Roy G. Schmidt

Roy Garry Schmidt was born at home on August 10, 1933, in Gackle, North Dakota, and was the fifth of 10 children. His parents were Edward and Neomi “Nimi” Schmidt of rural North Dakota near Streeter/Gackle. Roy went to be with his Lord and Savior on the morning of March 10, 2023, at the age of 89 years, in Walla Walla, WA.

A former resident of Hardin, MT, Roy first arrived in Big Horn County in 1952 and worked for Kuchera Farm, then for Saunders Lumber Co. He loved hunting with his brothers and fishing at Dry Head Canyon. Meeting his wife, Carol L. Benzel, they married on August 28, 1955, and lived at Hardin until moving to Everett, WA, for Roy’s health in 1957. After attending barber college, the couple moved to Marysville, WA, in 1958, where Roy bought his first barber shop. He remodeled the old-fashioned barber shop, where he built a good business before selling it. 1958 was a banner year for Roy as it was then that he also began the greatest adventure of fatherhood. Later, he opened another barber shop in a new mall in Marysville. A class “A” personality, Roy could never be still for long, so his leisure time was spent tending to an immaculate garden in the evenings and weekends.

As the family grew, Roy longed to raise his children in the country, so in 1962, the family moved to a farm near Stanwood, WA. He raised beef cattle, cut hay, and became a weekend farmer. He sold the Marysville barbershop and, after a time, bought another barbershop in the Viking Village shopping center located in Stanwood, which he operated for 20 years, all the time running the farm in the evenings and weekends. In 1964 the family moved to a new farm in the Victoria Heights area of Stanwood, where Roy raised commercial strawberries for eight years and then went into dairying with his sons, known as 4K’s Dairy. The dairy received several awards in quality and production. It was the first dairy in the nation to milk 225 cows four times a day commercially, being featured in The Dairyman magazine in March of 1988.

Roy retired from barbering in 1985 and began “snowbirding” with a barber college friend to Arizona for the next 15 years. He continued to help out on the farm some, but as his health began to fail, Roy decided to move to Walla Walla, WA, in 2013 to be near his daughter and her family. He quickly became acquainted with those living in his surrounding community and would often play the guitar and sing, which led him to self-record several gospel and country music CDs to share with others. He continued to “snowbird” for several winters after moving to Walla Walla, until travel became too difficult, and he would use his musical talent to lead worship for church gatherings down in Arizona.

Roy loved to bake and cook German foods, especially kuchen, a German pastry and loved making hundreds of pounds of German sausage. Some of his happiest times were around the table or some social gathering with lots of food and conversation. He also enjoyed golf, gardening, holding babies, westerns, and in his younger years, riding his horse, “Prince.” He was an avid fisherman, catching 50 and 60-lb. King salmon and continued his love of fishing up until the last few years of his life. He loved to bowl and received many trophies during his time spent on a bowling league. He loved to tell the story of the game he bowled “an almost perfect score,” throwing only one spare the entire game. As he grew older his interests changed and photography became a new passion as he was able to enjoy and capture the beauty of the Arizona desert during the winter months he spent there. He loved nature and all of God’s beautiful creation and wanted to share that with others. Roy’s greatest love was his relationship with Jesus and that became the most important quest in his life. He wanted to help others learn of the saving grace of his Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

Roy also served on many boards, some of which included Victoria Chapel (a non-denominational church affiliated with Village Missions that Roy and Carol’s family, along with a handful of neighboring families, founded in the 1970s), CENEX, Land O’Lakes, and the Marysville Co-op. He was also a member of the Gideons, where he helped serve in Bible distributions at public schools.

Roy was preceded in death by his wife, Carol L. (Benzel) Schmidt, six weeks prior to his passing. He is survived by his five children, all of Washington state-sons; Keith (Darlene), Kevin (Bonnie), Kerry (Missy), and Kenneth (Charlotte) Schmidt and daughter, Athena (Michael) Willard; 14 grandchildren and 25 great-grandchildren; two sisters, Verlene Feller and Delphine Kruger both of Hardin, MT; good friend, Bill Stenerson also of Hardin, MT; good friend, Arvid Kraft of Pasco, WA and a host of cousins, nieces and nephews.

A private memorial will be held on Saturday, April 29, 2023, in Stanwood, WA. In lieu of flowers, memorials may be made to Trinity Baptist Church (595 Abbott Rd. Walla Walla, WA 99362) earmarked “Schmidt Memorial” for the continuation of the gospel of Christ.