Equipment dealer also was a state patrolman

2/6/2006

OAK HARBOR, Ohio - Orland P. Knopp, owner and operator of the former Knopp Farm Equipment Co., in Curtice, Ohio, where he bought and sold farm equipment for many years, died here yesterday in the Riverview Nursing Home. He was 84.

Family members did not know the cause of death.

Mr. Knopp, also a former state highway patrolman, retired from his farm equipment sales business in 2003 because of failing health, said Lisa McQueary, his daughter.

"He didn't have much of an education, but he knew how to make money. He bought and sold just about everything," she said, recalling that her father once bought 15 cabooses from the Toledo Terminal Railroad and sold them at a profit for use as farm labor housing, grain storage, and playhouses.

Born in Oak Harbor, Mr. Knopp grew up there and worked on his father's farm. He attended public schools until the eighth grade when he stopped going to school and took up full-time work.

A World War II veteran, he enlisted in the Army at the start of the war and served for the duration of the war, his daughter said.

After the war, he came back to work on his father's farm and that is when he also started buying and selling farm and other equipment.

In 1959, Mr. Knopp became a certified state trooper and worked as a highway patrolman for a number of years. He was later named an honorary mayor of Curtice and held the honorarium for more than 20 years.

A lifelong member of St. Peter Lutheran Church in Martin, Ohio, Mr. Knopp was also a longtime member of the American Legion, the Elks, and the Moose Lodge. He enjoyed playing poker, euchre, going out to dinner, and dancing.

"He had a commanding presence and always had a joke," his daughter said. "He always knew what was going on and was always laughing with people in the community."

Surviving are his daughter, Lisa McQueary, and a granddaughter.

Visitation will be from 2 to 8 p.m. tomorrow in the Robinson-Walker Funeral Home, Genoa. Funeral services will be held at 11 a.m. Wednesday in St. Peter Lutheran Church.

The family suggests tributes to St. Peter Lutheran Church.