Wesley Palmateer; Truck Driver, Cement Worker

Wesley Palmateer, a former water truck driver for Paramount Citrus of Ventura County, died Tuesday. He was 62.

Palmateer was born June 22, 1934, in Doty, Wash. He moved with his sister to near Redding, Calif., in 1953, where he met his wife, Martha. The couple soon moved to Santa Barbara and in 1969 they moved to Fillmore.

“My father helped anybody and everybody,” said Palmateer’s daughter, Pat Lutz of Cottonwood, which is south of Redding. “He helped people when we had floods, and neighbors always came to him for help with mechanical things.”

Palmateer, who also worked at a concrete company in Fillmore where he mixed cement, liked to camp, barbecue and smoke his own beef jerky.

“Friends would place orders with him for his jerky because they liked it so much,” Lutz said.

In addition to his wife and daughter, he is survived by daughters Shirley Floyd, Martie Hensley, Vickie Schneidewind and Renee Deramo, all of Fillmore, and Marsha Palmateer of Cottonwood and Lonnie Kidder of Lindsay, Calif.; a son, Wesley E. Palmateer of Fillmore; 15 grandchildren and one great-grandchild.

He is also survived by brothers Harley and Carmen Palmateer of Fillmore, and Dale and Wayne Palmateer of Winlock, Wash., and sisters Birdie McCallay of Shelton, Wash.; Fern Escue of Onalaska, Wash.; Candy Kozlowski of Port Angeles, Wash., and Violet Nowlen and Sharol Blum, both of Winlock, Wash.

Visitation is scheduled for 9 a.m. to noon Friday at Skillin-Carroll Mortuary, Fillmore. Graveside services will be held at 1:30 p.m. Friday at Bardsdale Cemetery, Fillmore.