Robert Stockton

Robert Stockton Robert Edwin Stockton Aug. 5, 1933 – Feb. 6, 2015 “Bob” Stockton was the first born son of Walter L. Stockton and Mildred B. Hall Stockton in Kingman, Kansas. The family moved to Burley, Idaho to escape the Dust Bowl. He graduated high school in Burley Idaho in 1951. Bob was a veteran of the Korean War serving in the army. He was also stationed in Louisiana and Germany. He was a high Lead logger and worked throughout Oregon, Washington and California. He worked at Swanson Mill in Noti just before retirement. Bob was an avid hunter and fisherman. He gardened after retirement and was very active in the American Legion and Veterans of Foreign Wars. He loved to read and was a regular at the Veneta library. He loved westerns and history. His routine was Monday picking up trash at the shopping center with the American Legion, Tuesdays breakfast with the elderly at his granddaughters adult foster care home, lunch at the senior center and Fridays at the library. He loved Little League Baseball and Golf. It was best not to call him when these were broadcasting. He loved rock hunting and took trips into the beaches and deserts of eastern Oregon and into Idaho to collect and polish his treasures. He was married to Marge Schultz and divorced in his 20’s. He married Jennie Rose Miller December 16, 1965. They spent their wedding day babysitting grand children while a new grandchild was brought into the world. Bob and Jennie were married almost 43 years. He took care of her when she developed diabetes in 2002 and then Alzheimer’s until her death in 2008. For his 50th high school reunion in 2001 he wrote “Since Graduation – My 50 Years Shortly after graduation I migrated to the Oregon coast on my old friend, Harley Davidson. I started working in the woods at 17 years 10 months. I followed this line of work till retirement except for working for Uncle Sam when I was drafted. After traveling around the west coast and Alaska, I settled down outside of Eugene Oregon where I have lived since 1970. I raised my family here and finished out my career here. I enjoy gardening, travel, rock hunting, and reading. Also enjoy baseball. I have been blessed with good health, a good marriage and even grandchildren to spoil. Special Experiences I consider the time spent in the U.S. Army special, e especially the months spent with K Co. 23rd Regiment of the Second (Indianhead) Division, on the DMZ in Korea. After the division sent home I was sent to QM corps where I ran into a classmate of ours, Darold Kruger. The only other person I ran across was a boy from Heyburn, I think, he was in an infantry regiment near mine on the DMZ. If my memory is correct, his name was Chuckwarner. I consider myself fortunate to have spent my youth in a place like Burley, in a good era and environment. Great fishing, hunting, with opportunities to work for all, even youth. Thank God for small communities like Burley Idaho!” He is preceded in death by his wife Jennie Rose, a brother, Donald, and sister MaryAnn Sawyer and one stepson Bill Wilson. Bob is survived by sisters Carol Durham, Sandy Meeds, brother Gary Stockton, daughter Mollie Patrick, granddaughters Beverly Floyd, Melody Kenyon, grandson Braydon Kenyon, step children Rose Peck of Arizona, Freeman Wilson Missouri, Jack Wilson of Texas, Robert Wilson of Missouri, Lily Branco of Missouri, Joette Dullinger of Idaho, and many step grandchildren and great grandchildren. A celebration of life service and potluck will be held at the Community Center located at 25192 East Broadway, Veneta on Tuesday February 10 from 1 p.m. – 3 p.m. Instead of flowers contributions can be made to the Veneta Senior Center Meals on Wheels program. Robert Edwin Stockton By: Mindy Colley 5/29/01 On August 5, 1933 a baby boy was born named Robert Edwin Stockton. He was born in Kingman, Kansas, but he grew up in Burley, Idaho. He has three sisters and two brothers, but one (brother) died. His sisters include my Grandma Carol, my great Aunt Sandy and my great Aunt Mary Ann.(sister also died since this report) His brothers include my Great Uncle Donald who died in a logging accident around about 1962, and my great Uncle Gary. My Great Uncle Bob is from my mom’s side of the family. He is my Grandma Carol’s brother, or you could say my mom’s Uncle. He started school on September 1, 1959. He was six years old. He learned to drive when he was eleven years old, his dad taught him to drive in potato trucks, in potato fields. He wouldn’t let him out on the road until he got his license at twelve years old. When I asked my Uncle Bob where we immigrated from he said we didn’t immigrate, he said that we were Native Americans. I think that we are from a tribe in Kansas or Idaho, but I am not sure. My Uncle Bob learned to swim in the Snake River in 1945. He got married twice, one in June 1958, they didn’t have any children and they got divorced, but his second marriage in December 1965, to Jennie, they had one child, Molly, she was born on October 19, 1966. She now has two children Mimi(Melody) and Beverly. My Uncle Bob’s first job was pumping gas at the “Conoco service Station”. He received sixty-two and a half cents an hour that was in 1948. Then on May 20, 1953, when he was twenty, he entered the U.S. army. During his time in the service he had been to eight different countries; Korea, Japan, Germany, France, Denmark, Mexico, Alaska(before it was a state, when it was a territory), and Canada. He has lived in about twenty-five to thirty different places, i.e. cities, towns, etc. He bought his first house in 1965, with his second wife. The first car he ever bought was a 1936 dodge four door Sedan. It cost him eighty-five dollars. He retired from logging and mill working in 1995, six years ago. He likes all sports except tennis, volleyball and soccer. For some reason he always teases my brother Billy. He thinks that Billy is a soccer player, but Billy isn’t. In his daily activities, now and when he was younger, he liked to read the paper and listen to the radio. His friends were the neighbor kids, no one in particular. He would just play with the neighbor kids all day. His only pet was a dog named “Ring” because it had ringworm. At the time my Uncle Bob was a little boy, since he could remember, the president in office was Franklin Delano Roosevelt. When he first voted, he voted for Jack Kennedy for president. That was about 1960. He was twenty-seven years old. When I asked him about two historical events that took place that affected him, he told me the assassination of John F. Kennedy affected him because” It changed all of the political structure of America”. Kennedy’s death also affected him because he felt that it wasn’t fair that Kennedy died before he could do all that he said he would, and that it is always a shock when a leader gets killed, and he thought it was neat that J.F. K was the first catholic president. Also when J. F. K. got shot and Lyndon Johnson got us going with the war of Vietnam and Kennedy was just advising about it. My Uncle Bob also mentioned the death of Harry S. Truman. He said that “He was the greatest president we ever had” in his lifetime of course. He also liked Truman because he didn’t let anyone run all over him, or tell him what to do. This is my biography about my Great Uncle Bob, I love him very much and I hope you feel as if you met someone new as I read this to you