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In memory of

Ralph Rand Emery, Jr.

San Anselmo, CA, USA

April 29, 1927 - February 23, 2021

Apr 29, 1927 - Feb 23, 2021

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Ralph Rand Emery, Jr.

Born in Santa Rosa, CA April 29, 1927 died February 23, 2021

Ralph’s childhood included a snowball fight atop Bald Hill, defending San Anselmo from Fairfax. Ralph grew up in San Anselmo, attending Main School, now Wade Thomas, later taking the train to Tamalpais High School. He joined the track team, pole vaulting with a bamboo pole into a sawdust mound. On his team were comedian Pat Paulson), and Jim Vitek. He was a volunteer lookout for aircraft on a San Rafael Ridge during WWII. He was one of the first to the plane crashes on Bald Hill.

His high school years were WWII years, his yearbooks marked with when and where his classmates died fighting that war. He joined the army, and had orders to ship out to the Pacific theater when the war ended. One of his biggest regrets was not having fought, as so many of his contemporaries had.

After the war, he attended College of Marin, then graduated from San Jose State. During one summer, his lifelong friend, Jim Vitek got him a job cutting down trees that would soon be drowned by the waters behind then-new Bon Tempe Dam. He met Lois Hoffmann playing tennis on the Memorial Park courts, and married her in 1950. She joined Ralph on backpacking and climbing trips into the east side of the Sierra, led by Ralph’s younger brother, Tom, and Harold Klieforth. Ralph, Tom & Harold climbed Mt. Humphries, Ritter, Darwin, Lyell, Palisades, Whitney and others in the 1950’s.

Lois & Ralph bought a new home on Muriel Place in Fairfax. They had three children, Doug, Steve, and Carol. One of his early carpool commutes was from Fairfax to Burlingame to work for Purity Foods, as an accountant. In summers, the family would pack a succession of blue American Ramblers & camp at Dinkey Creek with the Sisk family. Ralph took his children on their 1st backpack into Saddlebag Lake in 1960. He was active in Boy Scout trips with both sons, and Girl Scouts with Carol. He introducing backpacking to scout leader “Pard” Dahl, and Troop 7 became a backpacking unit. He lead Steve and Carol up Mt. Whitney’s mountaineer’s route in 1969, and climbed Mt. Ritter a couple times with Carol. He bought a small Styrofoam boat, “Snark”, which the family enjoyed sailing on many lakes & on Tomales Bay. Later, Ralph bought a 19’ sailboat, and delivered food to the Indigenous activists when they reclaimed Alcatraz in 1969.

Ralph opened his own CPA practice in San Rafael around 1966, with Curry Plumbing and Gary Morey’s Junior Bootery as clients. Gary was a great friend & cartoonist, often drawing an overworked Ralph dreaming of sailing off to some paradise island.

Lois and Ralph divorced in 1969, and after his kids graduated, he began a new life with Susan Steen, a special education teacher. They married in 1974. He quit his CPA practice, working his first free spring harvesting silage oats with son, Steve, on Eddie Smith’s ranch in Sonoma. He met a blind activist, Mike May, in 1974 at a summer camp, which inspired a life changing career working with the blind. He got his Mobility Instruction degree in Arkansas & worked for the Lighthouse for the Blind. He then traveled around the world to work with the blind, while Susie taught special education.

In Japan, he helped establish a facility to help persons afflicted with both blindness and degenerative arthritis. He next worked in Vancouver, Canada, becoming a Canadian citizen in 1992. They lived in various parts of western Canada and Washington until 2009, when he and Susan bought a home in Sequim, WA. They camped all over the Olympic Peninsula in his Toyota camper and Ralph volunteered in the tourist bureau.

After Susan’s death in 2017, Ralph met some wonderful friends in a grieving group. In February of 2019, Ralph suffered a debilitating stroke. It was the year of “snowmaggedon” in Sequim, and he had helped many of his neighbors shovel out from under 4 feet of snow. He recovered somewhat, but never quite had the same energy, and could no longer live on his own. Steve drove him down the Washington-Oregon coast to Bello Gardens in San Anselmo. He used to deliver mail in that neighborhood, and could name who had lived in most of the homes in the 1940’s.

The pandemic lockdowns took a toll on all Bello residents, Ralph comparing it to the constant uncertainty during WW2. A day after his 2nd COVID-19 vaccination, he was taken to Kaiser Hospital, where life left him 2 days later. He is survived by his first wife, Lois Hansen, son, Douglas of Sebastopol, (and his wife Molly Eckler) Steven, of San Anselmo, (and his wife Kathleen Lipinski) and daughter, Carol Bruce of San Anselmo, (husband Bob Bruce). He leaves a few cousins behind, including Linda Espinosa of Santa Rosa, and Andriena Lundgren Streker Crowe of MA. Ralph is also survived by longtime neighbors & good friends, Joe and Mary Bruce and family.

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