Raymond E. Shirley

Wednesday, June 8, 2011

Raymond E. Shirley, 89, Nevada, passed away on Monday, June 6, 2011, at Research Medical Center, Kansas City, Mo., following a brief illness. He was born Dec. 14, 1921, in Dederick, Mo., to John T. Shirley and Anna M. Henderson Shirley. He married Betty L. Roggensees on March 26, 1949, in Nevada, and she survives of the home.

Raymond grew up in rural Vernon County and graduated from Walker High School in 1940. He served in the U.S. Marine Corps as an aircraft mechanic and SBD Dive Bomber in the Southern Pacific from 1942-1945. Raymond returned to Nevada following the service when he went to work for Hargrove Dairy and Kapple's Hardware. In the early 1950s, he began working for the U.S. Postal Service in Nevada until his retirement in 1988.

Survivors in addition to his wife, Betty, include three children, Kenneth Shirley and his wife, Jeannette, Mt. Home, Ark., Carol Shirley, Gladstone, Mo., and Joyce Shirley, Bryan, Texas; six grandsons; one stepgrandson; one stepgranddaughter; and numerous nieces and nephews. He was preceded in death by his parents; one son, Ronald Wayne Shirley; two sisters, Marie Robinson and Cleo Smith; one brother, Tom Shirley; and two half-sisters, Martha Dryden and Mae Cornforth.

Funeral services will be held at 1:30 p.m., Thursday, June 9, at Ferry Funeral Home, Nevada. Interment will follow in Newton Burial Park. Friends may call now and until the hour of service and the family receives friends from 7-8 p.m., Wednesday, at the funeral home.

Those who wish may contribute to the American Red Cross for Joplin, Mo., toronado relief or to Moss House in care of Ferry Funeral Home, 301 S. Washington, Nevada.

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