Joe Locke

Joe Locke, 84, of Norwood, Missouri, passed away peacefully in his home on Tuesday, July 30, 2019.

He was born March 13, 1935, to Samuel and Iva Lillie (Raney) Locke in Norwood, Missouri. He grew up in Norwood and spent most of his life there with the exception of a couple of years around 1956 when he lived in Kansas City, Kansas for training on hydraulic transmissions.

Joe had a love of all things tractor related. There didn’t seem to be a tractor he didn’t know how to fix. Even when life led him to operating heavy machinery for an occupation, he always found a way back to working on tractors.

In 1953, Joe married the love of his life, Elizabeth “Nadine” Talbot, who passed away in 2005 but greeted him, we are sure, very anxiously in Heaven along with their two sons, Larry and Russell.

Joe was a frequent visitor to the Norwood truck stop and enjoyed lunch there almost daily with friends and other locals. If you couldn’t find him in his shop tinkering on tractors, you were sure to find him at the truck stop. You rarely saw him without a big smile and a greeting. He met very few people who didn’t end up as friends and if he didn’t know your name, you were sure to be called “young feller” or “young lady”. If you knew him well enough, and sometimes you didn’t have to really know him at all, you knew that he had an ornery side. He would give anyone who would let him, a hard time and then give you that smile and laugh to let you know he was kidding.

Joe was very active in his relationship with the Lord. He was an active member in church, helped people with their ministry, and was very well loved by his church family. He was also a very proud member of the Ozarks Older Iron Club and it was tradition to attend the steam tractor shows.

Besides his parents and his wife of 52 years, Joe was preceded in death by two sons, Larry Joe and Russell Ray, two brothers and two sisters.

He is survived by two daughters, Debbie Fitzsimmons and her husband, Jim, of New Bloomfield, Missouri, and Sharon Burks and her husband, Brad, of Fordland, Missouri, one daughter-in-law, Betty Locke, of Fordland, Missouri, one brother, John Locke and his wife, Dorothy, of Norwood, Missouri, three sisters, Lorene Laub and her husband, Price, of Marshfield, Missouri, Joella McCallister of Springfield, Missouri, and Beverly Dugger of Sparta, Missouri, eight grandchildren, ten great-grandchildren, two great-great-grandchildren, his church family, and many neighbors, friends, and extended family who will greatly miss him.

As we sit here today remembering his life, his family and friends all know he would be pretty upset to know we were crying over him while he’s rejoicing in Heaven. He would want you to remember his ornery smile and how he helped anyone with anything that he possibly could, and the countless tractors, equipment and things around the farm he fixed. He would drop anything anytime and give anything to anybody who needed it without looking for return. Today is not a sad day or a day to mourn. Today is a day we celebrate the life of Joe and think about how his life has truly impacted so many people in many different ways; from his friendship and his giving ways, to the ministry or to simply fixing someone’s tractor. Over the last few weeks of his life, many people have stated that he’s a once in a lifetime type of man. We would have to say that his family agrees.