Joel Emery Sr.

JOEL EMERY SR.

Cedar Rapids

Joel Edgar Emery Sr. passed on peacefully to the Great Beyond July 8, 2015.

He was born Nov. 21, 1924, in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, to Joel Edgar Emery and Virginia Riffey. He attended Wilson Senior High in Cedar Rapids until his senior year when he and his mother moved to Florida to help out with his sister while she worked in a defense plant.

He graduated from Ponce de Leon High School in Coral Gables in 1943 and enlisted in the Army. He was put in the advance officers training program and spent six months in North Dakota, where the Army tried to mold 250,000 young men into officers that would be needed to command the millions of troops that were going to be needed to invade Japan. The Manhattan Project made this endeavor moot. He was then transferred to the infantry and sent to France to reinforce the invasion forces. He served in France until a severe mastoid infection put him in the hospital until after the war was over. He was awarded the Bronze Star.

After the war he married Dorothy Marie Hauser on Nov. 21, 1947, in Cedar Rapids. They were married for 65 years.

Joel had various jobs until he decided to avail himself of the veterans programs and started school at Coe College in Cedar Rapids. He attended school full-time while working part-time six hours a night at Link Belt Speeder as a welder. He graduated with a double major in English and history, summa cum laude. He then began his teaching career at McKinley High School in Cedar Rapids, where he taught until 1960, when he and his family moved to San Bernardino, Calif., with the promise of higher wages and warmer climate. Joel taught at various schools in the San Bernardino school system, ending his carrier at San Gorgonio High School.

Joel was an avid reader and during his last years spent a lot of his time reading everything from "War and Peace" and the Bible (which he read as literature) to Elmore Leonard and John Le Carre novels.

He was preceded in death by his father; mother; wife; his brothers and sister, William Joseph Doyle, John Emery, Richard Emery, Lyman Emery and Ruth Doyle; and also by his daughter, Pat Cirkl; and sons, John Brody, Richard Emery and Christopher Emery.

He is survived by his son, Joel (Noreen) Edgar Emery Jr.; stepdaughter, Judy (Robert) Paul; along with many grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

In keeping with his wishes there will be no service.

To those who are inclined, please send a donation to UnityPoint Hospice. Their help, compassion and understanding has made this transition just a little less painful. I can not thank them enough.

He will be missed.