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James P. Cowan, Jr.
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Heckart Funeral Home
Mr. Cowan was a member of St. Paul’s Lutheran Church and an active member in the Lutheran Layman’s League. He worked as a purchasing agent for Sedalia Fruit Company for 29 years retiring in 1986. At an early age his parents moved to Hertford County, North Carolina and James spent his first 21 years there. He graduated in 1938 from Murfreesboro High School, and immediately became employed as a truck driver, hauling pulpwood. He entered the United States Army Air Corp on December 2, 1941.
Upon completion of airplane mechanics school at Chanute Air Field, Rantol IL. October 1942, he was assigned to the eighth squadron of the 62nd troop carrier group and saw service in England, North Africa, and Sicily. While in Sicily he contracted polio and from October 1943 through May 1944 he was hospitalized and underwent therapy along with re-habilitation.
In May 1944 he was reclassified as being fit for duty and assigned to the “Sedalia Army Air Field” at Knob Noster. And from this assignment he was honorably discharged in October 1945.
Survivors include his wife Ethel Cowan, of the home; a son Stanley Cowan and his wife Nancy, of Jefferson City; a daughter-in-law, Bonnie Addington Cowan Finch, of Sedalia; four grandchildren, Matthew Cowan, Holly Haynes, Chris Cowan, and Sarah Cowan; a step granddaughter, Rachel Finch; four great-grandchildren.
He was predeceased by a son, Ronald James Cowan, two brothers, William A. Cowan and Haywood S. “Jack” Cowan.
Funeral service will be held at 1:30 p.m. Wednesday, January 30, 2008, at St. Paul’s Lutheran Church with Pastor Kenneth Tatkenhorst officiating.
Pallbearers will be Kenneth Schreiner, Ralph Viebrock, Wilbert Tobaben, Lonnie Acker, David Herzberg and Bob Berlin.
Honorary bearers will be Eugene and Ann Viets, Ralph and Helen Kreisel, Norman and Pat Childs, Ferdinand Schutte and Marie McMullin
Burial will be in Highland Sacred Gardens. Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 2591 will conduct full military honors at the gravesite.
The family will receive friends from 6:30 to 8:00 p.m. Tuesday at Heckart Funeral Home.
Memorial contributions are suggested to St. Paul’s Lutheran School.
James Pruette Cowan, Jr. 88, of Sedalia, died Sunday, January 27, 2008 at Boone Hospital Center, Columbia.
He was born April 25, 1919, in Halifax County, North Carolina. A son of James P. and Elizabeth Cooke Cowan, Sr. On April 4, 1945, in Sedalia, he married Ethel L. Heisterberg, who survives of the home.
