Joe T. Van Meter

Private Services for Joe T. Van Meter Sr., 90 of Kilgore are under the direction of Rader Funeral Home in Kilgore. Mr. Van Meter passed into the arms of our heavenly father December 1, 2020. He was the son of F.E. and Bertha Van Meter, born August 25th, 1930 in Smackover, Arkansas and relocated with his family as a toddler to Kilgore, Texas. He attended Sabine School and grew up tending his father’s cattle and working in the family meat market. He later married Lelia Jane Van Meter in 1951, to whom he was married for 65 years and had 8 children with.

As a young man he worked in the meat market, owned a dairy farm, and worked for Gregg County as a deputy sheriff and heavy equipment operator. He served for several years in the U.S. Army National Guard out of the Kilgore Armory. He began working for Schlitz Brewery in his 30s and retired from what had become Stroh’s Brewery in his 60s. He was a man who loved his family, his friends, and his country. He loved to hunt, fish, laugh and spin yarns about them all to any he could pin down long enough to listen. A childhood friend of his Mr. Luther Swan once said of Joe T. that “Him and his brother were all rough, those Van Meter boys played harder than most men fought.”

He was preceded in death by his wife Lelia, his parents, brothers Charlie, Frank, Gene along with his children Angel, Kathy, and David. He is survived by his sister Linda Van Meter, sister-in-law Iva Jo VanMeter.

His children Joe Thomas Jr. and Shirley, Becca VanMeter and Kelly Beck, Annie Truitt and Steven, Suzi Meyers and Rick, Dr. James and Dr. Sherry VanMeter; grandchildren, Charlie Van Meter, Alex Van Meter, Tera Hernandez, Arial Franks, Cole Truitt, Paige Van Meter, Tatum Fuller, Tristan Truitt, Liberty and Chase Meyers and Desiree Wardell; great grandchildren Angelise Hernandez, Sebastian Hernandez, Carolena Hernandez, Luke, Levi and Lela Franks.