James Adams was considered a quiet, thoughtful man, but family and friends say his legacy rings out loud and in unexpected ways.

Adams died Feb. 4 at age 63 at Avista Adventist Hospital in Louisville after having been diagnosed with cancer in October.

Born July 5, 1945, to Archie and Margaret Adams, Mr. Adams grew up in Peoria, Ill. After serving four years in the U.S. Air Force, he studied journalism at the University of Illinois, where he met his future bride, Ellen.

"We met in freshman English class in 1967. He was 22, and I was 17," Ellen Adams said, hastening to add that they didn't start going out until she was 18. They married on campus in April 1968; by August the couple had arrived in Boulder.

"We moved here to be on our own away from our parents. We also liked the good weather, compared to Illinois," Ellen Adams said. Mr. Adams attended the University of Colorado in Boulder.

Mr. Adams worked most of his career as a technical writer, penning operating manuals for numerous companies, including Lucent, she said.

"He was real good at explaining things but not at finishing them. All he had left at CU was one semester and he simply stopped. He never could finish much - that's just the way he was."

After Mr. Adams passed away, his wife found a cache of notebooks. "There are poems, parts of short stories and novel outlines that he had written," she said. "He was really a poet at heart. When we first moved to Colorado he even wrote a poetry column for the Daily Camera in Boulder."

A fan of all things Chinese, Mr. Adams practiced tai chi at home. He enjoyed reading books about quantum physics and the works of Mark Twain, especially the author's satirical Letters from the Earth.

And he loved being a dad.

"My dad was the focal point in my life," said his son, Paul Adams. "When he was around, I knew things would be OK. He was a good listener and had a way of always being calm and thoughtful about things. A lot of who I am today is based on that."

Although Mr. Adams wasn't particularly athletic - his sport was chess - Paul Adams said his best memories of his dad revolve around football.

"He was always available to toss a football, usually in the park. But when we moved into our new house in Louisville, there was no furniture in the living room. We were playing catch and he turned and ran so hard into the wall he hurt his ribs."

Mr. Adams loved the music of Gordon Lightfoot, and he often played acoustic guitar at home.

"Gordon Lightfoot is a far cry from the heavy metal that I like to play, but I think watching my dad play guitar when I was little inspired me to pursue music as a serious hobby," Paul Adams said.

Besides his wife and son, Mr. Adams is survived by a daughter, Jennifer Winterfeldt, of Dickson, Tenn.; two sisters, Terri Jones, of Centralia, Ill., and Margaret Ann Fletcher, of Odell, Ill.; and grandchildren Steven, Aidan and Candace. His granddaughter Kayla preceded him in death.

A memorial gathering will be held at 4 p.m. Saturday at the Unitarian Universalist Church, 5001 Pennsylvania Ave. in Boulder.

"There's so many ways for people to give and remember my husband," Ellen Adams said. She noted he was a body donor and his corneas were donated for transplant. His clothing was given to Lafayette's Sister Carmen Center, his phone to Cell Phones for Soldiers and his eyeglasses to the Lions Club.