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Neal McClymonds

Neal Erskine McClymonds U.S. Veteran

October 6, 1929 - March 18, 2016

Neal Erskine McClymonds, 86, passed away peacefully at Mountain View Manor in Prescott, Arizona, on Friday morning, March 18, 2016, after a long illness.

He was born on Oct. 6, 1929, in American Falls, Idaho, and liked to say that after his birth it took a few weeks before the Stock Market got wind of it and crashed.

His parents were Arthur Erskine and Isla Bruce McClymonds. His father worked for the government in experimental farming so the family moved often as Neal grew up: California, Colorado, South Dakota and finally Lincoln, Nebraska, where he graduated from college with a B.S. in Geology.

His life of travel continued as he graduated from college, in 1951 and joined the army as an infantryman with the 72nd Engineers (Geological Survey). He said his unit was on the way to Korea and the war but was diverted en route to Japan, where he spent the next three years surveying the beaches there in Japan and taking in the local culture.

When he got his honorable discharge from the Army in 1954, he bought a car in San Diego and drove to Tucson to enter U of A to earn his Master’s Degree with his thesis on the geology of the Waterman Mountains.

With his MA under his belt, Neal joined the U.S. Geological Survey and went to work as a Hydrologist (ground water geologist) in Holbrook on the Navajo and the Hopi. With his easygoing nature, Neal worked easily alongside the locals.

He transferred to Puerto Rico for two years and then on to Long Island, New York, where he met and married his next-door neighbor in December 1969. At this point, Neal opted to be loaned out as a hydrologist to USAID (Agency for International Development) and a new adventure in a third-world country, in this case, East Pakistan. No sooner had the work begun when the couple was evacuated to Iran for safe haven (this was the early 1970s) as civil war broke out in East Pakistan, destined to become Bangladesh.

Then came tours in Afghanistan, south-central India and Kenya, where his older daughter was born and his younger daughter was adopted from Thailand.

The family experienced the New Year fireworks celebrating 1980 in Hawaii on the way home to the USA where Neal rejoined the U.S. Geological Survey and was assigned to Helena, Montana, where he worked until he retired in 1985.

Upon retirement, Neal moved his family to his favorite place on earth, Arizona, and settled in Prescott where he surprised himself by staying put for the last 30-plus years of his life.

Neal leaves behind two older sisters, Fay and Margaret Ann; his ex-wife Barbara; two daughters Erica and April; and his beautiful granddaughter, Jordan.

His cremated remains rest in the Prescott National Cemetery.
“Our hero, always remembered.”

Arrangements entrusted to Hampton Funeral Home.

Information provided by survivors.