By Staff
CASSOPOLIS – Joseph E. Dayson Jr., 44, of Rowland Street, Cassopolis, died Monday, Jan. 12, 2009, at 3:14 p.m. at Borgess-Lee Memorial Hospital, Dowagiac.
A spiritual ceremony will be conducted on Friday, Jan. 16, at noon at the Pokagon Potawatomi Indians Lodge, 58620 Sink Road, Dowagiac.
Interment will be in Mission Hills Memorial Gardens, Sumnerville.
His family will receive friends on Thursday, Jan. 15, from 4 to 8 p.m. at the Lodge.
He was born on Jan. 26, 1944, in Nahama, to the late Joseph M. and Mary Ann (Schenosky) Dayson and moved to the area in 1960, coming from Nahama.
He married the former Susan L. Thornton on May 5, 1969, in Grand Rapids. She survives.
Additional surviving family include: three sons, Brian Dayson and his fiancee, Kateri of Lansing, and Joel and Keith Dayson, both of Cassopolis; seven grandchildren, Andrue Joseph Michael Dayson and his mother, Jennifer Boissoneau, Derrek, Mikey and Dakota Collett, Heather and Isaiah Mix and Marcus Wares; two sisters, Dorothy VonDestinon of Grand Rapids and Nancy Ortiz of Cadillac; two brothers, Pete Dayson of Dowagiac and Ted Dayson of Brethren; and an uncle, Leo Dayson of Mount Pleasant.
He was preceded in death by two sisters, Martha Zalewski and Elaine Dayson, and three brothers, Richard Dayson and two who died in infancy.
He retired from National Copper Products in Dowagiac, was a member of the Little Traverse Bay Band of Odawa Indians, was a Marine Corps veteran of Vietnam and was a member of the Dowagiac American Legion Post.
He was also a former volunteer with the Cassopolis Fire Department, was a coach with the Dowagiac Rocket Football League and Dowagiac Little League and adopted many other sons, daughters and grandchildren.
Memorials may be made to his family.
Connelly Funeral Home in Cassopolis is handling arrangements.