Obituary of Ronald Roger LaFever

Ronald R. LaFever, age 76, passed away Thursday, February 19 at his home in Winnsboro. Ron was born July 21, 1938 in Bismark, North Dakota to Frank LaFever and Rose Mossbrucker-LaFever. He served in the US Air Force for 12 years, part of that time in Vietnam. As a civilian, he served at the Goldstone tracking station for the first Apollo Space mission. He moved to Dallas in 1971 and called it home until 1988 when he moved to Paris, Texas to work at Kimberly Clark. He was very much a model train enthusiast and belonged to the East Texas Model Railroad Club in Commerce, Texas. His love of model railroading and his engineering skills resulted in an HO scale locomotive nicknamed the "LaFever Climax". He built and sold over 200 of these locomotives and then published a book to helps others do the same after the Parkinson's disease forced him to retire from his favorite hobby. His last publication was a book of love letters and poems that he had written throughout his life. He is survived by his daughter, Cindy Strait and husband Marty and their children Heather and Amelia, of Pittsburg, Texas and son Jeff LaFever and wife Linda and their children Alex and Chris of Austin, Texas. A memorial service will be held 6:00 P.M. Wednesday, February 25th at Erman Smith Funeral Home in Pittsburg.