Oren Ray Augsburger

Oren Ray Augsburger died on December 1, 2021, at the Elizabeth Scott Community of Maumee, Ohio at the age of 97 years. He was born on November 6, 1924, to Raymond and Velma (Good) Augsburger in the family home near Elida, Ohio, the first of four children. He completed eight years of education and then became a devoted farm hand to his grandfather, Christian Good, helping with threshing, field work, making apple cider, driving truck and operating a saw mill. As a Mennonite Conscientious Objector, Oren was accepted into Civilian Public Service when drafted during World War Two, serving first in Luray, Virginia, and then going into Out Service, working on dairy farms in eastern Wisconsin.

While working on a farm west of Seymour, Wisconsin, Oren was forced to walk to town on Sunday mornings to attend worship, and a neighboring family began to often pick him up along the road to town. This entailed being scrunched together in the back seat with the family’s youngest daughter, Arleta Kollath. Out of the scrunching grew a friendship and out of the friendship a marriage. Oren and Arleta were married in Seymour on October 26, 1946. To their union were born a son and two daughters. For the earlier years of their family life Oren and Arleta lived in Green Bay, Wisconsin, where Oren worked at the Northern Paper mills, operating the machinery that wound toilet paper onto the cores.

In 1959, after the tragic death of Oren’s father in an automobile accident, the family moved to Elida, Ohio, to provide support to Oren’s widowed mother. On the basis of a strong work recommendation from the Northern Paper Mills, something which Oren always valued, he was hired at Ford Motor Company’s Lima Engine Plant where he served faithfully for 27 years, retiring in January, 1987. Oren was a committed Christian and a life-long member of Salem Mennonite Church where he served as Sunday School teacher, elder and trustee.

During the eighteen years, from 1987 to 2005, Oren and Arleta enjoyed a rich and full retirement, with Oren enjoying many hours in his wood shop, producing many decorative and useful items. But during the last few years of retirement a cloud, in the form of Arleta’s increasing Alzheimer’s Disease, overshadowed the couple, until, in February, 2005, she had to be placed in a nursing home after Oren collapsed from the stresses of providing her care. Moving into assisted living in order to remain close to her, Oren faithfully fed Arleta every lunch and supper, except when needing to be absent, until her death. She died on February 16, 2018, in the 72nd year of their faithful marriage. Adjusting to Arleta’s death was a very hard passage for Oren, but he managed to continue on his own for almost four more  years. During his years in assisted living, Oren developed the hobby of using colored pencils to complete paint-by-number pictures, tediously and carefully working for as long as three months on some pictures and completing some real masterpieces.

Oren is survived by one son, Larry (Jeananne) Augsburger, and two daughters, Betty (Paul) Munn and Janet (Paul) Burford, ten grandchildren and twenty two great grandchildren.

Cremation has already happened and a memorial service of grieving and remembrance will be held at Salem Mennonite Church on Friday, December 10, 2021, with visitation beginning at 1:00 p.m. and the service at 2:00 p.m. Burial of the cremains in the Salem Church Cemetery will follow .