It is with deep sadness that the family of Robert ("Bob") W Conley announces his passing from natural causes on March 26, 2013 at the Newport Hills Villa in Bellevue, WA. Born on January 29, 1922 to Allerton and Hildred Conley, Bob lived his formative years in the bucolic splendor of the farming land of Washta, Iowa-- a place that he would fondly remember throughout his life--with several relatives, including his beloved Aunt Cote. Soon after reaching adulthood, in the days immediately following Pearl Harbor, Bob enlisted in the Army Air Corps. Noting that the Air Corps did not have the losses that had been expected at the war's start, Bob felt supremely lucky to be never sent to serve outside the continental United States, unlike some of his comrades whom he never saw again.
Upon the end of World War II, Bob matriculated at the University of Iowa, where he was recognized as being a summa cum laude student at both its undergraduate and law schools. Upon his graduation from law school in 1950, Bob followed the advice of Horace Greeley by leaving the plains of Iowa for the mountains of Montana. It was in the Treasure State where Bob hit his stride as a man who wore many hats: deputy sheriff, lawyer, entrepreneur (as he owned an insurance adjustment company), insurance claims manager for Travelers Insurance (after selling his company), and geologist/surveyor/mining assessment worker. It was also in Montana that Bob married the former Joan Allen and had a son James.
In the mid-1970s, the family moved to Lubbock, TX and later Bellevue, upon being transferred by Travelers to revamp that company's claims departments in West Texas and the Northwest, respectively. His professional accomplishments included being named Claims Manager of the Year in 1980. With his typical modesty, Bob downplayed this honor by saying that the award just followed the most noteworthy natural disaster of the year: in his case, a volcano. Upon his retirement in the early 1990s, Bob found time to indulge his passions in investing, watching the Seattle Mariners (for whom he had been a season ticket holder since 1979), and, starting in 2003, being a devoted grandfather to his granddaughter Chloe. It is safe to say that anyone who ever met Bob, who mixed intelligent sagacity with earthy realism in almost every conversation, would be incapable of forgetting him and his unique style.
Bob, who is preceded in death by his father, mother, and brothers John, Benjamin, and Kenneth, is survived by his brother Richard, and sisters Barbara, Margaret, and Colleen. He is also survived by his aforementioned wife, son, granddaughter, as well as daughter-in-law Suzanne.