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In memory of

Thomas Neal Laugle

Silverton, OR, USA

April 9, 1952 - April 27, 2020

Apr 9, 1952 - Apr 27, 2020

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Thomas Neal Laugle, most recently of Silverton, Oregon, passed away on Monday, April 27th, 2020 at the age of 68 after a protracted battle with cancer.

Son of Neal and Billie Laugle of Batesville, Indiana, Tom was the oldest of ten children. He was preceded in death by his sister, Linda, his father, and most recently his mother. He is survived by his wife, Ellen Munchel, his siblings: Jane Narwold, Julie Donohue, Jill Konradi, Jennifer Brebberman, Janice May, Jack Laugle, Paul Laugle, Bob Laugle, his son, Neal Laugle, his daughter, Kelly Tuomikoski and four grandchildren.

Tom lived in Batesville until he was 18 when he enlisted in the Air Force. While serving in the Air Force, Tom met and married a striking young officer named Jeannette Marshall (mother to Neal and Kelly). After time in Austin, Texas and Cincinnati, Ohio, Tom and Jeannette moved the family west to Oregon to be closer to Jeannette’s family. After working in various manufacturing and technology sectors, Tom found his passion in teaching. He began teaching computer aided drafting and manufacturing courses at Clackamas Community College in the early 1990s and became a fixture of the college, developing new classes and programs around his varied interests. He retired from the college in 2014 but continued to stay connected to teaching and to his students for whom he cared deeply. In his final years, Tom was able to rekindle a relationship with his high school sweetheart, Ellen Munchel, and they were married in 2015.

Tom grew up loving sports and in particular baseball. He played throughout his adolescent years into high school and Legion baseball at Batesville. His love for hunting, which began with stalking rabbits and squirrels in the woods outside of Batesville, continued once he moved to Oregon and graduated to regular deer and elk hunting trips. The Outdoors was his passion. He enjoyed fishing, rafting and boating on many rivers in the Northwest. He loved to tell the tale of his solo boat excursion up the Inside Passage from Washington state along the western coast of Canada into southeastern Alaska. As any visitor can attest to, whenever they made the trip to Oregon to visit Tom, they needed to bring hiking shoes and outdoor gear. Tom was never one for siting around; he was very comfortable outdoors enjoying the world God had planned for him. He inspired a love for the outdoors in his children and grandchildren.

A man who would have been perfectly suited to the job of town sheriff in the Wild West or a boat captain on uncharted seas, Tom found himself a bit out of sorts living the typical suburban lifestyle. Living on his boat, the “Max Bauer”, on the Columbia river outside of Portland and tending to “The Ranch” in central Oregon gave him much needed escapes from modern reality. He was an adventure seeker and story teller who, just like Twain, never let the truth get in the way of a good story. For those who knew Tom well it is easy to imagine him with his sidearm and his hunting dog standing at the pearly gates helping St. Peter keep the trespassers out of heaven. “Just another adventure!”

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