Clyde Orval Persons, age 86

Clyde O. Persons

 

     The stock market lost one of its greatest devotees, Clyde Orval Persons, to leukemia on March 19, 2016. He passed, aged 86 years, surrounded by his family.
Clyde was born Oct. 10, 1929, to Raymond Persons and Marion Thelma (Van Cleave) Persons. The family lived in the area of Jones and Jackson counties, S.D., moving occasionally to graze the cattle, before buying their own ranch near Philip. 
Clyde’s upbringing during the Great Depression instilled in him an unrelenting work ethic, and his primary school years were marked by the same inquisitiveness and high achievement which so characterized him, culminating in his graduation from high school as valedictorian in 1947.
During his subsequent service in the U.S. Navy from 1947 to 1951, Clyde gained his first exposure to electrical engineering working on radar technology at the U.S. Naval Aviation Test Center in Patuxent River, Md., before relocating to the Agaña Naval Air Station in Guam.
Clyde received his honorable discharge on Oct. 10, 1951, and with his appetite for technology duly whetted, he began his undergraduate studies in electrical engineering at the South Dakota School of Mines & Technology in Rapid City. Serendipity struck when he shared a boarding house with Loren Kiel, who introduced Clyde to his sister, Marjorie Kiel. After a summer spent getting acquainted, Clyde wisely assessed his priorities and transferred to the University of Minnesota to be closer to Marjorie. The two wed in 1953, and Clyde graduated with his bachelor’s degree in 1956.
  In the first move of their impeccably well-traveled marriage, Clyde and Marjorie moved to Whippany, N.J., drawn by an offer from Bell Laboratories to work on the Nike Hercules missile project. True to form, Clyde excelled in his work there. But when a friend informed Clyde that a Venezuelan Esso subsidiary, Creole Petroleum, needed an electrical systems engineer, Clyde signed on. A month after the birth of his first daughter, Larene, in June 1957, Clyde departed for Jusepin, Venezuela, where Marjorie and Larene eventually joined him. Their second daughter, Denise, was born in Caripito in 1959, and their third, Michelle, in 1960.
By 1963, Clyde had solved Creole's engineering dilemmas (and, with Marjorie, had thoroughly explored Venezuela, canoeing up the Orinoco River and flying over Angel Falls). With Clyde's attention now turned to graduate-level education, the family moved to Ann Arbor, Michigan, where he began a Master’s program at the University of Michigan. In 1964, with his new degree in hand, he accepted an offer from IBM in nearby Flint; and in 1965, the family having weathered a second winter buried in lake-effect snow, Clyde received Marjorie's blessing to accept a job offer at Esso’s Lago Refinery in sunny Aruba, Netherlands Antilles. 
After eight years’ work on the refinery, with a tour each of South America and Europe under the family's collective belt, Clyde bade his Sunfish sailboat goodbye, and the family moved to Florham Park, N.J., where Clyde had accepted a position at Exxon’s Research & Engineering plant.  Clyde worked at ER&E until 1986, having never missed a single day’s work in 27 years (aside from one half-day ... emergency dental procedure).
In 1988, Marjorie and Clyde built their retirement home in Banner Elk, N.C., with Clyde installing all the stonemasonry work outside the house and hand-crafting the railings, bookshelves and coffee tables inside. Although he enjoyed spending his newfound free time on such leisurely pursuits as genealogy, watching Fox News, dancing with Marjorie at Shadrack's, and whistling like a canary, he was ultimately unable to resist the 1992 siren call of a consulting opportunity in Egypt.
With Marjorie's accompaniment, Clyde returned to Egypt for a second round of consulting in 1993, and together they toured the pyramids, the Sinai Peninsula, and the Nile before returning home in 1994. But after yet another consulting opportunity in Thailand the same year through Exxon – and before two more similar opportunities in Venezuela and Japan in 1999 – Clyde and Marjorie found themselves consumed with wanderlust again, and so each year between 1995 and 1997 they taught elementary and high school students at the Oaxaca Mission School in Oaxaca, Mexico.
Still flush with the energy of their “retirement,” and with a mutual dream of inspiring children to appreciate classical music, Clyde and Marjorie founded their company, Classical Magic, in 1999 to expand upon Marge's music education brainchild, “Themes To Remember." For 10 years Clyde handled the bookkeeping and logistical work, while Marjorie expanded her mnemonic lyrics and “name that tune” quizzing into a popular book series. 
Clyde was preceded in death by his mother, Marion Shumway; his father, Raymond Persons; his stepfather, Rolland Shumway; his brothers, Gale and Leroy Persons, plus two infant brothers; and his sister, Letha Hanson. 
He is survived by his wife of 62 rich years, Marjorie; his daughters, Larene, Denise and Michelle and their respective husbands, Kevin, Jack and John; and six grandchildren, Alex, Jessalyn, Seth, Robin, Sean and James, all of whom are acutely reminded of him by the scent of freshly-cracked black pepper, slow talkers, and perfectly-sharpened pencils.
A memorial service will be held at 3:00 p.m. Saturday, Aug. 20, 2016 at the First Lutheran Church in Philip. Clyde’s ashes will be buried in the Masonic Cemetery in Philip.
All guests are invited to a time of visitation and a meal, hosted by the Lutheran Church Ladies, at the Bad River Senior Citizen’s Center, one block west of the church at the southwest corner of Pine Street and Center Avenue in Philip.
If you wish to make a donation in Clyde’s name, please consider The V Foundation for Cancer Research (http://www.jimmyv.org) or the Fisher Center for Alzheimer’s Research Foundation (https://www. alzinfo.org).
Arrangements are with the Rush Funeral Home of Philip.

The Pioneer Review

221 E. Oak Street
Philip, SD 57567
Telephone: (605) 859-2516
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