James E. “Jim” Arbuckle, Sr., 93, died April 22, 2005, at Whidbey General Hospital. He was born Sept. 19, 1911, in Stanwood to Lemuel U. and Alice Dove Arbuckle.

Jim was raised in Skagit County and attended Mount Vernon grade school. At the age of 15 he went to work in the logging industry throughout Skagit County, where he started as whistle punk and worked his way up to bucking, felling and blasting.

In 1945 Jim enlisted in the U.S. Army where he served on locomotives as a fireman. Jim served in Fort Bliss, Texas, and on Kodiak Island, Alaska. He was discharged in 1949 while stationed at Fort Lewis. In 1954 Jim became a civil service employee at Whidbey Island Naval Air Station where he worked as a boiler plant operator until his retirement in 1976.

In 1945 Jim met and married his sweetheart, Bernadine Fisher in Burlington. Throughout his life he loved to hunt and fish and had a true love for the great outdoors, especially after his retirement to Montana, where he and his wife Bernie spent 14 years before returning to Oak Harbor to be near family. Jim loved to tell stories and reminisce about the old days.

Jim Arbuckle, Sr. is survived by his wife, Bernadine of nearly 60 years, at their home in Oak Harbor; and son Jim Arbuckle, Jr. with wife Sharon of Oak Harbor, daughter Anne Iszler with husband Gerald of Renton, daughter Mary Sauer with husband Ronald of Waxhaw, N.C., and son Thomas Arbuckle with wife Patricia of Olympia. He is also survived by his sister Jessie Culver of Edison, grandsons Mark, Jeff, and Matthew Arbuckle, John and Chris Thomas and Jeremy Sauer, granddaughters Kari and Megan Arbuckle and Renee Golz, and four great-grandchildren.

A Mass celebrating the life of Jim Arbuckle, Sr. is Wednesday, April 27, at Saint Augustine’s Catholic Church in Oak Harbor at 11 a.m.