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1947
2021
MICHAEL A. NEWSHAM
May 24, 1947 ˜ July 2, 2021
Mike Newsham died Friday, July 2, 2021. Mike was the youngest child born to Bob and Ruth Newsham in Warrensburg, Missouri. Mike graduated from Fort Dodge Sr. High School in Fort Dodge, IA, June 1965. He graduated from the University of Iowa in June of 1969, and then was drafted into the US Army Aug. 28th of that year. He served in Vietnam as a clerk for ten months while he and his typewriter “kept the world safe for democracy.”
After the war he received an MA in Library Science from the University Denver. In 1975 he met his future wife Barbara Micheel, and they were married April 9, 1976. While working for the US Department of Energy from 1980-1986, they had two sons, Patrick and Matthew. In 1986 the family made a long trek west to Portland, OR, where Mike went to work for the Bonneville Power Administration. He finally ended in Transmission Operations, Real Time Scheduling. He then went into the private sector with Pacific Power Management as a real time energy trader. He retired from Pacific Power in 2006 and went back to BPA as a billing analyst, retiring from government service in 2006 with twenty-five years of federal service.
Throughout his life Mike was always physically active. He participated in wrestling and track in high school and enjoyed hiking, rock and ice climbing, and mountaineering; climbing in Colorado, Wyoming, Montana, the Pacific Northwest, and even Tanzania, where he peaked Mount Kilimanjaro in 2014. Mike was also very active leading hikes and climbs for the Sierra Club. He led approximately 200 hikes and climbs from 2006 to 2018. His motto was “I like to take people on hikes to places they wouldn’t normally go on their own.” This included Mount St. Helens many times, South Sisters, Mount Hood, and day hikes in the Columbia River Gorge and the high alpine country around Mount St. Helens and Mount Hood. If you hike or climb in those areas, look sharp and you might see his spirit somewhere high on a Pacific Northwest Mountain.
As much as he loved the outdoors, he loved his family more. Barbara was his rock, and she kept him grounded in life. He loved his sons and was very proud of them. He spent many hours with his grandchildren. They were all the apple of his eye and he loved the time he spent with them.
Mike is survived by his wife, Barbara Micheel; his two children, Patrick (Tina) Newsham and their son James of Wilmington, NC, and Matthew Newsham and his children Conner, Miette, Simone, Jaiden, Xavier, and Alex of Vancouver, WA; Also surviving is his brother, Robert (Glenda) Newsham of Fort Collins, CO. In lieu of flowers, donations may be made in Mike’s name to either the Mount St. Helens Institute or the Kaiser Foundation Health Plan of the Northwest Hospice, 2701 NW Vaughn St., Suite 140, Portland, OR 97210-5344.
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2 Entries
May 2023-Mrs. Newsham, sons and grandchildren. I just learned today that Mike has passed away. We were wrestling buddies at Urbandale High School and stayed in touch after Mike and his parents moved to Fort Dodge. Even made a climb together in Colorado in 1980 but stayed in touch by phone after that with the last phone call 4 or 5 years ago. As Danny McKenzie stated below, Mike will always be remembered. He is in Heaven now! God Bless, Pat Hannon
Pat Hannon
Friend
May 24, 2023
Classmate & friend during his 2 hrs at Urbandale High School in Iowa. Now immortal in my mind.
Danny Mckenzie
School
November 9, 2021
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