Joseph Rumble

Joseph Newton Rumble II September 7, 1927 - January 5, 2016 Joe Rumble passed away January 5, 2016 at Monitor, WA. He was born on September 7, 1927, in Lincoln, NE, to Gertrude (Lacy) and Joseph Newton Rumble. The family soon moved to Galveston, TX, and also lived in Houston, Waco, Dallas and Fort Worth, where his father found work as the Depression deepened. They settled in Albuquerque, NM, where Joe attended junior high and high school. During the summers before his last years of high school, he worked for the U.S. Forest Service on a fire crew and as a lookout in northern Idaho. He graduated from Albuquerque High School in 1945. He enrolled at the University of Idaho with the intention of pursuing a degree in forestry, but was drafted into the Navy in February of 1946. He was sent to the Navy Class A electronic service schools at Great Lakes, IL, Ward Island, TX, and Memphis, TN. Joe was honorably discharged in 1947 and re-enrolled at University of Idaho in the fall of 1948 to study engineering. During the summers of 1949, '50 and '51, he worked as a Forest Service smokejumper out of Missoula, MT. He graduated in 1952 with bachelor's degrees in both mining engineering and metallurgical engineering. Joe's first job was at U.S. Vanadium Corporation's Pine Creek tungsten mine near Bishop, CA. He found better working conditions at Anaconda's large open pit copper mine at Yerington, NV. Two years later, the family relocated to Boise, ID, where he worked for Mountain States Telephone Company, and later for Morrison Knudsen Construction Company on a three-dam hydro project on the Snake River. Alcoa's Wenatchee Works offered him a job as a process engineer in 1956 and Wenatchee became home for 16 years. In 1970, Joe and Mary bought Denny Horton's orchard in Monitor, WA. Alcoa transferred him to Port Lavaca, TX, where he worked as the cast house superintendent at Point Comfort Works. He was transferred again in 1975 to Albemarle, NC, to work at Alcoa's Badin Works. He would eventually complete 31 years of service, retiring in 1987. Not done working, he moved to Vancouver, WA, where he participated as cast house superintendent in Vanalco's restart of the former Alcoa plant. He retired a second time in 1991 and moved back to the orchard, which had been under the capable management of Otto Adams as Joe moved around the country. While in college at Idaho, Joe worked as a kitchen assistant at the university infirmary. It was there he met one of the nurses, Mary Loretta Powers, who would become his wife on August 27, 1950. After 37 years of marriage, Mary died of cancer surgery complications. He met Susan Stewart at a square dance in Vancouver, and they were married January 21, 1989. Joe was an active person and enjoyed running, biking, skiing and hiking. He was a founding member of the Mission Ridge Ski Patrol and participated in programs at the Wenatchee YMCA, most notably the 1966 and '67 Canadian canoe trips. At the age of 70, he started paragliding and completed over 100 flights. In 1993, he and Susan began hiking the Appalachian Trail, and they finished it in 2003 when he was 76. He was active on the Monitor Council, and will be remembered for his many letters to the editor in the Wenatchee World. He was a devout Christian, and was an active member of the churches he attended throughout his adult years. In addition to his parents and first wife, Joe was preceded in death by an infant son, John McCarthy Rumble, and two half-brothers: Paul (Norma) Wykert of Santa Fe, NM, and David Magowan of Pacifica, CA. Joe is survived by his wife, Susan; sister, Jane (Dick) Weirick of Ojai, CA; and six children: Joseph Newton "Newt" (Barbara) Rumble III of Ridgefield, WA; Mark (Kathy) of Silt, CO; Kyle (LaRee) of East Wenatchee, WA; Gavin (Sharon) of Lexington, NC; Derek Shawn (Sue) of Concord, NC; and Matthew of Wenatchee, WA; twelve grandchildren; and numerous nieces and nephews. In lieu of flowers, memorial contributions may be made in remembrance of Joe to the Wenatchee YMCA. Family and friends are invited to a Memorial Service to celebrate Joe's life at 11:00 a.m. on May 21, 2016, at Faith Lutheran Church, 171 Eastmont Avenue, East Wenatchee, WA. Arrangements are by Telford's Chapel of the Valley, East Wenatchee, WA.