William Thomas Free

William T. Free, Jr. was born in Courtland, Kansas on December 26, 1934 to William T. Free, Sr. and Florence Lottie Levrold. He was raised in this small north central Kansas farm community and graduated from Courtland High School in 1952. He was a revered athlete and sportsman, participating and watching most all American pastimes. Throughout his blue collar career, he worked in dirt and diesel. He began working for farmers as a young man, aside his father, and found his passion sitting atop a D-9 Caterpillar. The ìSwedeî was sent to Korea with the US Army from 1956-58 where he continued his heavy equipment skills and built service roads for the troops. Returning to the states, he traveled Kansas with his father laying down miles of highways. He met his wife, Joan Sankey of Republic in 1958 at the Knights of Columbus on a September night and danced their ìSentimental Journeyî until she agreed to marry him on March 28, 1959 at the Amana Lutheran Church in Scandia, Kansas. She survives at their home in Cleveland, OK. They became a couple traveling from Nebraska to Oklahoma for 52 years building roads, reclaiming coal-mined pits and creating enormous landfills. He clocked in endless hours as a laborer and foreman with Reece Construction, Bemis Construction and Heide Construction, and eventually became the contractor, Heide, Patzel & Free. He officially retired from the dozer, loader and scraper world in 2005. Two daughters decorated his life. The youngest, Victoria, arrived in Emporia, KS, and was the athlete he lived through in track, basketball and later her coaching events. Sherry was born in McCook, NE He was proud of their accomplishments as college graduates and teacher/coaches, but primetime came with the addition of Sherryís husband, Rick Bowin and his love of the Kansas soil. As they farmed in southeast Kansas, near McCune, they gave him three grandsons, and within the last three years two great-grandsons. His basketball team is now complete. The team includes Matt, Nichole, and Chase Bowin of Springfield, MO, Seth Bowin of Corpus Christi and Aaron, Tara and Korvin Bowin of McCune all involved in the farm or construction, of course. Bill is the brother of Ben and Shirley Free of Formoso, KS and Carol Larson of Apache Junction, AZ and brother-in-law of Helen Sankey of Republic, KS and Beth Sankey of Belleville, KS. A memorial service will be held at 1:00 pm, Saturday, July 9, 2011 at the Chapel of the Chapman-Black Funeral Home in Cleveland, Oklahoma. Following cremation, Bill will be interred on a family farm in Kansas at a later date. Memorials are suggested to Infinity Care of Tulsa, 6914 South Yorktown, Suite 115, Tulsa, OK 74136 or the Republic County Historical Society, 615 28th Street, Belleville, Kansas 66935.