Leslie Fenton Foster, 97, of Fremont and formerly of El Cerrito (53 years) passed away on Friday, January 20, 2017. Mr. Foster was born in Pasco, WA on January 8, 1920. Fenton was a Field Engineer Manager and Senior Programming Representative for IBM for many years. He was a member of SIRS (Sons In Retirement). Mr. Foster is is survived by 3 children; Carol Singleton, Medford, OR, Les (Valorie) Foster, Palmdale, CA, and Susan (Dennis) Monticelli, Fremont, CA. 6 Grandchildren; Kevin (Ephrat) and Daniel Foster, Cinthia (Matthew) and Wayne Singleton, Alisa and Laurel Monticelli. 4 Great Grandchildren; Tuesday (Rick) Baker, Ben, Jedd, and Lea Foster. 2 Great Great Grandchildren; Harper and Preston Baker. Graveside services were held at 11:30 on Friday, January 27, 2017 at Sunset View Cemetery, 101 Colusa Ave., El Cerrito, CA. Memorials may be made to Alzheimer’s Association.

THE FOLLOWING EUOLGY WAS WRITTEN BY Susan Monticelli on January 27, 2017

Leslie Fenton Foster was born January 8, 1920 in Pasco, Washington to Ida Mae and Leslie Gould Foster on the coldest night on record when the temperature dipped to 33 degrees below zero. He was the fifth child born in a family which would grow to seven children. Three boys and four girls. On the cold night he was born, the family’s car would not start so his father hitched up the horse and open buggy and drove his wife nine miles over the bumpy road to the house of a female friend who would assist with the birth.

Life was not easy for the family of nine who lived on a thirty acre farm near town in a two bedroom home with a sleeping porch with additional beds. His mother was a real pioneer woman who rode a horse, made her own soap and put a hole in one of her husband’s favorite water tanks while shooting coyotes. Their father dragged a railroad tie behind a horse to make a plow in the snow so the children could walk to school.These were the years before immunizations and a family with seven children often caught serious illnesses and the entire family was placed under quarantine when they were unable to leave their home for a period of time. One year in the early grades Dad lost most of a year of school as a brother had diphtheria and a sister had smallpox. Later in life, another brother contracted polio. When the children wore out their shoes, they put cardboard in them to make them last a little longer and they only had one or two sets of clothing – usually bib overalls and a blue chambray shirt. Most families were in a similar position during those Depression years though Pasco was a railroad town and some people were better off. In spite of these hardships, all of the siblings survived into adulthood. Dad was the only one to move out of the state of Washington but he always made a special effort to visit and stay in touch with the family, speaking to his sister, Ruth and her husband, every week until she passed away at age 99. Dad never looked back negatively at difficult times in his life, whether it was poverty, Mom’s illness, or later his own illness. He always tried to surround himself with humor, positive thoughts, and positive people.

One of Dad’s earliest memories was when his mischievous older brother, Lane, was playing with matches and set the house on fire while they were away visiting friends and they saw the flames as they were returning home. Luckily there was a ready supply of milk from their cows handy and that is what they used to put out the fire before too much damage was done. His older sister, Neva, often milked 10 cows before headed off to school in the morning. In addition to raising livestock, the family grew crops such as corn, potatoes, watermelons, cantaloupes, tomatoes, peas, beans, etc. I guess that is how Dad became so good at thumping and slapping the watermelons in the grocery store to find a good one. As he got older, one of his primary duties was to cut and split firewood for the stove and when he got to high school, in addition to helping on the farm and being president of his senior class, Dad started his own business with a friend gathering and reselling wood. Later, after graduation, he worked for JC Penney and as a rural mail carrier before joining the National Guard and then the Navy in 1942. He reported for duty aboard the USS Prince William, an escort aircraft carrier, where he was responsible for maintenance of sonar, surface and air radars and all pertinent electronic gear. He made ten crossings of the Pacific in 12 months transporting aircraft and personnel to South Pacific bases and Australia. Dad was commissioned an Ensign in 1944 becoming one of the few Navy officers commissioned directly from enlisted ranks without going to Officer’s Candidate School. At the end of WWII in 1945, he was released to inactive duty and was later discharged from the Naval Reserve as a Lieutenant in 1954.

While in the Navy a major event occurred in Dads’ life in Oct 1942 as he was riding a train to Oakland. He struck up a conversation with an attractive dark haired lady sitting near him. This led to a date at the SF Zoo the following weekend. Though she was initially hesitant and turned down his proposals, they were married in San Diego on March 8, 1945, a marriage that lasted 63 years. Together they raised three children at their home in El Cerrito – Carol, Les and Susan.

After returning to civilian life, Dad sold real estate for a short time but that he said, “…wasn’t a good fit for a country boy”. He then accepted a job with an up and coming company called IBM in 1948 in San Francisco which is where he spent most of his working life, retiring after 33 years in 1981. At first he trained to service punched card accounting machines then in the mid 50s he serviced the IBM 650, the first medium size stored program computer system. Soon after, he became a field manager supervising the customer engineers responsible for maintenance of the full line of IBM equipment. He retired in 1981 as a Senior Programming Systems Representative. Susan remembers her dad going off to work in his suit, white shirt and tie with a pink baby rose in the lapel. Her career goal as a little girl was to grow up to be Daddy’s secretary.

Being a perfectionist by nature, Dad always worked and worked very hard. There was no sitting in the big black easy chair back then. If you wanted to find him at home when he wasn’t at the office you needed to go down to his basement or garage. While working at IBM either servicing the computers or as the manager of the servicemen, he would be on call and the phone would ring at all hours of the night. He would often have to be on the phone for hours trying to solve the problem or get up and drive into SF. He remodeled two houses at Russian River on the weekends, almost never taking time to relax and smell the roses, he considered them to be investments for the future, not vacation homes. He was a man who could fix anything and everything, especially tube televisions, and all the neighbors knew it. Dad was generous with his time and would go above and beyond to help someone. We never had a repairman at our house because no matter what it was Dad could fix it – the car, the washer and chances are he had the part right in his garage or basement. Whether because of his own personality or his Depression era upbringing in a family of nine, Dad could clean his plate cleaner than anyone I have ever seen. In his world you didn’t throw things away and they never expired.

In retirement, Dad and Mom enjoyed travel and time spent with family. For a while they had a motor home. Dad in particular enjoyed his hobbies of photography, the computer, and producing the newsletters for groups he belonged to. Life was good until Mom was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s Disease and began a 14 year illness which changed the lives of everyone in the family, especially Dad. As difficult as it was, he cared for her at home with minimal outside help until his own health began to deteriorate. After the difficult choice was made to move her to an Alzheimer’s facility, he dutifully visited her almost daily.

Later, after recovering from back surgery, he agreed he needed to leave his house of over 50 years in El Cerrito and move closer to family in Fremont. I admired the way he made the move with an open mind and didn’t look back. He made new friends, got involved, and even became President of the Residents’ Council. He met a spirited lady named Alice and they shared laughter and good times. Dad was very social by nature and joined many organizations throughout his life being an active participant and almost always taking on a leadership role. He was very intelligent and very curious, always interested in learning and taking every opportunity to keep himself informed whether it was current events, politics, or the latest technology. He created quite a stir when he visited the Apple store – probably their oldest customer. He loved to travel and never lost the desire to go, only the ability.

A few years ago I asked Dad if he had any regrets and he said only that he didn’t get to go to college and study electrical engineering. He wondered what all he could have accomplished had he been able to do that. I would say that he accomplished a great deal in his life. He had a successful career and provided well for his family, had family and friends who loved and cared about him, drove a car until the age of 95, enjoyed good health until his mid 90s and remained sharp mentally until the end of his life. He was able to remain in his own apartment and had two excellent caregivers Connie and Amyrose who were extremely reliable, patient and devoted to him. They were with him for two years and are with us here today. Thank you Connie and Amyrose very much for all you have done.

Susan Monticelli
January 27, 2017