grave import

Obituary

Roderick William Armstrong, age 84, passed away on July 24, 2013, in Council Bluffs, Iowa. He was born on November 18, 1928, to Frederick and Tina M. Armstrong in Kirksville, Mo. He had older twin sisters, Margaret and Frances, and an older brother Richard.

His family moved to Burlington in the 1940s when his father got a carpenter’s job at the Iowa Army Ammunition Plant (IAAP). He graduated from Burlington High School in 1946 and later graduated from Burlington Junior College with an Associate Degree in Electrical Engineering. Roderick married Anna Horst October 15, 1948, at First Presbyterian Church in Burlington, Iowa. They had 3 children, Carol, of San Francisco, Roger, of Burlington, and Eric, of Carter Lake, Iowa.

Rod worked as an electrician for the CB&Q railroad for 16 years. He was then an electronic technician at Mason & Hanger at IAAP. After that, he was a technical writer and professional photographer at Winegard Company retiring in 1990.

He was known as a “Mr. Fixit”, “Inventor”, and “Bicycle Repair Man,” because of his simple clever solutions to problems both large and small. He spent a lot of time with his kids and grandchildren. He loved the out of doors, gardening, sailing, iceboating, windsurfing, cross country skiing, and woodworking.

In his retirement, he rescued many broken mystery items from auctions, figured out what was wrong, fixed them, and found them new homes. He collected and organized a workshop with an extensive collection of tools both modern and antique. Blowing up marshmallows in vacuum tubes and coming up with fun experiments was one of his joys. Rod was a master of building jigs and fixtures so that his finished work was perfect and repeatable. There was nothing he could not invent, engineer, fix or build.

Rod was always tinkering with something electrical or mechanical, but he especially enjoyed repairing engines. He taught his kids and grandkids about steam engines and he rebuilt one cylinder hit and miss engines with his grandsons. The largest item he brought home from an auction was a 1937 Farmall F20 decrepit rusted out tractor. With help from his grandsons, he totally over hauled the tractor to a rebuilt working specimen.

Among the things he built and in vented were automated pecan crackers, French rolling pins, and ornamental wooden butterflies. He built tree houses for his children and a generation later another for his grandchildren. A major achievement for him was creating seven beautiful grandfather clocks; from cutting and drying the cherry tree lumber for years and handcrafting the wood into family heirlooms that took thousands of hours to complete.

Any sport on water was mastered - motor boating, water skiing, fishing, sailing, windsurfing, and ice boating. He even built an ice rink in his backyard for his family that allowed for many memorable ice-skating activities. For many winters he raced ice boats with his son all over North America. When he wasn’t racing he was building and tuning the boats to be some of the fastest boats racing in North America and some of the equipment he built is still being raced throughout the world today.

No vegetable garden was ever large enough for Rod. Proud of having the earliest tomatoes in town, he built a greenhouse and started his plants in mid-winter. He furnished free garden produce to the neighborhood and far beyond. The house always had fresh flowers year round from indoor and outdoor gardening.

Rod loved animals, cats were his passion. Over the years, he adopted many strays, especially those born under his back porch. Ducks and rabbits were also among the menagerie of pets in his care over the years.

He was team captain and support domestique for the three-generation family RAGBRAI cycling team consisting of his son, grandsons, and nephew leading the team across the state of Iowa.

Rod was the original road warrior traveling frequently with family in tow to the Florida Keys; traveled across country to visit his daughter Carol in San Francisco, through many a national park and down the west coast. He and Anne also enjoyed the flavors and sights of Europe, but his favorite respite was the shores of the Mississippi for sailing and camping as often as possible.

Rod loved music and took up restoring player pianos and Hammond spinet organs. He collected piano rolls and vintage sheet mu sic to go with them. Rod moved with the times, playing music through his iPad amazed how he could find, “any,” music he wanted online.

Rod’s love of photography began in the 1950’s as a hobby. As his passion grew from family and vacation photos in the early days, Rod also did industrial photography for work. His serious interest gave him a wide array of camera’s and equipment as well as dark room’s both at work and home. Many historic photos of Burling ton from the 1800’s can be found on display in local museums, restaurants and public buildings as a result of Rod restoring old negatives.

In the cooking arena Rod made the best popcorn especially that grown by family. Using his clever inventiveness he motorized 100 plus year old corn sheller and added a chafing system. The machine processed literally tons of popcorn that was distributed to people around the world.

He was predeceased by his parents; brother, Richard; sister, Margaret; and son-in-law, David Thistlethwaite.

Rod is survived by wife Anne; sister, Frances of Galesburg Ill.; 3 children, Carol Thistlethwaite, Roger and Colleen (Mullahy) Armstrong, Eric and Hillary (Parker) Armstrong; 4 grandchildren, Roderick Armstrong, Nathan Armstrong, Erin Armstrong Hernandez, Christy Lucas; 3 great grandchildren, Cuauhtemoc Hernandez, Christopher, and Cassandra; and extended family members.

A Memorial fund in Roderick’s name has been set up at the Des Moines County Humane Society.

The funeral for Mr. Armstrong will be held on Saturday, Aug. 3, 2013, at 1:00 p.m. in Prugh’s Chapel, Burlington, Iowa, with the Rev. Deb Kinney officiating. Visitation will be on Friday from 5:00 until 7:00 p.m. at Prugh’s Chapel, where the family will receive friends at this time. Burial will be in Aspen Grove Cemetery.