Dale Warren Saethre was born September 9, 1930, in Grand Marais to Mable (Berglund) and Alfred Saethre. He was baptized and confirmed at Bethlehem Lutheran Church. He quit school at 17 to join the Air Force and flew in the Berlin Air Lift delivering coal. After the Air Force, he worked for Erie Mining as a surveyor. He and the president of United States Steel pounded the spike to finish the railroad on the Iron Range.
One day in the summer of 1954 he went to a resort on the North Shore with his childhood friend and girlfriend to meet a waitress that was working there. They went out the following week, and that was that. She went back to graduate from Duluth Central in 1955, and they were married one week later with a justice of the peace, with a reception at an A & W Root Beer stand.
They lived at Murphy City for about six months and then moved to Grand Marais. Dale was an avid hunter with rifle and bow and arrow but mostly a fisherman. He worked for the Cook County Highway Department for 35 years, first in the engineering office and then as a patrol operator. They owned Saethre’s Travelers Rest for 24 years and helped take care of Trailside for 16 years. He moved to Thompson’s RV park, bought a pontoon boat and fished every day and night until they moved to Florida for good.
He loved visiting at the donut shop after church and always had a joke.
He and Harold Flavell founded the Grand Marais Yacht Club until he sold the “Dale 2” and moved to Florida.
He lived in Ormond Beach, Fla. for 24 years until daughter Susie and son-in-law Frank bought the Suwannee River Rendezvous. They sold out and moved to the resort where he worked in a big beautiful shop and built all the tables for the new dining room at the resort.
Dale loved taking the grandkids fishing. He loved his three dogs, Pinky, Skipper, and Toby who rode in the current toy, a red golf cart.
He worked every day until he went into the emergency room in Lake City, was transported to Gainesville where he got wonderful care by hospital staff and daily visits by granddaughter Jackie and friend Kathy Page, and died peacefully of lymph node cancer with family surrounding him on September 15.
Survivors are his wife of 62 years, Dale Lavonne; daughter Susie (Frank) Page, Mayo, Fla.; sons Mike, Las Vegas, Nev., Dan, Mayo, Fla., and Patrick (Linda), Deltona, Fla.; grandchildren Shannon Fuller, Blue Earth, Minn., Chris Fuller (Jai) Hong Kong; Candace Malfoy (Arnoud), Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, Nickolas Saethre, North Carolina, Jackie Clark, Gainesville, Elizabeth Rivera, Gainesville, Melyssa (Ryan), Heather (Chris); great-grandchildren Renee and Claire, Hong Kong, Sable, Blue Earth, Layla and Cameron, Gainesville, Penelope Malfoy, Malaysia; sisters Eleanor Waha, Lorraine McDonald; brothers Chester Lindskog and Roy Lindskog; and numerous nieces and nephews.
He was preceded in death by sisters Olive Brugge, Irene Thompson, Carolyn Engebretson, brothers Rev. Roland Saethre, Lyle Saethre and Russel Lindskog.
Service will be held at Bethlehem Lutheran Church at 1 p.m. on Friday, October 6 with interment to follow at Maple Hill Church.
Leave a Reply