SHAUN STANLEY/Durango Herald

When Frank Grosseibl died five months ago, friends and a handful of family members mourned. The former research lab technician and volunteer fireman left behind no immediate family, just a niece and some cousins.

But he did leave something else behind - something valuable and surprisingly large. Something so big that it brought the beneficiaries to tears.

Grosseibl was born in New Jersey in 1925, and for his first 54 years, that's pretty much where he stayed.

But in 1979, he and friend Russell Roedema moved West and opened the Southwest Coffee House in Durango's Main Mall. Anna Anderson recalls when she stopped there to warm up after taking out her sled dogs, Grosseibl would venture outside to her truck and give treats to each of her 17 dogs.

More recently, in the early 2000s, Grosseibl adopted a dog named Katie, a black Labrador that Chris Nelson, director of animal services at the La Plata County Humane Society, calls 'the sweetest dog on Earth.'

Deborah Warner said Grosseibl, a friend of hers for nearly 20 years, had seven dogs in his life, Katie being the last.

'He loved that girl,' Warner said. 'Made her two scrambled eggs every day she spent with him - also made sure that she had a soft comforter from Penney's, her yearly Christmas present.'

Then one day around 2006, Katie suffered a seizure. Within hours, a heart condition sent Grosseibl to the hospital. With Grosseibl incapacitated, the humane society coordinated Katie's care. After that, the humane society helped with Katie more than a dozen times.

The society often ends up taking in animals when a person, particularly someone who lives alone, becomes ill and can't care for a pet. But Katie was special. Staff members took extra pains to give her blankets and attention. The friendly and easy-going Lab became a staff favorite. Nelson said they did about everything for her but make the scrambled eggs.

Jon Patla, the humane society's director of animal protection, said Katie's health was 'a roller coaster ride.' Sometimes he'd show up at Grosseibl's house to take in Katie and they'd remove her on a stretcher. The next time Katie would run down the stairs. And Grosseibl was always appreciative.

'When we would get there, he would just light up, and she picked up on that,' Patla said. 'It was amazing she lasted another six or seven years from when we first got involved. I really never expected her to stick around that long.'

Grosseibl, in his 80s by then, began to hint that when he died, he'd take care of the Humane Society and Annie's Orphans. Patla thought he might be joking. Often, people overestimate the amount in their estate, Nelson said, and a donation isn't as large as planned.

Anna Anderson founded Annie's Orphans, a no-kill dog shelter, in 1985 on Florida Mesa. Grosseibl kept in touch and talked about leaving $20,000 or $30,000 to Annie's in his will. The humane society got wind of a similar amount.

Katie's health declined, and so did Grosseibl's. But he hung on.

'He always said he had to stick around until Katie passed,' Nelson said.

Katie died in August, and Grosseibl made it just a few weeks more. On Sept. 1, 2013, he died in Durango at age 87.

The funeral procession consisted mostly of fire trucks and animal-control trucks.

It wasn't until a board meeting Jan. 29 that Grosseibl's lawyer, Phil Snyder, dropped the bombshell: Grosseibl's estate had $200,000 to bequeath to the Humane Society. He also gave $200,000 to Annie's Orphans.

'My jaw dropped,' Patla said. 'That's unbelievable.'

Anderson, working on a far lesser budget, was equally stunned. To her, the $200,000 looked like a bogus Publisher's Clearing House sweepstakes check.

She said, 'I sat here looking at the check for a couple days thinking, this had to be a joke.

'What a wonderful, generous man he is,' she said.

Anderson's hope is to use the money to start a training program or other programs they've talked about for a while. The over-arching goal is to train dogs so they can leave the shelter and enter a home.

'Basically, we want to use this money in the smartest way possible to assure the future of Annie's Orphans,' Anderson said.

Anderson is a bit concerned that benefactors will begin thinking that Annie's is set for life. But she knows the money won't last forever. And she won't either: someday soon, someone else will have to take over.

'I'll probably die with a pooper-scooper in my hand,' Anderson said.

Nelson said the humane society's share will go toward a capital fund drive for a new adoption center. Space is tight at the current building, and there's no place to separate incoming dogs from those who've been around for a while. Dogs in the main kennel may not be ready for adoption, and the better situation is to have them out of the public's eye.

Also, the addition would allow the La Plata County Humane Society to take care of more animals. Last year, the Humane Society took in 574 animals from outside the county that would have otherwise been euthanized, Nelson said.

'There's definitely a need for it,' he said.

Grosseibl could be miserly, insisting on advertised discounts and celebrating when he discovered his beloved king-sized Hershey bars were on sale, Warner said.

'Then he would say: 'Heck, what good is money? ... What am I going to do with it when I die?'' Warner recalled. 'I said, 'Make it easy on yourself, leave it to the animals.'