Ronald Maurice Cross

Ronald Maurice Cross WAPELLO, Iowa - Ronald Maurice Cross, 94, of Wapello, died Saturday evening, August 29, 2009, at the Wapello Nursing amp; Rehab Center. Funeral Service will be 10 a.m. on Wednesday, September 2, 2009, at the United Methodist Church, Wapello. Rev. Scott Smith will officiate. The burial will be at the Mallory Cemetery rural Wapello. After the burial, a lunch will be served at the Briggs Center in Wapello. Visitation will be from Noon to 8 p.m. on Tuesday, September 1, 2009, at the Dudgeon-McCulley Funeral Home, Wapello, where family will meet friends from 5 to 8 p.m. Memorials can be made to Izaak Walton League, the Louisa County Conservation Commission, and the Louisa County Historical Society. Ronald was born on March 3, 1915, the son of Alvin Jerome and Inez Anna Snyder, in rural Letts. He married Fannie Lea Matthews on May 6, 1939, in Burlington. She preceded him in death on January 19, 2003. He grew up in Grandview and graduated from Grandview High School in 1932. He attended Cornell College for two years and graduated from the University of Iowa. He moved to rural Wapello and farmed for many years. He taught junior high for th...[more]

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apello Community School District for several years and retired in 1980. He was a member of the United Methodist Church at Wapello, the Masonic Lodge No. 5 A.F. amp; A.M. in Wapello. He was a honorary lifetime member and board member of the Archeological Society of Iowa, a past president of the library board and church board, a conservationist of soil serving on the ASCS board, a member of the Louisa County Farm Bureau, the Louisa County Historical Society, the Louisa County Genealogical Society and the Izaak Walton League. He won the state duck calling competition twice. He enjoyed nature especially the bluebirds for which he built, placed, and maintained some 200 houses in the area for many years and was a member of the Bluebird Society. He is survived by his six children, Jerome L. Jerry Cross and wife, Mary, of Wapello, Ronald M. Ron Cross and wife, Joan, of Fairfax, Virginia, Sue Ellen Cross Lea of Iowa City, Carla E. Grimm and husband, Keith, of Wapello, Deborah Debbie Wiley and husband, Russ, of Wapello, and Douglas R. Cross and Lorraine Orr of Wapello; 20 grandchildren; 45 great-grandchildren; a great-great- grandson; a brother, Warren Wiele of Waterloo; and a sister, Emma Lou Mettke of Anaheim, California. He was preceded in death by his parents; his stepfather, Lester Wiele; his wife, and two brothers, Norbert and Howard.