Ralph L. Smith

Ralph L. Smith, 89, of Rogue River, died Sunday, September 30, 2007 at Rogue Valley Medical Center.

A funeral service will be at 1:00 p.m., Friday, October 5, 2007 at Hope Presbyterian Church in Rogue River with Pastor Brian Boisen officiating. Interment will follow at Woodville Cemetery. Hull & Hull Funeral Directors are in charge of arrangements.

Ralph was born February 24, 1918 in Quartz, Montana to Lloyd & Mattie Smith. His family moved to Rogue River when he was seven. In 1936 he graduated from Rogue River High School with a graduating class of 12 students. During World War II he served in the Army Air Corps as a Staff Sergeant. He met his future wife, Mary Watkins who was also in the Army Air Corps and they were married in 1948. Together they raised three children, Pat, Mike, and Debbie. Ralph worked as a carpenter on the rodeo circuit, in the timber industry, owned a butcher shop, and later the Triangle Service Station in Rogue River with his partner, Bud Dick. In May 1967 he became the rural mail carrier for Rogue River and Evans Valley, retiring July 1983.

An avid outdoorsman, Ralph loved fishing, hunting, camping, and raising bird dogs. He had a gift for telling stories and knew every channel in the Rogue and Illinois rivers and how to catch fish in the lakes in southern and central Oregon. He believed that a stranger was just a friend he hadn’t met yet.

Survivors include his wife, Mary; two sons, Pat and Mike; daughter, Debbie; grandchildren, Alex, Jaclyn, and Tiffany; brother, Art Smith, and sister, Dorothy Brown.

He was preceded in death by his parents, Lloyd & Mattie Smith and a sister, Velma Baker.