C L Ritter

C. L. Ritter was born to Vernon Gray Ritter and Daisy Bell Patton Ritter on April 28, 1932 in Pampa, Texas and departed this life, at the age of 85, on December 19, 2017.

He was the youngest of Vernon and Daisy Bell’s three children and was six years old when he lost his father from drowning.  He began school in Pampa before his mother moved the family to Beaver County in 1944, when he was 12 years of age.  The family lived on the Blakemore Ranch, where his older brother, Vernon, Jr., worked.  C. L. then attended Turpin School before moving to Beaver, in 1945, where he continued his education. 

C.L. worked at Ideal Food Store in Beaver, at the age of 12, before he began his life long career in the oil field, working mostly in Beaver County except for spending a short time, in 1974, working in the African oil field.

C. L. married Beverly Spangler in 1950 with two sons, Guy Max and Rex Lee, being born to this union.

He married Joyce Herring Bleeker, in Liberal, Kansas on August 2, 1974 and took her four girls, Tammy, Debbie, Lori and Lisa, as his own.

C. L. and Joyce enjoyed camping and fishing various Oklahoma lakes, before their passion for fishing landed them on the shores of Lake Eufaula, for their retirement, in 1984.

They enjoyed the Eufaula community and began attending Oak Ridge Baptist Church, where C. L. gave his life to Christ and was baptized in May of 1994.

Realizing the need to be closer to family, C. L. and Joyce returned to Beaver in 2012, where he remained at home until entering the Beaver Co. Nursing Home on Sept. 27, 2017.

C.L. was preceded in death by his parents, son Guy Max Ritter and brother Vernon Ritter “Junior”.  He is survived by his wife Joyce, son and wife Rex and Sandy Ritter, step-daughters and husbands, Tammy and Larry Millikan, Debbie and Larry Paxton, Lori and Pete Kelly, Lisa and Ronnie Lawson, sister and brother-in-law Verna Bell and Walter Parker, sister-in-law Betty Ritter, mother-in-law Sylvia Owens, brother-in-law Larry Owens, sister-in-law Pat Owens, many grandchildren, great grandchildren, nieces and nephews.

Burial was at 10:00am Saturday December 23, 2017 at the Pioneer Cemetery in Beaver, OK with a memorial service following at 11:00am at the Beaver First Baptist Church. Arrangements were entrusted to the Beaver County Funeral Home.

Memorial donations made in C.L.’s name may be made to the Beaver County Nursing Home, P.O. Box 220, Beaver, OK 73932.