Joseph Miles Foster, 86, of Florence, passed away on January 14, 2009.
The funeral service will be Sunday at 3:00 p.m. at the Elkins East Chapel Funeral Home. Brian Jarrett and Wendell Gann will officiate. Burial, with military honors, will follow in the Civitan Cemetery, Rogersville. The family will receive friends Sunday from 1:00-2:45 p.m. at the funeral home.
Mr. Foster was born in Waterloo, Alabama and enlisted in the U.S. Navy in 1941. That enlistment began an interesting twenty year career in which he saw action during WW II on the USS Tracy (DM19), a fast minelayer, and during the Korean War on the USS Rowe (DD564), a destroyer. He also met his wife, Evelyn, in San Fransisco where she was stationed serving in the WAVES. They were married January 14, 1946.
Following his retirement from the Navy, he worked at Redstone Arsenal until his retirement in 1975. He and Evelyn lived in Rogersville twenty-eight years until they moved to Florence in 2003. They had been members of the Rogersville Church of Christ and were members of Jackson Heights Church of Christ.
He loved the outdoors, and enjoyed fishing, hunting, and gardening.
Mr. Foster is survived by his wife of 63 years, Evelyn Foster; sons Thomas W. Foster and wife Marty, Pace, Florida, and Larry A. Foster, and wife Louise, Marietta, Georgia; grandchildren Allison Edwards and husband Kelly, Caroline Foster, Katie Foster, and Sarah Foster; sisters Beatrice Stansell and husband Fay, Florence, and Vivian Clark and husband Denzel, Killen; nieces and nephews.
Pallbearers will be Robert Stansell, G.B. Cochran, Hershel McFarland, Thomas Cochran, Thomas W. Foster, and Larry A. Foster.
Please consider memorials to the American Heart Association or the American Diabetes Association.