Louis Michael Bell

Louis Michael “Mike” Bell was born on July 3rd, 1937, the eldest of four children, to parents Catherine (Carpeneto) and Louis Bell. His three siblings were sisters Cristina, Catherine, and Elizabeth. He passed away peacefully on December 24, 2021.

Bell grew up in State College, Pennsylvania, where his father was Director of Public Information at Penn State University, and taught him to read at an early age, passing on his love of words. When Mike was 14, he was publishing sports stories in the local paper. He attended Philips Academy-Andover, going on to earn his PhD in Scandinavian Studies at Harvard University in 1973. His dissertation pioneered the creation of concordances through computers ─ now common practice ─ via a project through IBM. It was the first time a text had been keypunched to be more easily studied. The work was an Icelandic saga, the famous Egil's Saga, which is 65,000 words long and might have taken decades for scholars to index.

During his time at Harvard, (where he was sports editor for the university radio station, WHRB), he fell in love with the history of the English language. After winning a Fulbright Scholarship, he traveled to Iceland to study Old Norse and the Icelandic Sagas, and became fluent in Icelandic. Throughout his life, Bell was fascinated by folklore, folk culture, and mythology, particularly Viking and Nordic history, though his interests were wide-ranging, including the study of linguistics. He spoke or was closely acquainted with six languages, both living and extinct.

Bell moved to Boulder, Colorado, in 1974, with his then wife Jennifer Heath, stepson Matthew, and daughter Sarah Catherine. There he began a career in the English Department at the University of Colorado, Boulder. He was a well-liked professor, teaching an eclectic array of subjects from contemporary and ancient folklore and folk music (including a seminar on the poetry and influence of musician Bob Dylan), to “car-lore,” the folklore of automobiles, and African American folklore, among other unusual topics. Bell retired from CU in 2008.

Bell was an accomplished guitarist who also created “Highway 322," spinning folk and blues music on Boulder’s independent radio station, KGNU, and hosted it for thirty years. "Highway 322" continues to this day (Bell’s extensive record collection was donated to the station by his daughter). Bell studied blues and folk music throughout his life, even travelling to the deep South to study the lives and techniques of classic blues musicians. Indeed, Bell was an avid traveler, and spent many months travelling in Europe, particularly Italy, France, Norway, and Iceland, making friends all over the world.

Bell is survived by daughter Sarah Catherine Bell-Springer, sister Elizabeth Bell, and longtime partner Regina Carlyon.

Mike Bell will be remembered by his close friends and family at a small, private memorial.