David William Richardson 1938 - 2019

David William Richardson heard his conductor call “All aboard!” on November 14, 2019. An avid train enthusiast, David, who rode everything from horse to airplane in his 81 years, saw nearly every state and several countries. He loved going places with family and friends. He is now riding shotgun with Jesus in the cab of a heavenly locomotive.

David was born January 14, 1938, in Lake Orion, Michigan. He was the fifth child in Stanley and Clara Richardson’s crew of six kids born in Michigan, all first-generation Americans from Canadian stock. Stanley, a machinist and bi-vocational pastor, moved the family west in 1943. His various pastorates and mission work took the family to Phoenix and to many small towns in Arizona, Colorado and Washington. The main line of the Santa Fe Railroad ran by their home in La Junta, Colorado. Watching the powerful steam locomotives pass by daily gave David his affection for trains.

David met the love of his life, Bonnie Jean Porter, whom everyone calls Sue, while singing together in the Mountain View Baptist Church choir in Flagstaff, Arizona. They were married there in 1960. David and Sue lived the rural life near Flagstaff, where their three children were born. He worked as a telephone lineman, laid carpet and tile, was a printer’s assistant, and later a local and long-haul truck driver.

Tired of the Flagstaff winters, the family moved to Yamhill, Oregon, in 1975. David continued driving trucks until he and Sue bought the hardware store in Carlton in 1984. While Sue ran the hardware store, David started DeMoss & GutterMan from the back of the store. Eventually, they closed the hardware store to focus on DeMoss. Sue grew the business over 35 years into one of the largest, most trusted gutter companies in the Northwest with David maintaining the facilities and equipment in his later years. Together they had many grand adventures “for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness, and in health, to love and to cherish until death do us part.” Just days ago, David and Sue celebrated 59 years adventuring together.
David was very talented working with his hands. He could figure things out and build almost anything. He restored the historic John Marion Bunn House, the family home in Yamhill. He started covering the house in lights their first Christmas in Yamhill, a tradition his daughter, who now owns the house, continues to this day. David worked hard all his life, but also wanted to have fun. Countless times he showed friends and guests a good time with something as simple as a meal or as elaborate as trips to another state and even Disneyland. He quietly repaired and maintained the property of dozens of widows, indigent people and friends in every community where he lived. David worked hard building, welding, climbing ladders and fixing things until just two months before his final train rolled away.

While David did many wonderful things in his life, he would quickly say he did things he was not proud of. We all have. The most important thing to David is that he knew Jesus Christ. He knew God’s forgiveness for his wrongs, because he accepted Jesus’ payment for his sins. Above all, David wants everyone to know that Jesus can forgive and give us the power to live as we should, if we will only ask. While he was far from perfect, Jesus kept steadily changing David’s character all his life, and He has now freed David from sin and made him complete in Christ.

David’s devoted wife, Sue, awaits the day she boards the Heaven Express to rejoin David. His son, David William Richardson Jr. and wife Pamela Mordenti Richardson of Peachtree City, Georgia, daughter, Tina Suzanne Hoyt and husband Brian Hoyt of Yamhill, and daughter, Kelley Leanne Bodnar and husband Timothy Bodnar of Newberg, Oregon, are sad their dad is gone. So are David’s nine living grandchildren and six great-grandchildren. David’s granddaughter, Sara Bodnar, was here only hours, and he got to see her again when David arrived at his new home. David’s sister, Carolyn Marie Thompson of Kansas City, Kansas, and brother, Robert Lewis Richardson of Phoenix, beat David to the platform in 2010 and 2009. They, their dad and mom, and Jesus greeted David at Heaven Station. David’s brother, Benjamin Harold Richardson of Coupeville, Washington, and sisters, Elizabeth Anne Parish and Mary Ellen Schloesser of Phoenix, miss him terribly.

David will be remembered at a public flannel and jeans graveside service at 2:00 p.m. Thursday, November 21, at Friends Cemetery in Newberg, with  a no-host reception afterward at Lago de Chapala Restaurant in Yamhill. Flowers may be sent to 275 W. Third Street in Yamhill, and donations in his memory may be made to Assumptions Institute (www.assumptionsinstitute.org), P.O. Box 3463, Peachtree City, GA 30269.