Jack Crowder

Jack Crowder of rural Kim, 96, passed away Monday, October 5, 2020 at the Bent County Healthcare Center in Las Animas. He was born on March 9, 1924 to Earl and Stella (Marshall) Crowder in La Junta.

On Sept. 3, 1947 he married Margaret T. Arnet where they lived at Big Arroyo near Thatcher until 1954 when they moved to their ranch near the Purgatoire River until the Army displaced them in 1983. In 1984 they purchased their current ranch northwest of Kim where Jack lived until fall of 2019.

Jack grew up on an irrigated farm in the Arkansas Valley, the youngest of four children – Ralph, Everett (Eb), and Anna Louise (Bill). His first job, other than hoeing beets and feeding hogs, was driving a team with a corrugated roller over listed corn stalks so they could plant sugar beet when he was nine. His dad bought his first tractor, a John Deere A on steel wheels, in 1936. Jack hated tractors and machinery ever since.

Following eighth grade, he went to high school for two days. The first day the teacher needed a dollar or two for something which he brought the second day. The teacher wanted another dollar or two for something else. Jack decided he couldn’t afford to go to high school. Jobs were very hard to find during the depression. If your family owned their farm, as his did, you weren’t eligible to work on the WPA projects. He went to work for Bane Smith, manager of the Mills Ranch farm. They put up hay in the summer and worked at the ranch after the haying was done. He decided being a cowboy was much better than being a farmer. He spent the rest of his life doing that following his naval discharge.

In August 1942, Jack went to work for the Kitch Ranch near Thatcher. In November, 1943 he left to join the Navy. He was inducted in January 1944 and discharged May 1946 where he served as an ammunition loader and cook on the aircraft carrier USS Lunga Point. He returned to the Kitch Ranch until 1954.

Jack is survived by sons, George (Gail) of Vail; Jim (Debbie) of La Junta; Joe (Teresa) of Amherst; daughters, Peg (George Mitchell) Crowder and Teresa Walz (Ward Fellhauer) all of La Junta; twelve grandchildren, and numerous great-grandchildren. He also leaves behind many nieces, nephews, friends, and neighbors. He was preceded in death by his wife, Margaret in 2011, his parents and his siblings.

A graveside service will be held on Friday, October 9, 2020 at 2:00 p.m. at the Kim Cemetery in Kim.

In lieu of flowers, memorial contributions may be made to the Kim Fire / EMS fund.

Online condolences may be made at www.PeacockFH.com. Peacock-Larsen Funeral Home & Arkansas Valley Crematory is in charge of arrangements.