Blaine & Miriam Knop

Blaine Moore Knop was born in Des Moines, Iowa on January 26, 1924 to Henry Orvel Bennick and Sara Marie Rigg. He was adopted by his step father, Ed Knop, at the age of 3. The Knop family grew to include six siblings. The family struggled through the Depression. Blaine began working at an early age to provide for his mother and younger siblings. As a youth, Blaine was an Altar boy at the Episcopal church in Des Moines. He was active in Boy Scouts and worked at Camp Mitigua as a counselor during the summers. He was 17 when Pearl Harbor was attacked and his mother made him wait until he was 18 to join the war effort.

Blaine volunteered at enlistment for the Submarine service. During the war he served as an Electrician’s Mate 1st class on the USS Flasher (SS249). His sub was stationed out of Perth, Australia. He served on 7 of the subs 8 patrols. Patrols lasted 2-3 months at sea. The Flasher sunk the most tonnage of any US submarine in WWII. The conning tower of the Flasher serves as a memorial at the National Submarine Memorial in Groton, Connecticut.

During the war, Blaine started his life-long love affair with Miriam Carolyn (Mim) Burke. He continued to provide support for the Knop family during the war. He would send his mother his pay, but always had money. He was known to be a great poker player and used his photography skills to take portraits of shipmates, for a fee, that they could send home.

After being honorably discharged from the Navy in 1946, he returned to Iowa and enrolled in the Forestry school at Iowa State. On September 3rd, 1947, Blaine married Mim at the First Lutheran Church in Des Moines. They moved into Pammel Court, the married student housing area, after converting a grain storage bin into a cottage. During the first two summers of their marriage, the couple manned a fire watch in the wilderness of Idaho. They survived on Blaine’s hunting skills, Mim’s baking skills and few packed in supplies.

Blaine graduated Phi Kappa Phi from Iowa State in 1950. He was offered and accepted a job in Pilot Rock, Oregon with the Pilot Rock Lumber Company. They barely made it to Oregon in their 5-cylinder Model A Ford. They settled in Pendleton, Oregon where Blaine worked his way up from mill-work to Vice President of Operations for Kerns Furniture Company. In the 1970’s Blaine pursued other business opportunities working for Noblecraft Industries in Hillsboro, Oregon and DelMar Cabinets in Conyers, Georgia. He had an opportunity to return to Oregon in 1975. Blaine and four business partners purchased Kerns Furniture Company. They operated Kerns RTF until 1984 when the demand for pine furniture fell off.

Throughout Blaine’s career he traveled all over the United States, Canada and Mexico. He stepped foot in every US state during his lifetime. His travels made him appreciate the time he had at home and he took full advantage of that time. He loved nothing more than to spend quality time with his children, Nancy and Todd. Whether it was playing “burn out” catch, building and launching model rockets with the neighborhood kids, building push go-karts to ride down the steep hills close to home, or remodeling houses, he would take the time not just to tell, but to show his children the right way to do things. The “right way” is certainly the way Blaine constructed things, in fact, a fence he built in Pendleton over 50 years ago is still standing today.

Blaine would find ways to engage with his children. He decided that he and Todd needed a project while in Georgia, so they built a Bradley GT kit car in the basement of their home. He was always there to watch Todd play football from Pop Warner through college. He taught Nancy to shoot a gun – calling her “Annie Oakley” and “Dead Eye”. He taught her to be proficient with a hammer and how to fix pretty much everything. Blaine and Mim were loving, supportive and proud parents and grandparents.

Blaine loved to tease and would do so at any opportunity. No one was immune to his nicknames and humor.

For almost 30 years, Blaine and his family could be found at their cabin at Langdon Lake in the Blue Mountains of Eastern Oregon. Winters were spent snowmobiling, summers were spent canoeing, fishing and hiking. Blaine was always eager to share his knowledge of the forest and demonstrate his prowess at falling a tree.

Perhaps the proudest you would ever see Blaine was when he was with his four granddaughters. He was known to whisper in their baby ears, “I’m your favorite person.” It seemed to work, as they all had a special bond with Grandpa and PooPah. He loved to build things for them and spend time with them.

Blaine and Mim spent the last healthy 30 years of their marriage in Bend, Oregon. Blaine never retired. His business partnership with Rob Kirkpatrick evolved into multiple business ventures. Blaine continued to go into work daily into his mid 80’s.

During his “semi-retirement” years, Blaine and Mim enjoyed traveling. They took several trips to Scandinavia. They traveled the US, even driving Swedish relatives across the country from Oregon to Pennsylvania. Blaine enjoyed attending his submarine shipmate reunions all over the country. They enjoyed spending time with their picnic group friends in Bend, Blaine’s “old retire guys” lunch group and Mim’s PEO activities.

Blaine’s beloved wife passed away after 64 years of marriage. At that time his family moved him to Portland. Blaine passed away peacefully on March 10, 2014. His family will miss him deeply. The memories they have will always keep him in their lives.

Blaine was preceeded in death by his parents and all of his siblings. He is survived by his children: Nancy (Paul) Phillips of Tigard, Oregon, Todd (Kate) Knop of Lufkin, Texas. Granddaughters: Kaisa Phillips of Pendleton, Sofia Phillips of Tigard, Frances Knop and Sarah Knop of Lufkin Texas. Several nieces and nephew and sister-in-law Claire Burke of Hawaii.

A celebration of life will be held Friday, May 16, 2014 at Living Savior Lutheran Church in Tualatin Oregon. A private inurnment will take place at Willamette National Cemetary.

In lieu of flowers please consider contributions in Blaine’s name to: Alzheimer’s Foundation of America or The Alzheimer’s Association.