The funeral for Leonard Nicholas Ruhl, 79, of Alva, will be 10 a.m. Friday at Sacred Heart Catholic Church, Alva. A wake will be 7 p.m. Thursday at the funeral home. The Rev. Shane Tharp will officiate. Arrangements are by Wharton Funeral Home, Alva.
He was born Aug. 9, 1927, in Saginaw, Mich., to Blanche Dufney and William Ruhl and died Monday, Nov. 6, 2006, at Share Medical Center.
He attended parochial school through the eighth grade, then lived with his brother after his parent’s died and attended public school. He was drafted into the Army during World War II and received a bachelor of science degree from Purdue University.
He married Mary Beard Nov. 22, 1947, in Indianapolis.
He worked as a carpenter and later became head of maintenance for Washington Township School, Metropolitan School District of Indiana.
In 1963, they moved to Cocoa Beach, Fla., where he worked for Pan American at Cape Kennedy. He was in charge of the “clean room” where the astronauts go before a flight to make sure there is no contamination, and worked with all seven original U.S. astronauts.
In the 1970s he transferred with Pan Am to the naval air station at Bremerton, Wash., where base maintenance was contracted out to Pan Am, and he provided support for the Poseidon submarine program. He transferred again to another submarine base in Kings Bay, Ga., as superintendent of base maintenance. After his retirement from Pan Am they returned to Florida, where he opened his own business, the Marlen Co. He also worked in the hobby shop of the condo association where they lived, making wooden toys for underprivileged children for Christmas.
He was with Civil Air Patrol and had a private pilot’s license, flying out of Merritt Island, a small private airstrip in Florida, where they worked in conjunction with the Drug Enforcement Agency.
He was a member of Sacred Heart Catholic Church.
Surviving are his wife, Mary; two daughters, Susan Kendron of Merritt Island, Fla., and Jean Bailey of Orlando, Fla.; four sons, Bill of Alva, Bob of Palm Harbor, Fla., John of Atlanta and Joseph of Agawam, Mass.; 14 grandchildren; nine great-grandchildren; and one sister, Helen Ruhl, of Port Huron, Mich.
He was preceded in death by a brother and three sisters.