Tri-Valley Hero: Lifetime Achievement, Pleasanton’s Dolores Bengtson

Dolores Bengtson estimates she has led more than 5,000 people on hikes, beginning in the late ’70s.

“I always hoped it gives them an appreciation of the outdoors and the natural world that will stay with them,” she said.

Bengtson moved to Pleasanton, then with a population 17,000, from Richland, Wash., in 1968 when her husband took a job with Kaiser Aluminum & Chemical Corp. They had four children, the youngest in fifth grade.

“We arrived at the time of the fair, and we couldn’t find any places to stay. There were motorcycles all over and all the taverns — it was like a brawl downtown,” she recalled with a laugh. “But we came back on Monday to this peaceful, quaint little town.”

She started working for the city as a swim instructor as she had in her previous home. Then she began training swim instructors, and teaching handicapped swimming and exercise classes. She also went to Cal State Hayward to earn her degree in recreation.

“Later on I was a full-time city employee as a supervisor, about 1975-76, then in 1979 I became director of the department,” Bengtson said.

Although the city’s aquatics center had opened in 1971, Bengtson shepherded the construction of the deep water pool and built the swim program based on water safety.

“I felt we had a mission to make Pleasanton’s children and adults safe in and about the water,” she said. “I never cared how fast somebody swims. I wanted them comfortable in and about the water.”

“In the early days it was pretty much staffed with high school and college students, 40 young people that did such a spectacular job,” she added. “Those were some of the most joyous years I ever had.”

As recreation director, Bengtson also developed the policy of planning neighborhood parks within a half-mile of most residences as well as larger community parks.

When she retired in 1998, Bengtson was pleasantly surprised at a City Council meeting to hear it announced that the aquatics center would be renamed in her honor. Most people assume such honors only are given in memoriam, she noted.

“I had a repairman come to my house after I retired, and when I opened the door his eyes popped open and he said, ‘Oh, you’re alive,'” she remembered.

Hiking was important to Bengtson, too, as she trekked her favorite three local spots — Sunol Park, Morgan Territory and Pleasanton Ridge — volunteering to run hikes for the city and the Sierra Club.

“I always felt I should do anything I can to promote getting people outside and walking,” she said.

In the early ’90s she and a friend walked from the end of the Iron Horse Trail in Dublin to Shadow Cliffs.

“We showed it could be done,” Bengtson said. “We started lobbying the city and East Bay Regional Park District in opening that up. It was kind of like a vision, to have these wonderful walkways you can ride your bike and walk on and no traffic.”

Now 85, Bengtson often leads walks for the World Walk to Wellness group in Pleasanton that meets Saturday mornings, and her cemetery tours are especially popular.

“I can remember when I could walk 22 miles. Now I walk two miles and I’m tired,” Bengtson said. “Getting old is not for the faint of heart.”

In 1988 she took an adventure tour to Africa and fell in love with the continent, returning several times.

“After I retired I became enamored of Tanzania and found through Cross-Cultural Solutions a way to go for six weeks and work with schools,” she said.

Now she is staying closer to home, often traveling with family members. Last year she took her three daughters and a great-granddaughter to Alaska.

“I am trying to give ‘memory trips’ to my children and grandchildren,” she said.

Bengtson also has been on the Kottinger Place Redevelopment Task Force and the Pleasanton Gardens board, to provide affordable housing for folks to “age in place” in Pleasanton. And she can be found working with the Amador Valley Gardening Club, where she runs the Penny Pines program for donations to plant trees in forests destroyed by fire.

Born in 1932, Bengtson says being raised during the Depression formed her.

“Living in a world that had so little, the rest of my life has been a gift,” she said. “To me, life is wonderful.”

Hero FYI

* Dolores Bengtson taught swimming and lifesaving for 85 cents an hour in Richland, Wash.

* She almost majored in pre-law in college.

* After her children were grown, she made it a rule to walk 25 miles a week, even when working full-time.

* Bengtson has four children, six living grandchildren and five great-grandchildren.

* Her home is centrally located for family reunions — her offspring live in San Luis Obispo, Marina, Oakland and Washington state.

* While on a six-week trip visiting national parks with her grandsons, 11 and 12, she altered their route to include watching grizzlies catch fish in the Alaskan Panhandle.

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