James F. Rold

The family of James Frederick Rold, MD is sad to announce the loss of their beloved husband, father, and grandfather on April 8, 2020.

Jim was born in 1933 on Evansville’s Westside to Edward and Inez Rold and was the descendent of German immigrant families with deeps roots in the region. Among his first memories were the Great Ohio River Flood of 1937 and reading books at the old public library on Franklin Street as a child. His family eventually moved to Breckinridge and then Davies Counties Kentucky, where he graduated from high school before enlisting in the navy, serving as a radio technician and getting his first experience of the wider world. He joked about finally having his first pizza at 19, meeting a fellow solider from New Jersey whose accent he struggled to comprehend when he referred to birds as ‘boyds,’ and even dancing and getting into a ‘not very impressive’ bar fight in Cuba.

After military service, Jim was the proud beneficiary of the nation’s GI bill and majored in biology at Western Kentucky University, ultimately graduating with honors before attending and graduating from the University of Louisville Medical School in 1963. He was in general practice in rural Kentucky for several years and then later specialized, completing a residency in radiology in San Francisco where he appreciated the foggy nights from a home on the Presidio overlooking the Golden Gate and developed a love for the music of Janis Joplin and Creedence Clearwater Revival. Jim returned to the Tri-State after serving his country again as a physician in Vietnam and eventually practiced medicine in the region for over forty years. He was affiliated with the Trover Clinic in Madisonville, with St. Mary’s Hospital in Evansville, and then established southern Indiana’s first diagnostic imaging center, Midwest Diagnostic Imaging and also later of Advanced Diagnostic Imagining.

In addition to his long and respected career in medicine, Jim was a man of many talents and interests. A lifelong lover of literature, he was a passionate and expansive reader, and especially admired the works of the great Russian authors Tolstoy, Pasternak and Solzhenitsyn. Jim was also a very gifted writer himself and the author of numerous published short stories, essays, and longer works, including the novel First Degree Love from Strawberry Hill Press, a memoir about his boyhood in Kentucky, and a collection of short stories forthcoming.

Jim was a lover of sports, rooting for the Kentucky Wildcats and the St. Louis Cardinals and, if necessity arose, a few other less worthy teams. A devoted athlete, gamesman, and outdoorsman, he played baseball, racquetball, tennis, poker, and golf, enjoyed biking and hiking, and especially loved fishing, spending many winters casting for sheepshead in Sanibel, Florida. He was also deeply engaged in agriculture, owned several farms in Kentucky, Illinois, and Indiana, and had a long interest in livestock breeding, including both beef cattle and alpacas. He had a passionate curiosity about the world and continued traveling throughout life, visiting Europe, Africa, Canada, Asia, the Caribbean, the South Pacific, and every state in the United States. Highlights of his many trips include climbing Mount Kilimanjaro, salmon fishing in the Northwest Territories, sailing and snorkeling in Jamaica, and biking through rural China.

In addition to his varied interests and endless curiosity, Jim was also known for his understated sense of humor and incredibly quick wit. Although a gifted athlete, he confessed to hating the drudgery of working out to stay in shape, once commenting, “I know I have to do it, but there’s never a moment when I’m exercising when I know I wouldn’t be happier if I stopped.” His friends and family were impressed with his gifts for language, his ability to remember the lyrics of almost every song he ever heard, and his deep knowledge of an eclectic range of subjects including, but far from limited to, the Civil War, horseracing, martins, deciduous trees, mushrooms, motorcycles, the Battle of the Coral Sea, Bible verses, the poetry of Samuel Taylor Coleridge, nuclear medicine, novels, livestock, soybeans, country music, and politics.

Above all, Jim was a highly valued friend and family man, known for his kindness and generosity. He treated all human beings equally and with genuine respect. He was greatly loved and will be greatly missed by all who knew him. He is survived by many close family members and friends including, first and foremost, his much-loved wife and best friend, Hope Rold, with whom he spent almost twenty joyous years and who cared for him with loving devotion in the final years of his long life. He is also survived by his three children, Susan Nadler, Julie Rold, and Matthew Rold, along with their mother, Marjorie Newsam, and also children-in-law, Mike McDermott, Yongan Zou, and Kris Rold, Susan and Larry Cline, Mary and Bill Skeeles and grandchildren Morgan Nadler, Anna Zou, Katie Skeeles and Lance Cline. Additionally, he is survived by extended family in Kentucky, Indiana and all around the country, including his sister Martha Dowell, as well as many nieces, nephews, cousins, and also countless dear and wonderful friends from many different places.

Jim is preceded by his parents, Edward and Inez Rold, his brothers Clyde and Robert Rold, sister-in-laws Laurel and Dorothy Rold, brother-in-law RT Dowell, and his beloved sons Mark and Ben Rold. As a funeral and service are not possible at this time, he will be buried privately in Evansville at Locust Hill Cemetery, but his family hopes to have to a celebration in honor of his life in late June around the time of what would have been his 87th birthday with details forthcoming to all who might wish to attend.

In the meantime, in lieu of flowers or other gifts in his memory, his family ask for donations to the Tri-State Food Bank or public radio WNIN, where Jim was a generous patron.