SIRES, Vern Sr. 1926-1973

SIRES, LAVELLE, KEMP

Posted By: Tammy (email)
Date: 11/11/2019 at 12:37:50

Services Aug. 31st For Vern Sires, Sr.

Funeral services were held Friday afternoon at 1:30 at the United Methodist church in Dike for Vern W. Sires Sr., 47. Mr. Sires was pronounced dead at Sartori hospital in Cedar Falls at 1:30 a.m. last Wednesday morning after apparently suffering a heart attack at his home.

The Rev. Robert W. Hoover, Jr. officiated at the service. Mrs. John Paige, organist, played selected prelude and postlude numbers and music interludes of "How Great Thou Art" and "Be Not Dismayed" during the services.

Ushers were Jack Heritage and John Volberding. Mrs. Alice Mayer and Mrs. Glenn DeBower were flower attendants. Pallbearers were Jim Burdette, Maynard Oleson, Robert F. Benton, George Betz, Dick O. Henry and Stanley Hermansen.

Burial was in Elmwood cemetery, Dike.

Vern W. Sires was born July 19, 1926, in Postville, Iowa, the son of Floyd and Ruth Lavelle Sires. He lived in Elgin, Iowa, till he was 9 years old, when he moved to Benson and then to Cedar Falls in 1943. Vern served in the armed forces during World War II, serving in the U.S. Navy aboard the USS Dane, a troop transport. He was a signalman aboard the ship.

In 1947 he moved to Dike and on July 2, 1949, was married to Roberta Kemp in LaPorte City. He worked for the Carnation Co. as a truck driver for 14 years. The past two years he was a self-employed contract carrier for the Mississippi Valley Milk Producers Assn.

He is survived by his widow, Roberta; his father, Floyd, Cedar Falls; his mother, Mrs. Ruth Lavelle Sires, Cedar Falls; two sons, Vern Jr., who is in the U.S Navy and stationed at the Naval hospital at Jacksonville, Fla., and Patrick at home; four daughters, Christine Croci of Dike, Mrs. Laverne (Jan) Weber, rural Dike, Candice and Tamara, both at home; 3 grandchildren; 4 brothers Paul, Levi, Dean and Jerry Sires, all of Cedar Falls; two sisters, Mrs. Roland (Norma Jean) Knudsvig and Mrs. Herman (June Marie) Wenzel, both of Waterloo.

He was a member of Dike American Legion Post No. 471.

The Dike Funeral Chapel was in charge of the arrangements and held viewing at the Chapel from Wednesday evening till 11:30 a.m. Friday morning, when the body was taken to the church for viewing prior to the services.

--The Grundy Register (Grundy Center, Iowa), 6 September 1973, pg 6