Charles F. Scheid II

Charles F. Scheid II, a long-time resident of Lock Haven from 1920 to 1964, passed away peacefully on 7 July 2022 after a rewarding and interesting life of 102 years. Charles was married for 64 years to Mary Emert Scheid until she passed in 2010. Charles is survived by his five children and their respective spouses, Loretta (Lori) and husband Chuck Pesta, Charles III and wife Kristy, Geoffrey and wife Susan, Kevin, and Lynn; four grandchildren and two great grandchildren, Michelle and husband Chris Meyer and their children Adelaide and Henrietta, Charles IV and wife Lisa, Geoffrey II and wife Laura, and James.

Charles was born in Warrendale, PA, where his father worked as the business manager of the Thorn Hill School for Boys north of Pittsburg. His parents moved to Lock Haven in the early 1920s when they purchased and ran the Quigley Hall Tea Room on old Rt 220 just at the end of the Great Island. Charles grew up swimming and fishing in the Susquehanna and hunting for arrowheads in the freshly plowed tobacco fields of the valley. After achieving valedictorian in High School, Charles learned to fly and worked at the Piper Aircraft Company in the late 1930s as a draftsman and a pilot to deliver new Piper Cubs around the country. It was also at Piper where he met his future wife, Mary Emert. When the war broke out, Charles enlisted in the US Army Air Corps and was immediately assigned as a flight instructor. Later he flew a variety of multi-engine aircraft in the Pacific Theatre, including the B-24, B-17, B-25, C-45, C-46, and many other large aircraft that aided the successful Pacific campaign.

Near the end of the war, Charles and Mary married at Gettysburg, PA, which was as far as they could go on the fuel ration tickets they collected from family and friends. They lived in Lock Haven during the 1940s and 50s raising their family in a modest home on Woodward Avenue. Charles attended the University of Lock Haven (then the LH Teacher’s College), then worked for Sylvania and later the Singer Sewing Machine Company. In 1963 the family moved to a new home outside Princeton, New Jersey, when Charles was promoted in Singer and worked at its headquarters at Rockefeller Center in New York City during what we now call the “Mad Men” era. The family moved again in 1970 to Barrington, Illinois, a suburb of Chicago, and Charles worked in the Chicago Loop. He completed his career as a safety engineer with the CNA insurance company in Chicago.  In the late 1980s, he and Mary retired. In 1989 they moved to charming Salisbury, North Carolina to “get out of the snow” and enjoyed their home, garden, hobbies, pets, family and, each other.

Charles was a loving husband and caring father with a dry and great sense of humor. In addition to an interesting career, he was a great storyteller and amateur writer, a computer hobbyist, one of the nation’s most experienced HAM Radio operators (his passion for radios stared as a boy), and an avid piano player. He will be deeply missed by his family, friends, and the excellent team at Trinity Oaks Retirement Community of Salisbury, where he spent his last 12 years.

Charles’ ashes will be interred later this month at a private family ceremony next to Mary in Jersey Shore, Pennsylvania.

Online thoughts and memories can be made at www.yost-gedonfuneralhome.com and the Yost-Gedon Funeral Home Facebook page.