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Obituary for Eugene Norton Harmon
Eugene Norton Harmon passed away on April 8, 2019 in Colville, WA. He was born on January 18, 1924 in San Bernardino, CA to John and Annetta Harmon. Gene was raised in San Bernardino, where he participated in Boy Scouts and helped out with his father’s thriving automotive repair business. He graduated from San Bernardino High School in 1941.
Gene interrupted his college education to enlist in the U.S. Navy in November, 1942. He completed basic training at the Naval Training Center, Farragut, ID, after which he received training as an Aviation Machinist’s Mate in Norman, OK. After several stateside postings he was transferred overseas to Guam and Shanghai, where he maintained four-engine transports for the Naval Air Transport Service. He was honorably discharged in March, 1946.
Gene returned to San Bernardino after the war and resumed his education at San Bernardino Valley College. In December, 1946 he married Ruth Jorgensen of San Pedro, CA, whom he had met on a blind date before joining the Navy. Their marriage was to last until Ruth’s death in 2008.
After graduating from UCLA in 1949, Gene went to work for General Motors, working at GM plants in Kansas City and Los Angeles. In 1958 he left GM to work as an industrial engineer in the aerospace industry in San Diego, first for Rohr Aircraft and then for Convair (General Dynamics). After his retirement in 1991, Gene and Ruth settled in eastern Washington, first in a log home near Northport that they had built in 1980 and finally in Colville. Gene’s last few years in Colville were spent at Parkview Assisted Living.
Gene is survived by a son John (Kathryn) Harmon of Spokane, Washington and a daughter Gail (Doug) Berkey of Centennial, Colorado, six grandchildren, Bryan Berkey, Lori Benson, Kristen Davis, Tyler Berkey, Astrid King, and Eloise Harmon and sixteen great-grandchildren, all of whom loved him.
