His family left Salem in 1929 and moved to suburban St. Louis to follow work during the depression. In 1931 the family was forced to move to Seymour, Webster County, Missouri, where they lived with the Hailey family. Albro left the family the same year and Helen was forced to raise Gene and his brother Edgar. Helen met Fred W Krauss and they were married in the fall of 1934. The family moved to a farm in Jerico Springs, Cedar County, Missouri where Gene attended school. In the summer of 1943, Fred sent Gene (16) and Edgar (15) with all their possession in two suitcases to Boonville, Missouri to help with the worker shortage during the war but fortunately there wasn't any work there so they headed west towards Kansas City. They stopped in Liberty to see if there was any work before heading into Kansas City. Gene found work at a farm in Platte City by a man named Henry Cannon and Edgar worked for a family in Liberty. After two weeks Mr. Cannon told my dad he could only pay him $1.00 a day for working instead of the $1.50 per day as promised so he put him on a bus and sent him back to Liberty. He and Ed moved into a room at 211 N Water for a few weeks and then moved to 337 N Water around July of 1943. Gene worked a few odd jobs until July of 1943 where he started school at the North American Aviation training academy at 10th and Washington in Kansas City, Kansas. After a month he went to work at the production facility in the Fairfax district, building B-25 bombers. He was laid off in August of 1944 and in September went to work at the Chicago Burlington & Quincy depot in Liberty, Birmingham, Shelbina and other locations in northern Missouri until 1955.
He met Ruth Mildred Engel in the fall of 1945 at the Liberty depot where Ruth would pick up the mail for the American Red Cross. They were married November 30, 1946. Three children were born, Robert Eugene Jr (1949), Thomas George (1956) and James Lee (1958).
In 1953 he was deputized by the Clay County Sheriff’s Department working part time. In January 1956 he was hired by the Liberty Police Department, a position he held until March 1956, where he accepted a positon at the TWA overhaul base in Platte County, retiring in 1992. He continued working for the Liberty Police Department part time from 1957 until 1970.
He was a lifetime member and instructor of the NRA and also of Local #1650, I.A.M.A.W. Coaching baseball and watching his grandchildren play sports was one of his greatest hobbies.
He was preceded in death by his parents, wife Ruth, son Jimmy, grandson Michael and daughter in law, Linda. He leaves in memory, son Robert Eugene Jr, grandson Ronald, great granddaughter Madison, son Thomas (Lisa), granddaughters Amanda and Kim, great granddaughter Taylor and great grandson Daemon.
You were the rock and glue that held our family together and will be greatly missed.
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