Dale Walter Beardshear, 97

Funeral services for Dale Walter Beardshear, 97, of Gainesville, were held March 15, 2018, at Clinkingbeard Funeral Home in Gainesville with Brother Joby Steele officiating. Mr. Beardshear died March 12 in Mountain Home, Arkansas.
He was born Nov. 26, 1920, in Homer, Nebraska, the son of Harvey Walter and Mary Elizabeth Nelson Beardshear. Following graduation from Homer High School in 1939, he helped in his dad’s carpentry and honey businesses before joining the Army as a radio operator, serving in Okinawa and the Pacific Theater during World War II. After the war, he lived in Kansas City, where he met Wanda Norma Baumgarner at a church function. She had come with her brother, and Mr. Beardshear had brought a date. He and Wanda were married Dec. 1, 1946, in Kansas City; Wanda’s brother married the woman who had been Dale’s date at the church event. The Beardshears then moved to Homer, where they adopted their infant daughter, Carla, nine years later.
Mr. Beardshear owned and operated B&B Electronics from 1947 until the early 1970s, when the family moved to West Plains. He repaired televisions, radios and anything electronic. The Beardshears had many interests, including square dancing at festivals in the streets of Sioux City, Iowa.
In the mid-1970s, they moved to Gainesville, where Mr. Beardshear helped his wife  manage the Adult Boarding Home  He also helped Wanda in her MOZARK Regional Orchestra activities. He enjoyed playing the piano and singing to his favorite sheet music, including such songs as “The Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy of Company B” and “Don’t Sit Under the Apple Tree with Anyone Else But Me.”
Mr. Beardshear was active in his church, Theodosia United Methodist Church, as long as his health allowed. In October 2011, the Beardshears, both veterans, traveled on an Ozarks Honor Flight from Springfield to Washington, D.C., accompanied by their daughter Carla and granddaughter Jamie.
He is survived by his daughter, Carla Boze and husband Douglas; granddaughter Jamie Parrott and husband Rodney; great-grandsons Samson and Orin Parrott; great-granddaughter Onna Boze along with her mother and sister Blaine and Jaden Rybolt; two sisters, Leah Hardy and Neva Nickum; and several nieces, nephews and cousins.
He was preceded in death by his parents; by Wanda, his wife of 70 years who died in August 2017; one brother, Lorn Beardshear; one sister, Vera McCoy; and his grandson, Lucas Boze.
Burial with full military honors was in the Lilly Ridge Cemetery. Memorial contributions may be made to the Gideons International or to St Jude Children’s Research Hospital.
Arrangements by Clinkingbeard Funeral Home, Gainesville.