Richard Albert Gaeth

Born Sept 20, 1936 in Mayville Michigan. Passed away May 19. Loving husband and widower of Carole Ann Hale. Beloved father of Richard Jr. and Rodney Alan. Cherished brother of

Herbert Jr.(dec), Edith Bell Petersen (dec), Irma Faye Harrington, Lewis William, Howard J., and Glenn (dec). A graveside service will be held 11am Sun May 20 at Christian Memorial cemetery 521 E Hamlin, Rochester Hills, MI. Breathe deeply and relax rather than purchasing flowers.

Born the 6th of 7 children in tiny Mayville, MI, Richard grew up making minor mischief with his brothers and the neighborhood kids in rural Rochester, MI of the 1940's. He attended and graduated from Avondale High School in 1954 and soon after began working for the U.S. Post Office as a letter carrier.

The long distances he had to walk everyday got him in good shape for what was to come next.

In 1956 at the age of 20 he was drafted and took the bus to Fort Leonardwood, MO. The exercise delivering mail allowed him to feel confident in boot camp while others fainted on the long hot marches. Later he was stationed at Fort Bragg, NC. He spent the next 2 years serving in peace time and earning a few sharp shooting medals with his marksmanship. Leave was spent on adventures socializing with army buddies and girlfriends from the local towns.

After military duty he came home and got a job at the Pontiac GM truck plant. With his employee discount he bought a brand new white 1958 Chevy Impala convertible and found new weekend adventures with buddies and girls at the drive-in movies around Rochester.

On one of those nights in 1960 at one of those drive-in restaurants he met Carole his future wife. He was 26 and she was 18. Over 2 years they dated, then decided to live together, and soon after were married in a small civil service in Union Lake on the 29th of June, 1962. Their romance continued and they joined his older brother Lewis (or Bill) and his wife Mary on a road trip vacation, seeing many sights in the western states.

In December 1964 Carole gave birth to Richard Jr or “Ricky” and in March 1966 she had their second and last child Rodney Alan or “Roddy”.

Richard bought a heavily wooded plot of land close to Union Lake and began clearing it on the weekends. With the experience he'd learned from his father he began to build a small 2 bedroom house where his new family could live. They moved in before it was finished to concrete floors, unpainted drywall, and a fuel oil stove for heat. He would continue to make improvements on the house and yard for more than 25 years.

In 1969 they tried to get Ricky and Roddy excited about the black and white television showing the first man on the moon. In 1970 Richard's father, mother, and older brother Howard moved in right next door. Richard was bored with the factory work and took a more challenging job with an early computer company his brother Lewis worked at. In 1971 that company had him travel to Germany for a month to install equipment. He called regularly long distance to talk with his young wife and boys. They both cried, missing each other, and he consoled her fears that he would leave her and stay in Europe.

Unfortunately the computer company failed but he took a job he really enjoyed. Rough carpentry for a residential home builder he respected. A few years later that work dried up too and he made the difficult decision to go back to the mind numbing but better paying assembly line work.

In the late 1970's he began working evenings and weekends expanding the house into a tri-level about 3 times the original size and added a garage.

He and Carole watched as his sons got their drivers licenses and he spent many hours helping them fix their junky cars. They saw both boys graduate high school and be accepted to and begin college.

In February 1989 on a Friday night about 10:30pm Carole was struck with a burst blood vessel in her brain, an aneurysm. Paramedics kept her body alive as they took her to the Intensive Care Unit at the local hospital. Over the night they were told there was no brain activity and that she wouldn't be able to live if taken off of the machines. With the family's permission she was allowed to die the next morning at only 44 years of age. Richard and the rest of the family began grieving this sudden and unexpected loss.

He continued to work the factory job for the next 4 years but when he was 58 a chance for early retirement came up he took it. It meant that he would have a very meager income until age 62 when social security would start but he preferred that to continuing in that depressing atmosphere.

Soon after retiring Richard sold his house on Portage Trail and bought a smaller 'fixer upper' on Yale in Pontiac. Between Christmas and New Years he began sorting almost 30 years of belongings and moved them in heavy snow with his sons over several long days. He renovated it at his own pace, eating breakfast with tools and sawdust on the kitchen counter, and about 2 years later sold it too.

During that 2 years he had visited his older brother Lewis (Bill) in Portland Oregon and loved the mountainous scenery. After selling the Pontiac house he stayed with Bill while he scouted for another downtrodden property he could save. He found one just over the Columbia River to the north in Vancouver Washington which had lower taxes than Portland.

He relished the building project in solitude and stayed almost 6 years in Vancouver. But, of course, he eventually found an even better place. He remembered eastern Tennessee from his days in the army. It had picturesque sleepy small towns, warmer weather, views of the Appalachian mountains, cheap property, and absolutely no income tax. In about 2002 he sold the Vancouver house, moved to Greeneville, and bought another house that needed work.

Over the next 10 years he gradually slowed down and had less interest in his renovation. He just felt tired all of the time. During the summer of 2011 he lost a lot of weight which made him suspect that 55 years of smoking had caught up with him. Finally he was able to successfully quit, while many attempts at programs in the past had failed.

In September 2011 he went to the doctor and a 9 cm cancerous tumor was found in his left lung. He refused their strong recommendations of surgery and chemotherapy. He said he wanted to, “let nature take it's course.” He had refused any more testing so the type of cancer was unknown and therefore how long he had left was anyone's guess.

Before Christmas 2011 Richard Sr. decided to move back to Michigan and he put his house up for sale. He lived with his oldest son Richard Jr. in a 1 bedroom apartment at first and later in a 2 bedroom condo. He enjoyed pizza, crime and western fiction, and watching movies borrowed from the library.

Over the months he began eating less and sleeping more. Slow and unsteady he became very fatigued walking short distances even with the help of oxygen. In the last 2-3 weeks he sometimes had obvious confusion over familiar things, like the TV remote and the coffee maker. On the morning of Saturday May 19th he gently passed lying in his favorite reclining chair with Richard Jr.