Russell Allen Rea

1924 - 1996  (71 years)

• Name	Russell Allen Rea
  Born	31 Dec 1924	Tracy, Lyon, Minnesota, United States
  Gender	Male
  Buried	Jun 1996	Guardian Funeral Home, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, United States
  	Cremated
  Died	22 Jun 1996	Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, United States
  Person ID	P44551590	My Genealogy
  Last Modified	28 Feb 2012

  
  

  Father	Noel Bates Rea,   b. 22 Apr 1900, Tracy, Lyon, Minnesota, United States ,   d. Jul 1974, Tracy, Lyon, Minnesota, United States  (Age 74 years)
  Mother	Luella L. Larson,   b. 26 Dec 1900, Near Morris, Kendall, Illinois, United States ,   d. Apr 1980, Tracy, Lyon, Minnesota, United States  (Age 79 years)
  Married	1920	Tracy, Lyon, Minnesota, United States
  Family ID	F3	Group Sheet  |  Family Chart

  
  

  Married	1 Sep 1950	St. Louis, Missouri
  Children	1. Gary Stephen Rea   2. Cynthia Ann Rea   3. Bruce Allen Rea
  Last Modified	21 Jul 2019
  Family ID	F2	Group Sheet  |  Family Chart

  
  

• Notes

  Russell was a civil engineer. After completing his B.S. in civil engineering at the University of Minnesota in 1948, he worked, briefly, for the Minnesota State Highway Dept. June 28 in probably 1944 or 1945, he graduated from Advanced Bombardier School while in the U.S. Army Air Force at Big Spring, Texas. His graduation photo was taken at Iowa City, Iowa. Russell was working in St. Louis, Missouri as an engineer, and this is where a friend and co-worker introduced him to Mary Alice Cannon. The two were married and moved to Oklahoma City, Oklahoma in 1950. There, Russell worked, first, for Guy Treat at Treat Engineering Company, which has long since been defunct. He left after Mr. Treat died of a heart attack and the office folded. In May 1956, he began working for Benham Engineering Company (today known as The Benham Companies), from which he retired in 1986. In between, from October 1963 to March 1968, he worked for Glendening & Associates, another Oklahoma City engineering firm which has long since gone out of business. It was in March of 1968 that he returned to work at Benham, which, by then, had changed its named to Benham-Blair & Affiliates. Dad had our first house built in the then-new Village of Oklahoma City, at 9521 Ridgeview Drive. The house was completed in February of 1954 and on March 7, 1954, we moved in, Mom, Dad and myself, age 17 months. Prior to this, we had been living at Rancho Village Apartments, 1342 S.W. 38th Street in Oklahoma City, where Mom and Dad were living when I was born. Among my father's several interests was model railroading and photographing and cataloging actual deisel locomotives. This was a life-long interest of his, precipitated by his boyhood in Tracy, Minnesota, a town which grew up around a rail stop. Russell also had an intense interest in history and had many books dealing with American history, in particular, WWII. During the war, his college days were interrupted by a breif period of service in the Army Air Force, in which he was first trained as a bombardier, then changed to meteorology, just as the war was coming to a close. Dad was a meticuluous record keeper, right up until his death. In 1996, found a small notebook he kept of some of his expenses, from the early 1950s. In this I found that my baby crib cost $28 in 1952. This is in a list of all the furniture I so well remember living with as a child. He had the cost of every piece, including sales tax. My high chair cost $12.75, and my stroller was $15.95 ($16.27 with tax). Being the engineer that he was, he even drew detail drawings of some of the parparts of the appliances in the kitchen. I was surprised to see an entry that said, "sale of shotgun, Jan. 1, '54, $75.00." I had never known my father to possess a gun in his life. No doubt Mom had convinced him to sell it. In fact, Dad was never a sportsman, to speak of. I recall him fishing with his father at Lake Shetek, in Minnesota, when I was about five or six, but that was the only time I recall seeing him fish. There are photos of he and my mother, taken before I was born, camping at Mt. Scott, in Oklahoma, so, apparently, he did engage in some outdoorsmanship in his younger years. Some other items of interest in Dad's notebook: his Oklahoma state income tax was a whopping $25 in 1954. His income, as a civil engineer in 1954, was $521.50 per month, or about $137.30 per week, which was pretty good in those days. It supported us in our new home, which Dad had built the same year. Of course, there were only three of us at that time. Two years later, my sister came along, and my brother the year after that. Dad's car (described only as "automobile") in December 1957 had 20,667 miles on it and it cost $11.89 to lube the chassis, change the oil, check the transmission fluid, the differential, the air cleaner, and install a new oil filter. The same thing Jiffy Lube does now for about $30. Dad kept detailed records of his daily expenses on the road when we took our longest vacation ever, in 1957. For example, the turnpike toll from Oklahoma City to Tulsa was $1.30. He stopped for gas in Miami, Oklahoma and that cost $5.21. Lunch was $5.40 for our family of five. His gas mileage wasn't bad, for the fifties: 18.2 mpg. He bought tobacco and cigars in St. Louis, Missouri for $1.20, and while he was at it, he bought souvenirs for Cynthia, Bruce and I that cost $5.60 total. Beer was $1.09 and our motel room that night cost $11.50. Our motel room in Bowling Green, Kentucky cost $13.62 for the night. We had lunch the next day at Mammoth Cave for $2.15. From The Oklahoma City Journal Record, April 1, 1997: NOTICE OF HEARING: PETITION FOR DISTRIBUTION, DETERMINATION OF HEIRS AT LAW AND DISCHARGE OF CO-PERSONAL REPRESENTATIVES Case No. P-96-907-46 In the District Court of Oklahoma County, State of Oklahoma. In the Matter of the Estate of Russell A. Rea, Deceased. NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN that Gary S. Rea and Cynthia A. Rea, Co- Personal Representatives of the Estate of Russell A. Rea, Deceased, having filed in this Court their Petition for Distribution, Determination of Heirs at Law and Discharge of Co-Personaal Representatives, the hearing of same has been set by the Judge of the District Court on the 21st day of April, 1997, at 9:00 o'clock A.M. before The Honorable James H. Paddleford, Judge of the District Court, and all persons interested in saiid Estate are notified to then and there appear and show cause, if any they have, why the said account should not be settled and allowed, the heirs of said Deceased determined and the Estate distributed. Dated this 31st day of March, 1997. THOMAS S. BALA