Bob DeBuhr, former Red Cross leader, dies at 88
Saturday, March 17, 2007 1:21 PM PDT
By Stephanie Mathieu
Printable version
E-mail this articleBob DeBuhr is known as the former Red Cross manager who rushed to help citizens after Mount St. Helens ruptured --- even though his own home had been ruined in the volcano's wake.
Others recall his humorous commentary, 30-year career in the Boy Scouts of America and his devotion to wife Bette DeBuhr, who died in 1999 after an eight-year battle with Alzheimer's disease.
Bob DeBuhr died Wednesday at the Hospice Care Center. He was 88.
"He's had an interesting but difficult life," said John McClelland, a self-proclaimed local history buff and former Daily News reporter who conducted interviews with DeBuhr.
DeBuhr was born in Hillsboro, Ore., spent much of his life in Longview and graduated from R.A. Long High School in 1939. He joined Longview's Troop 301 when he was 13, and his career in the Boy Scouts took him overseas to Europe and the Middle East.
After the Boy Scouts, DeBuhr became the local Red Cross manager in 1974.
Mud flows from the 1980 eruption of Mount St. Helens destroyed the DeBuhrs' Toutle River home, but DeBuhr didn't return to his house until after a week of providing transportation, housing and food to victims, and after several people told him they'd seen his home floating down the river.
The house was found on the banks of the Toutle River with a foot and a half of mud in the couple's bedroom.
"What kind of hurt was we dug that place out of the wilderness ourselves," DeBuhr told a Daily News reporter that year. "But a lot of people are a lot worse off than we are."
DeBuhr occasionally wrote free-lance pieces for The Daily News, and in his later years, he regularly wrote commentary for "Second Half," a monthly publication for seniors. He also taught safety classes at Lower Columbia College.
He compiled and penned jokes and wrote openly about Bette DeBurh's battle with Alzheimer's.
"It is important to have a sense of humor," he wrote in 2000. "Find something to laugh about each day."
McClelland said DeBuhr was certainly funny and a "downright, nice guy."
"He was a voice for people who have to deal with loved ones with Alzheimer's. I'm sure he had a lot of inner turmoil, but he kept it to himself."
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