Ronald Wayne Feldman

One of the really good guys has left the building. Suddenly. Unexpectedly. Ron Feldman had just celebrated his 79th birthday with a homemade apple pie but died at home the morning of Saturday, January 23. His family and friends are stunned. Ron was born in Peoria, IL, on January 19, 1942, the second child of Nina Hitchcock and Floyd Feldman. He joined the Navy when he was just 17 and went to sea. He loved his life in the Navy and eventually served 22 years with time spent in Greece (where he met and married his first wife Effie Katsoulis), Guam, Sacramento and San Diego. They had two children, Dino Ryan and Vanessa. His second wife Anita Giani always called him her sweetheart, her personal private certified hero, with good reason. He was awarded the Navy and Marine Corps Medal in 1962 when “On two separate occasions within 48 hours, entered treacherous waters to assist in the rescue of injured, downed aviators. Both rescues were affected during complete darkness in heavy seas and heavy winds. The rescue of March 2, 1962 was further complicated by freezing air and sea temperature of 40 degrees. After Feldman had assisted in bringing the injured aviator aboard, he himself had to be helped aboard where his frozen clothing was cut away from his body. His outstanding courage, perseverance, and selfless devotion to duty were in keeping with the highest traditions of the United States Naval Service.” Ron retired as a Senior Chief in 1982 after serving in radio communications on ships and then as an instructor on land in San Diego. He would say that he had been called a sailor but did not learn how to sail until later in San Diego. He eventually moved to Redwood City, CA and went to work as a technical instructor of Network Equipment Technologies (NET). He bought a sailboat, called it Liberty Call, and lived aboard on the San Francisco Bay. He later bought a 38 ft. Hunter, called it Liberty Call II, and moved to Pete’s Harbor in Redwood City. It was on the docks there that he met Anita in the spring of 1994. That September, she asked him what his intentions were, and he said, “If I thought you’d say yes, I’d have asked you to marry me on our first date.” They married at Sequoia Yacht Club on January 8, 1995, with the help of a country western band and a line dance instructor. Anita and Ron lived on Liberty Call II for 14 years, nine of which were on the San Francisco Bay. They then sailed her down to San Diego in 2004 where they spent more than a year preparing to sail to Mexico in October 2005. They spent almost three years cruising the Baja peninsula and the mainland, making some life-long friends and having some wonderful adventures. In the fall of 2008, they had sold the boat and moved to Pass Christian, Anita’s hometown. They had seen pickleball played in Mexico and wanted to play it here. For the first two years, Ron visited area senior centers, trying to introduce people to the game. In 2009, Pass Christian was rebuilding its tennis courts and Anita, who served on the parks and recreation commission, helped get pickleball lines painted on two courts. Ron started holding free clinics there. Eventually he got people interested, and the game now has hundreds of people playing at courts all along the coast. Friends donated a plaque for those courts crediting him with bring pickleball to the area. He was diagnosed with Parkinson’s Disease in the fall of 2009, and within 10 years, he could no longer play pickleball. He was very fortunate that the progress of the disease was very slow, but it did rob him of his ability to drive and be mobile. This did not stop him from traveling. Anita and Ron bought a Roadtrek camper van in 2017 and traveled the west coast for three summers, mostly with former sailboat cruising friends who had transitioned to land. In January 2018, Ron found that he had a son he did not know was his. Wes Morgan, his wife Becky and two children, Dakota (Sophia Ruppert) and Josie (Cole Moss), came into Ron’s life. Wes was an amazing gift; he and his family were quickly welcomed into the family and loved dearly. They made Ron very happy these past three years. Those who went before Ron include his mother and father and his sister Judy Foiles. He leaves behind his wife Anita, children Ryan (Joe Ciaverella), Vanessa (Mike Koch), and Wes (Becky) Morgan as well as Anita’s children Elizabeth (Parshaw) Vaziri and Fletcher (Christine) Mason and their children. He also leaves his beloved brother Lee and sister-in-law Liz Feldman, nieces and nephews, as well as cousins and friends. A visitation will be held at Bradford O’Keefe Funeral Home in Gulfport (next to Salute’s) at 1 pm on Monday, February 1, followed by a private interment at Biloxi National Cemetery. A celebration of life will be held at 4:30 pm at Anita and Ron’s home. In lieu of flowers, the family requests that donations be made to the Michael J. Fox Foundation, P. O. Box 5014, Hagerstown, MD 21741-5014 or www.michaeljfox.org. Bradford O'Keefe Funeral Home, 15th Street, is honored to serve the Feldman family.