Coach, mentor, friend: Paul Snyder remembered
Chris Peterson | Hungry Horse News | UPDATED 2 weeks, 2 days AGO
A longtime coach, teacher, mentor and friend, the Columbia Falls community has fond remembrance for Paul Snyder.
Snyder died at the family home in Martin City July 29. He was 76.
Snyder was a Hall of Fame athlete in wrestling and football while a student at Columbia Falls, winning the Tom Dumay award in 1968 as a senior. He returned as a coach both in wrestling and football.
He coached the football team from 1989-1995.
Zac Perry was a quarterback under Snyder in 1995.
“He was a positive voice in every aspect of life,” Perry recalled Monday. “He had a lot of patience. But at some point when things needed to be corrected, you knew you would get constructive criticism ... a lot of clarity ... he’d say you’ve got to quit being a mullet and focus.”
“(Mullet) is in my vocabulary to this day because of Paul Snyder,” Perry said with a laugh. “Genuine thoughtful human being all the way around.”
Snyder was also a beloved physical education teacher and outside of coaching, was a mentor to many youths over the years.
Snyder was born in Glasgow, Montana in 1949 to Wallace (Spud) and Dorothy (Dottie) Snyder.
The family moved west in 1952 and established a home at Stoney Broke Ranch near Martin City in 1955. Spud Snyder was renowned for raising POA horses.
Paul Snyder always had bits of wisdom when he talked to the Hungry Horse News.
Later in life we recalled one conversation where he was suffering from some ailments and he noted the “Golden years weren’t so golden.”
And when cell phones became a staple in teenaged life he referred to students wryly as the “generation that never looked up” because they were always looking at their phones.
Outside of school he was also very involved with various church youth groups, creating his own program called the “Christian Cats.”
He was an avid hunter and fisherman and horseman. After retiring from teaching he worked in Glacier National Park for a few years and also managed a ranch in the foothills of the Bear Paw Mountains at one point.
A service for Snyder is scheduled for Oct. 4 at 3 p.m. at the Columbia Falls High School gymnasium. His full obituary is in this newspaper.