollution for the Illinois and Iowa EPAs – where he met his wife. He then worked 23 years in Los Angeles with the Air Pollution Agency as Community Relations Manager. He wrote newsletters and did lots of public speaking. On the side, he free-lanced articles for Earthwatch magazine and through it got opportunities to band birds in Panama, photograph migrating whales, and radio-track wolves in Minnesota, kangaroos in the Australian outback, and sloth bears in the jungles of Nepal, while riding on an elephant. There was no danger that the magazine articles he wrote recounting these scientific adventures would be dull. The public speaking couldn’t have been either.
And if only we had a tall ship out on the lake, Larry would be our man to sail it. For 10 years he was a volunteer sailor on Pilgrim, a 98 ft square-rigged brig, a replica of the ship Richard Henry Dana sailed on from Boston to California and back, hauling California hides to the East Coast and writing about in Two Years Before the Mast. (Well worth the reading, by the way.) The ship was used in the movie Amistad and fifth graders got to spend a night on it learning about sailing life in the 1840s. To raise money for maintenance, a CD of shanties was produced on which Larry sang.
Larry was born with a cleft lip and soft palate, fortunately so well-repaired that he has no trouble with pronunciation. In fact, until well into his teens he didn’t know he had a cleft palate. His parents had told him that his scar had resulted from falling out of his highchair.
In 2023 he learned that the nonprofit Smile Network International (SNI) was coming to Lake Chapala to do surgeries free of charge on locals with the same birth defect – free of charge to the patients but requiring the assistance of local agencies and donors. The group of volunteer specialist plastic surgeons and nurses affiliated with the Mayo Clinic bring impeccable expertise. In the last 20 years, they have sponsored free surgeries in 13 countries and have treated over 1,500 patients in Mexico. Larry publicized the project with a humorous article about how his grandfather taught him swear words as part of his speech therapy. Larry has become a generous donor and also gifts each patient a teddy bear – or rather a “Larry bear.” Nobody is too old for the surgery or, it seems, to value their fuzzy trophy.
If you’d like to join Larry as a donor, go to smilenetwork.org.
Discover trusted local services and hidden gems with our easy-to-use online directory.
- PROFILE: Larry Kolczak - March 28, 2026
- PROFILE – Michael Reason - January 31, 2026
- Soul Man - January 31, 2026
