Ralph Edward Horner

He was born on January 27, 1936 in Kansas City, MO and was the youngest of 8 children. Ralph grew up in Kansas City, Missouri and graduated from Northeast High School in 1955. He was active in music and the youth orchestra while in junior high and high school and served as a youth conductor and in the VFW and NCO dance bands. After graduation, he enlisted in the Navy that same year and attended the Naval School of Music in Washington, DC before serving as a Naval musician from 1955-1959. He married his high school sweetheart, Joan, in 1955 and they spent a prolonged honeymoon stationed in Cuba, where he performed taps and reveille at ceremonial events and played his trumpet several nights a week in the Navy band at the Admiral’s Club. After leaving the Navy, he and his beloved wife returned to the Kansas City area and started their family, settling in Independence, MO, where they were members of the First Presbyterian Church. He began training in the printing/graphic arts profession and spent his career at Spangler Printers and Chroma-Graphics in Kansas City, MO.

After retiring, he took numerous cruises and enjoyed traveling the US and living in a motor home at Grand Lake of the Cherokees, Oklahoma, fishing, boating, and living near several of his siblings. He also lived in Oregon near his youngest daughter and grandchildren from 1997-2000, where he fell in love with the beauty of the Pacific Northwest. He later moved to Fort Collins, CO in 2010 to be near his 4 youngest grandchildren and enjoyed spending time watching them in their various activities such as dance, baseball, soccer, and gymnastics. He was an organized, meticulous person that loved to study computer programming, politics, and the constitution, and enjoyed researching his family’s genealogy, tracing his mother’s line all the way back to the Mayflower. He also enjoyed listening to jazz and big band music, playing his trumpet in his earlier years, woodworking, reading and watching PBS and CNN. He was a quiet, introverted family-focused man whose greatest pleasure was spending time with his wife, children and grandchildren, and his unconditional support and love will be greatly remembered and missed by all of us that called him “Daddy” and “Papa.”

He was preceded in death by his beloved wife, Joan Sue (Garnett) Horner in 1983; his parents, Ray and Claire Horner; brothers, Ray L and Charles W. Horner; sisters, Virginia VanWinkle and Wanda VanNess; and his great grandson, Jayce Estep.

Ralph is survived by his daughters, Lisa L. Horner and Constance L. Presley (Dan); granddaughters, Jacque Estep, Karissa Erickson (Levi), Bethany Presley and Moriah Presley; grandsons, Jason Estep and Nathan Presley; and great grandchildren, Oliver and Ryleigh Erickson.

A visitation will be held from 1:30-2 PM, service 2 PM, at Floral Hills Funeral Home and Cemetery, 7000 Blue Ridge Blvd, Kansas City, MO 64133.

In lieu of flowers, memorial contributions may be made to St Jude Children’s Hospital, https://www.stjude.org/donate