Robert Charles Downing

Robert C. Downing

March 18, 1931 – July 31, 2025

Robert Charles Downing-a replaced Kansas guy-met, dated, and married a gal from Montana (1974), both living and working in the school district of Brookings, Oregon.

Bob, as most folks knew him, passed away on July 31, 2025, from his year of kidney failure.

He spent his very young years as a 5 & 10 cent helper in his parents’ small store in their small community of Glasco, Kansas. His “love” at that time was all school sports. He went on to graduate from Kansas State, then spent nearly 31 years as a high school guidance counselor in Brookings and Eastern Oregon at Elgin, living most of those years in La Grande. Plenty of scenic areas to ride double in beautiful Wallowas or over the mountains to Walla Walla (wonderful college concerts there) or to Pendleton Round-up on his Gold Wing.

It was our years in this part of the USA when we decided to ride Bob’s Gold Wing East – the summer of 1983. 10,000 miles across, Ferry to Nova Scotia and all the way back home. Bob did not have an accident, cause an accident, nor get a single ticket!

Perhaps the greatest love of his 56 years of our dating was table tennis… from a low scorer at Las Vegas to the club in Sun City West (on and off snowbirds) until a heart attack. In Hamilton at the club – he MUST get the point for his teammate. A broken hip this time. He had three months to heal or get left behind on a booked tour of New York City.

In retirement, 1993, Bob was “hooked” on volunteering with the Forest Service in their Passport in Time projects: ‘Magruder’ in the Westfork District, Roosevelt’s hunting ranch north of the Yellowstone, a lookout tower near Stanley, Idaho needing some repair, near Pole Bridge in Glacier, and another project near St. Regis. Each reminded Bob of his summer jobs working for the Forest Service at Priest Lake National Forest as well as the Loveland, Colorado forest and a summer in Glacier National Park. He would have enjoyed being a Forest Service Man.

Of course, traveling far and wide was on his wife Shirley’s bucket list as she had made two trips to Europe before his own 1969 Europe adventure. By 1993, Bob and wife number one were packed and ready for many travels. Perhaps a favorite of Bob’s was Easter of 2003 in Great Britain. We had decided to have just a few goals for our six weeks of travel, one being to look up where some of our greats were married. That Easter it was Olney, England, where Bob’s great-great-grandmother was married. It was also the church where John Newton was a minister and was known to pen the beloved song, “Amazing Grace”. Bob was introduced as the great-great-grandson of Eleanor Yorke, this wedding some 100 years after John Newton’s time in Olney and another 100 before Bob’s visit.

Before this last chapter in Bob’s life came to a close, we had made a few Pilgrim journeys to Bible lands, Australia, New Zealand, Ireland, Mexico, several countries in Europe, a week on the Danube, Wales, Hawaiian and Alaskan Cruises, and our own American states in 2000-2020, such a wonderful place to live. We are grateful for all the years we had together, a wonderful soulmate and a caring neighbor and friend. He was loved. He is missed.

A family memorial service for Bob will be held in May of 2026 at his hometown cemetery. Joining for the service will be Bob’s four nephews and their wives: Steve and Marille Downing (Thorton, CO), Tom Downing (Gulf Breeze, FL), Mike and Shelly Downing (Boulder, CO), Tim and Erin Downing (Denver, CO). Bob’s brother Don and wife Connie Downing are deceased, as are Bob’s parents, Fred and Lola Downing (Sun City, AZ). Tom’s wife Tracy passed in February of this year due to a blood clot in her brain. Some members of Shirley’s family will be in Kansas to honor their Uncle Bob, too.

Condolences may be left for the family at www.dalyleachchapel.com.