Birth date: Feb 9, 1925 Death date: Nov 20, 2017
Gene Francis Pierson, age 92 of Rehoboth Beach, DE, passed away peacefully on Monday, November 20, 2017, at Harbor Health Care & Rehabilitation Center, in Lewes, DE. He was born Monday, February 9, 1925 in Vineland, NJ, son of the Read Obituary
So sorry to hear about you Father Jennifer. May light perpetual shine upon him.
Jill Matthews
Gene was born February 9th 1925 and lived here in Vineland for 90 years. He grew up on his parents’ duck farm on Landis Ave. He helped his grandfather and father around the farm raising the ducks, collecting eggs and taking care of the various other animals they had on the farm. His parents also owned Pierson Morris Drug Store at 6th and Landis Ave and he spent many days helping out at that store. He loved to fish with his grandfather and would spend hours practicing casting a fishing line so he could get it to land in just the right spot. He first saw his wife, Mary Lou, while she was pushing her little sister in a baby carriage down Landis Ave. and often, over the early years, he would see her at the drug store soda fountain where he was a soda jerk.
Gene briefly attended Valley Forge Military Academy and graduated from Vineland High School in 1943. He joined the Navy and served in the Pacific theater of WWII in the United States Naval Air Corps. His flight crew was stationed in the Philippines on the island of Sumara. He was a belly gunner on a PB4Y-2 Privateer. Once Gene left the service he briefly attended college in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho and then transferred to Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, New York, where his father had also attended college, and graduated with a degree in mechanical engineering.
While in college, Gene and Mary Lou met again, this time on a blind date and on October 3rd 1953 they were married at the First United Methodist Church here in Vineland at 7th and Landis Ave. …. A marriage that ultimately lasted 64 years. They moved into a house across the street from the duck farm. Three years later Jennifer came along and five years after that David.
Gene worked for Westinghouse Electric Corporation his entire career. He commuted every day to his office near the Philadelphia airport… at first having to cross the Delaware River by ferry until the Walt Whitman bridge was completed. At Westinghouse, he worked on the Nautilus submarine program, coal gasification and after 35 years retired as Director of Contracts and Costs for the Combustion Turbine Systems Division.
In retirement, Gene kept busy taking care of the duck farm property (by this time without the ducks) and some rental properties, traveling, fishing at the inlet behind Ocean City New Jersey, using his computer to research stocks and tending his vegetable garden. Gene was an exceptional mechanic and could fix just about anything. He also loved woodworking in his father’s woodshop and keeping up his cars. His brother-in-law, Kenny, convinced him to join the board of directors for this cemetery, Oak Hill, where he served for several years.
Two years ago he and Mary Lou moved to an assisted living facility in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware. All of the nurses and aides loved “Mr. Gene”. They renewed their wedding vows on June 7th of this year and celebrated their 64th wedding anniversary on October 3rd.
Above all, Gene was a great husband and family man, who treasured time spent with his loved ones. He was a down to earth, unpretentious, sweet, generous, good guy. We were all blessed having a man like Gene in this world and he will be missed by all who knew him.
