Joe Beaver

JOE EDWARD BEAVER
HUSBAND, FATHER, BROTHER, FRIEND *** SCIENTIST, INVENTOR, WRITER*** OUR DAD "POP"

Joe Edward Beaver was born May 24th 1930 to Joseph Michael Beaver and Gustille Wicker in Oklahoma City. He is survived by his son Joe and wife Donna, daughter Liz McGlasson and husband Scott, son Jerry and wife Dena and their children Elizabeth and Christopher, his sister Jenna Blalock and her husband Jim, brother Bob and wife Joyce. Also much other family, acknowledged below, and many nieces and nephews on all sides of the family. We invite you to read on and enjoy the details of the fabulous and interesting life Joe led and the many lives he touched.

As with most people born in and around 1930, times were tough. Pop rarely mentioned living in the foster home he lived in for several years as a youth. But when he did, it wasn't negative and he said it was a loving home. After his mom remarried, Joe moved back home with her and her husband Herman Hurst. Herman was a wildcatter oil man with a diligent work ethic. Herman's love for his family and hard work in the oil business left a lasting impact on Joe. Joe's wit surely came from his mother, Gustille, who loved all her family dearly, and was never at loss in making a situation funny with her own dry sense of humor and keen wit.


One of our father's favorite stories to tell was about how he was a high school drop-out. He joined the Air Force in 1947 (at age 17), and served in the Korean War. The military got him eyeglasses and changed his life! During his time in the Air Force, he served as a Sergeant and Staff Sergeant. He was responsible for making proper and accurate charts off of photos for the command to use to guide the air planes. He excelled as a draftsman, often worked many extra hours and was given a Commendation Ribbon for meritorious service. His commanding officer said that his "attitude toward his duties and manner of performance of such duties has brought credit to himself as a non-commissioned officer and to the USAF."

Before being sent to Korea, Joe was stationed in central Texas. He attended a dance for servicemen in Austin and met his future wife, Peggy Youngblood. They were married December 3, 1949 and enjoyed a full life with each other, their kids, their pets, their extended families, their two grandchildren, and buying homes and eating out and traveling some, until Peggy's passing in 2013 after 63 years of marriage.

After his service, he and Peggy returned to Oklahoma where he attended college on the GI Bill. He excelled in math and physics. He graduated from Central State University (CSU) in 1958 with a degree in Physics. He later taught Physics at the University for 2 years, and years later the University recognized him as a distinguished alumni. He loved to share his knowledge and make a difference. He had many good friends from his university days and believed strongly in education.

Joe used what he learned at CSU to build a long and enjoyable professional career that took him from Oklahoma to Oak Ridge and then to Miami and to St. Louis. He worked as a nuclear physicist in several different cyclotrons throughout his career and became a leader in that field. In 1969, he moved into the field of nuclear medicine and from then on focused his career helping to design and run facilities that produced radioactive pharmaceuticals. In that position he was responsible for the design, specifications, installation and startup of the first privately funded, hospital based radioisotope production facility in the world, at Mount Sinai Medical Center in Miami Florida. This was a growing field at that time, and it provided new diagnostic tools for doctors. Joe was very proud of the tangible impact his physics knowledge made in the real world for cancer detection and medical research. He later was a lead consultant to help a company in Japan build a similar facility. Joe ended up publishing many articles, a book in his field and had a US Patent to his credit. Joe had a very strong work ethic and always placed importance on the work he did and the projects he led. He made many lifelong friends in his career and kept up with many of them throughout his life. Several of these friends have said that Joe was an important part of their lives and influenced them professionally and personally. His work was important, and it was important to him.

Along the way he developed a better "target" (a production part used in the cyclotron) and started a company that manufactured and sold these targets. This was also a family business and all his children worked in various stages of the production of these targets. The company was "Fabrication Development & Sales Inc." and he was very proud of this accomplishment and the success of that venture. In 1988 he and Peggy returned to Tennessee where Joe went back to work at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory. He retired from that job in 1993 and he and Peggy moved to Fort Worth, where they lived until their declining health instigated a move to Austin. In Ft. Worth he was a consultant of a company tasked to find a commercial application for a linear accelerator left over from the nation's Superconducting Super Collider project in Waxahachie, Texas.

Joe and Peggy wanted children but they had to wait 9 years before Peggy became pregnant with their first child, Joe Dwayne. Joe was born in 1958, and four years later they had Jerry Layne and four years after that they had Penny Elizabeth. One of the most important things in Joe's life was his family, and he was very proud of it. He worked to be a good father, and although he spent a lot of time at work, he often made time for his family. He loved his children as much as any father ever has, and built a great relationship with all three kids. He also developed strong relationships with his children's spouses and grew to love Donna Beaver, Dena Beaver, and Scott McGlasson as his own. He was very proud of his children, and his grandchildren. One of Joe and Peggy's favorite possessions was a family portrait of all of his children, and their spouses and his grandchildren in a frame that read "A hundred years from now it will not matter what my bank account was, the sort of house I lived in, or the kind of car I drove... but the world may be different because I was important in the life of a child.".

Pop was extremely proud of his two grandchildren Christopher and Elizabeth Beaver. They were the icing on the cake of his long life. Even in his declining days at his memory facility, he was telling people there that he had the two best grandchildren anywhere.

Joe and Peggy made a point of staying in touch with their siblings and their families despite the distance apart they lived. Joe had a sister, Jenna, that he loved very much and kept in contact with throughout his life. Joe had a deep love for her and her husband Jim, and loved them and their children Breck and Garrick and their families - Breck's wife, Gloria, and their children Kailee and Cullen, and Garrick's wife, Kaori, and their children Natalie and Douglas. Joe and Jenna were very close and did their best to keep their kids in touch with each other's lives. Joe and Peggy also kept in touch and built strong relationships with Peggy's brothers and sisters and their spouses and families. He clearly loved all of this extended family as his own and all of their children; his nieces and nephews. He is survived by Katherine (Judge) Youngblood and her daughter Judy. Preceded in death by her husband TJ Youngblood, their son Tommy and his son Drew. Survived by Tommy's Daughters, Christine, Jenny and their brother Scott. Survived by Anne Youngblood and her son Ed Nicholas, daughters MaryAnn, Carol, and Joy, preceded in death by Anne's husband Ed Nicholas. Survived by Jeanie Youngblood, and preceded in death by Bill Youngblood, survived by his son Larry and Larry's kids Brian, Dustin and Derek. He is also preceded in death by Peggy's sister Libby Proffer and her husband Bob, sister Buddie Shockey, her husband Dick, and their daughter Ann.

In younger years he loved boating and camping, and even later in life was wishing and shopping for another boat. He enjoyed photography and back in the day developed his own film. His love of photography has given his family many memories to keep in print and film, of boating, building a boat and camping in Tennessee, enjoying the sand, Bays and Keys of Miami, and all the many fun birthday celebrations they threw for their kids. He was also a car buff and enjoyed buying and selling cars and he was able to own a number of pretty nice automobiles over the years. He loved building things and was heard many times saying "always do a job yourself if it requires buying more tools!"

Joe's biological father was Joseph Beaver. Joe became aware of Joseph's family in Oregon in 1980 at the time of Joseph's passing. Joe was invited into the surviving members of the Oregon Beaver family warmly. This was a new family to get to know and both sides made trips to visit and many Sunday phone calls to develop relationships. Joe's father married Helen, they had two boys, Bob and Bill, who both married. His brother Bill passed away in an accident in 1996. Bill had four children. He is survived by Bob and Joyce Beaver, and many nieces and nephews.

Peggy and Joe were active in their church, and built many strong and lasting friendships. They played bridge with their good friends from church, the Motterns and the Ropers, for hours on end, and loved to talk about how the games went.

Joe and Peggy always loved animals. They enjoyed many dogs and cats over the years, the last being Corky who was with Joe to the end. Corky was his sidekick and buddy for the long years after Peggy's passing, going everywhere with him. Joe got his love of dogs from his mother and supported many humane societies and animal shelters.

No summary of Joe's life would be complete without a discussion on his character. Joe was a very kind and extremely generous man. He helped many less fortunate than him throughout his life. He provided financial assistance to his family countless times, and was happy to share his money as quickly as he shared his sound advice. He loved a good joke and enjoyed making someone else smile. He was slow to anger and quick to smile.

His last years were filled with making friends at breakfast shops, favorite restaurants, computer stores, Costco, and all of his many caregivers. If you met Joe, you liked him. Even when he was having trouble expressing himself he could still get a joke out of any situation. One of his favorites was, while shaking your hand, "Hi, I'm Joe, I guess you know who you are." As his mind was slipping away he still thought it more important to make people laugh than sit around and worry about the day. His nephew Breck described him best as "always being there with a broad smile, a keen wit, and a heart the size of Texas." The family has heard from many of his caretakers and favorite restaurant staff saying he impacted their lives and they loved him and will miss him. It's safe to say he will be missed by many.