Beloved ‘reptile guy’ remembered by community in celebration of life

‘He was family to Gaiser Pets’

Friends and family of longtime community member Richard Neubauer gathered at the Ellis Lake Gazebo on Monday for a celebration of life for the man known to many as the “reptile guy,” for his work at Gaiser Pets in Yuba City.

Neubauer passed away over the weekend at the age of 70. He was born in Delaware and lived in Pennsylvania and Florida before moving to California in the 1970s. He met his future wife Dottie in 1981. He was into art and music, even playing in bands.

“It wasn’t a normal childhood and I’m so thankful it wasn’t,” Neubauer’s daughter, Angel Fisher, said of traveling around with her parents.

Neubauer and his wife worked to improve the downtown area of Marysville, including working to get the arches on D Street reconstructed.

“He was very much a community activist, when my mom was alive with him,” Fisher said.

Dottie was shot and killed in 1995 and her service was held at the Ellis Lake Gazebo. Fisher said having her father’s service

at the gazebo was a way of reuniting them.

After Dottie’s death, Neubauer didn’t do as much community activism but put his efforts into working at Gaiser Pets in Yuba City, where he developed the reputation of being “the reptile guy.”

“He was just very wellremembered and respected and his knowledge was second to none,” Fisher said. “It was just something he enjoyed so much and you could see that passion to other people as well and igniting that in them.”

Courtney Fitzsimmons was a co-worker of Neubauer’s who was one of three people to speak on Monday afternoon along with Fisher and Neubauer’s friend Steve White.

“He was a really good

Angel Fisher daughter

friend,” Fitzsimmons said. “He was actually more than a friend, he was family to Gaiser Pets.”

Fitzsimmons described how Neubauer made sure every person who purchased a reptile didn’t leave the store before knowing exactly how to take care of the animal.

“He was the common factor that kept us all together,” Fitzsimmons said.

White is a teacher at Marysville High School whose students were some of the many in the area that got to see the lizards, tortoises and other reptiles Neubauer took to different schools.

“I call him an unshackled spirit,” White said.

White met Richard and Dottie in the mid-1980s at a meeting of Marysville residents looking to increase foot traffic in town.

They worked on many projects in the community together and remained friends until Neubauer’s death.

“He was so cool,” White said. “He was about the most chill guy I ever knew.”

White recalled how he and Neubauer would go back and forth about the pedal steel guitar. When they heard a song that included the instrument, White would say the song would have been better without its inclusion and Neubauer would say it should be louder. The last time this came up was a couple weeks ago when White visited Neubauer in the intensive care unit.

“You’re right,” White remembered telling his friend. “I think we need to make it louder.”

Those in attendance were invited to go to the Silver Dollar Saloon to continue in the sharing of memories of Neubauer.

Mike Potts, owner of Pottsy’s Pollination and Honey Farm uses a smoker to keep his honeybees calm as he works on a hive next to a walnut orchard in Sutter County Monday. Potts recently had 92 of his beehives stolen off of South George Washington Boulevard.

Appeal-democrat file Store volunteer Richard Neubauer pets Adrian, a 4 1/2-foot male monitor lizard, at Gaiser Pets in Yuba City.

Friends, family and community members gather at the Ellis Lake Gazebo in Marysville Monday afternoon to celebrate the life of Richard Neubauer who passed away over the weekend.

A collage of photos placed on a table under the Ellis Lake Gazebo as part of the celebration of life of Richard Neubauer Monday in Marysville.