Richard Warren Curtis, longtime Parsonian, died at age 97 at the St. Paul Prairie Mission Retirement Village on Saturday, Sept. 14, 2024. He was born in a West Mineral house owned by his grandparents to Cecil and Ruth (Trudgeon) Curtis on Oct. 27, 1927.
In his words: “I was lucky – yup. I was lucky with the friends I had when I was young, Gene Costner and Donald Smith from West Mineral. And then I was lucky with friends I had when I was older, my brother Jack Curtis, Pete Hughes of Parsons and George Clark of McCune, as well as Lou and Marjane Wamsley.
I graduated in May 1945 from West Mineral High School and was drafted into the Army and sent to Luzon, Philippines, in January 1946. I went to the East Coast and shipped out of Newark, New Jersey, sailing through the Panama Canal (it’s real tiny!). I was mustered out in March 1947. The Army was a good experience for me!