Albert Ray Sweeden

Born August 28,1931 in Pawnee Ok

Passed peacefully in his home in Lincoln Ca at age 94 on March 21, 2026.

Albert was preceded in death by his wife of 74 yrs Shirley Anne on Sept 27, 2023.

The funeral and burial will take place on April 7, 2026 in Lincoln.

Albert is survived by his three loving daughters Laurel of Roseville, California, Nancy of York, South Carolina, and Linda of Lincoln, California. He is also by his brother Franklin Estes Sweeden, and sisters Laura Lann of Oroville, California, and Daisy Hall of Tonopah, Nevada. He is also survived by eight grandsons, ten great grandchildren, and three great-great grandchildren. He was also beloved by his many nieces and nephews and other family members.

Albert was preceded in death by his beloved wife Shirley, his son Jimmie Ray Sweeden, brothers George Aikin and Jack Sweeden, and sisters Bonnie Palmer, Mary Torrez, and Betty Thompson.

In early 1949, Albert met the love of his life, Shirley Ann Linstead. They were married on September 14, 1949, in Santa Rosa, California. They moved to Lincoln, California, in 1951, when Albert got a job and the Gladding-McBean Company. He worked there for 15 years, he then began working at McClellan Air Force Base, where he retired in 1990. He was proud of the job he did as an airplane mechanic and rose through ranks to retire as a WS-14, Branch Manager.

Albert and Shirley loved to travel and go places and do things together. Retirement for them was just the beginning of the next adventure. They took their children on numerous trips before they all grew up and began their own lives. Then it was just the two of them and even more adventures. They often included one or more of the grandsons on their adventures.

Albert loved country music, and learned to play the guitar as a young man. He and his brother Jack played at many of the bars and clubs in the area. They were quite popular and a local band and will fill up any venue they played in. He would also host "pickin' parties" at their homes in Lincoln. Many would come, some to participate in the music, and some just to listen. Occasionally his beautiful wife, who had a lovely voice, would sing with the band.

Albert also tinkered with repairing small electrical devices, especially old record players. He would buy them from ebay, repair them, and then sell them for a profit. He did that not so much for extra money, but for the satisfaction of taking an old, ugly, worn out, broken device and make it beautiful, shiny and new and operating as it should.