David Meredith Ackley

1934 – 2018

David was born January 22, 1934 in Philadelphia, Penn., to Meredith and Ruby Ackley. He was the oldest of four children, followed by his sister, Alice Jane, 11 months younger and his brother Bob who arrived 3 years later. Paul was the youngest, born in 1942.  They grew up in Pennsylvania and attended school in Washington County.  After high school, Dave joined the Navy and was assigned to the Destroyer USS Prichett.  After some extensive submarine training, he was assigned to the Sub. USS Pomodon on which he served three years. After receiving an honorable discharge in 1957 with the rank of First Class Petty Officer, he moved to Iowa and enrolled in classes at Graceland College where he met and fell in love with Sharon Sherman.  Concerned that someone else might snatch her, they eloped in 1958.  It must have been a match made in heaven for they were married 12 days shy of 60 years.

They had some amazing adventures in those 60 years.  Jayne arrived first, she married Michael Hartwig and gave Sherri and Dave four wonderful grandchildren, Erin, Kara, Brian and Josh.  Jayne is an elementary teacher.

Erin, a navy veteran like her grandfather, married Brian and gifted Dave with his first great grandchildren, Chloe, Derek and Ty.

Kara, our traveling nurse and soon to be pilot, brought Devin into the family.

Bryan, Jayne’s third, married Brittany (an excellent cook) and they brought two grand dogs into the family.  (Buster and Max)

Josh, their youngest, added to the canine grand dogs with his best pal, Piper.

After Jayne they had a son, David Lawrence, who married Margaret and two more beautiful granddaughters arrived, Emily, who graduated from Truman University in December and Kimberly who is designing furniture in Columbia, Mo.

Their third child Susie arrived and brought a lot of lively activity into the household.

Susie married Will Munson and two more grandsons entered the scene, TJ, who added another grand pup, who they named Kato but is better known as Houdini, and Ben.  Ben married Bethany. And there is another great grandson on the way.  (Sherry thinks Dave and he may already be getting acquainted.)

Last, but definitely not least is Michael, a pilot for United Airlines, he enjoyed taking his Dad with him on some of his European flights. Michael is married to Dawn and they have brought two precious granddaughters into the family, Jennifer, a freshman in college and Sarah who added to the family by marrying Alex.

I could go on and on because they have some amazing semi-adopted kids from Africa and Russian who basically adopted them as grandparents.  His three siblings expanded the family with many wonderful nieces and nephews.

Needless to say it was an active household as they grew up.  In the early 60’s Dave took an engineering job with IBM in Kansas City while the family was expanding, however so was IBM and they moved to Apalachin, N.Y., where he continued to work for IBM for 30 years.

He may have been working in an office, but on his free time he was out adventuring with his family. He had his commercial and instructor pilot’s license and a Scuba license.  Sherry and Dave both helped a number of years with the Graceland Winter Term in the Cayman Islands teaching scuba classes.  He loved sailing, scuba diving, canoeing, camping, hang gliding, flying and motorcycling.  I guess they all had their own motor cycles. Sherry said at one time there were five in the garage.  David Lawrence said that canoeing with his Dad was one of his most cherished memories. They canoed the back waters and the full length of the Delaware River (but not all at once).

Dave was active as an adult leader in Boy Scouts, and was awarded ‘Order of the Arrow’.

Church was always a very large part of his life.  He carried the office of Priest and was Pastor for two years in New York and dedicatedly served as the CFO and ground keeper of their congregation.

After his retirement, he continued to stay active.  Dave and Sherry made over 19 trips to Honduras with Friends United, they took school supplies and helped with workshops. Although their first trip to Honduras was back in their days in Lamoni, Dave and Sherry and two other couples drove to Honduras to take supplies to the Blumenscheins, when they started their clinic in La Buena Fe. They drove with a trailer they had built to carried supplies and double as a camper.  Of course, many of the roads at that time weren’t really roads mostly rock and dirt and bridges almost nonexistent.  The opportunity to fly on their more recent trips was a blessing.

They also helped with Bible Schools in the Cayman Islands for several years with a team from Osage Hills which included some family members.  Afternoons were often spent in the water for the summer temperature there was quite warm and humid. Anyway, it was a great excuse to enjoy the ocean.

They moved back to Independence in 2014 and have enjoyed sharing with the family here.  Dave has continued staying busy working on his house, helping his brother-in-law, Lynn, with his projects, sharing with his children and grandchildren, traveling, playing games, reading, going to church, weekly meetings with his military buddies at McDonald’s and just enjoying living life.

David Meredith Ackley, 83, of Independence, Mo., passed away Wednesday, January 17, 2018 at his home. Dave was preceded in death by his youngest brother, Paul. He leaves behind his loving wife, Sharon, and a wonderful legacy in his children, grandchildren and great grandchildren, his sister, Alice Jane, brother, Bob, and their amazing families.  He dearly loved all of his children, grandchildren, nieces, nephews, and all those who claimed him as Grandpa Dave.

He lived life to the fullest and loved His Lord and Savior.  Church and family were his life’s work.  He will be greatly missed.

Visitation will be held from 2 to 3 p.m. on Saturday, February 3, 2018, Village Heights Community of Christ Church, 1009 Farview Drive, Independence, Mo., with Memorial Service following at 3 p.m.

In lieu of flowers donations may be made to Friend’s United or Outreach International.