Locals remember ‘Leo and Max’
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ELKINS -- Leo Dever, with his small dog Sassy Max, was a well-known local personality during his time living in Randolph County, and he posted his adventures online as he traveled the country raising money for animal adoption centers.
Many local residents who knew Dever were saddened to hear of his death in Wyoming over the Thanksgiving holiday.
Keri Manley, a great-niece of Dever, confirmed to The Inter-Mountain that Dever passed away in Casper, Wyoming at the age of 69.
"He froze to death in his tent and was found on Thanksgiving Day," said Manley, who lives in Arkansas. "Someone had made a health check call on him because he had been camping at a certain spot and nobody had seen him for a couple days.
"The coroner said his tent was close to a river bed and when they investigated, they said there was no sign of foul play. But they could see next to the edge of the river bed that there were slip marks where it looked like someone had slipped into the water. So they think he may have slipped into the water and went and crawled in his tent to try and warm up."
Manley said the families' minds were somewhat eased by the knowledge that Dever passed peacefully.
"The coroner told the family that when people pass away like that, before they go, they slip into a euphoric state," she said. "The coroner said that people who pass away like that believe that they are warm and comfortable and that he probably just drifted off to sleep. So that gave us some comfort."
Dever was in Wyoming doing what he had done for years, traveling from state to state and raising money for animal adoption centers. His adventures and efforts to help animals gained popularity over the years, as his Facebook page "Leo and Max Across America" has close to 5,000 followers.
People from towns and communities across the United States have posted photos on the page and talked about encounters they had with Leo.
Unfortunately, Sassy Max passed away sometime within the past year, and Dever had adopted a new dog who was on the road with him.
"Ever since he was in his teens, he has been a roamer," Manley said. "He would settle down somewhere for a few years and then one day he would be up and gone. As far as I know, he's been traveling around the country for over 50 years."
Manley said she believes Dever lived the way he did for so many years because of a traumatic experience he endured when he was a child. She said when Dever was 9 years old, a man his family knew entered the home, shot and killed his parents and four of his siblings and set the structure on fire.
Dever and his 6-year-old sister were able to escape to a nearby residence, walking more than a mile in freezing weather. Both children were treated afterward for pneumonia, exposure, burns, cuts and bruises, according to The Jonesboro Evening Sun's account of the crimes.
The tragic event happened in December 1963 near the town of Trumann, Arkansas. Frank Harris was convicted of the murders and was executed in the Arkansas State Prison electric chair in 1966.
"(Leo) had a really, really rough life from the time he was a kid, but he wouldn't want to be remembered by that," said Manley. "His thing was trying to collect money for animals, which I think was an escape from everything that happened to him when he was a child."
Manley said Dever hardly ever returned to his home state of Arkansas, and if he did, it was just to pass through.
"He would come through Arkansas and come through Missouri, where he grew up, but he wouldn't stay very long," said Manley. "It was just kind of a slide through to get to the next destination. His favorite two states were West Virginia and Wyoming, and he always seemed to head to either one of those during the winter. He loved the mountains and water."
During his stops in Elkins, Dever made a lot of friends throughout the community, including Connie and Earl Light of Mill Creek. Connie Light said she met Dever in 2016 and had been friends with him ever since.
"I saw him with his sign on his bike one day, so I stopped and asked him who was Leo, and who was Sassy Max," she said. "We just became friends after that and he was just really a nice guy. Everyone kind of shied away from him because he was homeless, but he lived the life he wanted to live and saw more of the country than any of us will ever see. He's been everywhere. and he did it all on a darn bicycle."
Earl would transport Dever, whose bike had a sign attached to the back promoting his Facebook page, around town to get any items he needed during his stays in Elkins.
"That was a fine little fella," Earl Light said of Dever. "We helped him out for a little over a year when he was here last. He was a strong go-getter and just a fantastic person to be around.
"He would try to push his bike, hold Sassy Max, and carry a five-gallon kerosene can from across town to over where he was staying up by the airport. So I would take him to get his kerosene so he didn't have to do that. But he would never ask anyone for anything, you would have to offer something for him to accept."
The two became close enough for Earl to get an invite to Dever's tent, which was located in a wooded area close to the Randolph County Airport.
"My husband went up to his tent one time and before he went in, Leo asked him to take his shoes off," she said. "He told my husband he didn't want him tracking up his house. He was very particular and very neat. You could go up to where his tent was and he had flags around it and Christmas decorations during Christmas time. He was really just a nice and unique guy."
Connie Light said that Dever had started to build a small cabin in the area where his tent was located.
"He wanted to build him a cabin up on Airport Hill and he had the floor started," she said. "I'm not sure who owned the land where he stayed up there, but someone was letting him live there when he was in Elkins. We figured he'd come back, but he never made it back."
The couple said they weren't the only ones in the area that became friends and helped Dever.
"There were a lot of people who helped Leo, it just wasn't me and my husband," Connie Light said. "Cheryl Riggleman, a nurse over at the hospital, would help him, and everybody at Burger King gave him a hand. He would go to Burger King in the mornings and sit and they would give him a biscuit and he would drink his coffee and charge his phone. He really has a lot of friends around here."
Manley said she has received several messages of support from people in Elkins who said they knew her great-uncle.
"I know Leo was in Elkins for a while and I've had a lot of people from the town reach out to me," said Manley. "We really appreciate everyone helping him along the way, because it was hard for us to do anything for him, besides sending him money. But he didn't want that type of help. He always wanted everyone to know how independent he was and that he could do it on his own. We are so touched that people loved him so much."
Manley said Dever's remains were being brought back to Arkansas, and that any updates on arrangements would be posted to his Facebook page.