Ronald Fleischer was born in Albert Lea to Alfred and Julie Fleischer. He was a brother to Phillip Fleischer and his wife, Noi, of St. Ansgar, Iowa. Dad excelled in football, basketball and track at Wells High School.

He enlisted in the U.S. Marine Corps after high school with some friends and served in Korea. Dad married Sandra of Staten Island, N.Y., after meeting her while working at the Higby Club in the Adirondack Mountains of New York, with his friend Pat Vogel. Soon after he graduated from the University of Minnesota, he began a career with Mobil Oil that would span 35 years.

After a few visits to his college buddy Pat Gleason’s home in Huntington Beach, Calif., the warmth of the California sun brought him to Bakersfield, Calif., in 1976. Ron and Sandra had four boys Stephen, Bradley, Mark and Scott; a physical education teacher, a USMC captain, a private sailor and chef and an Episcopal priest. While in Bakersfield, Charlie Hallum kept Dad’s fleet of family vehicles running and he was just one of the local Mobil Station owners that Dad spent his work days with.

Dad married his second wife, Cindy, and she had a son, George, and daughter, Jill, that he thought the world of. Dad and Cindy relocated to Hermosa Beach for five years. His favorite spot to meet his friends after work was the mermaid located on The Strand.

After retirement from Mobil he did some consulting for another Minnesota friend, John Stuart. (His family thought it was the access to free hockey tickets, doughnuts and coffee that kept him working, but they know it was really because he got to spend more time with his buddy John.) Dad loved playing sports, especially basketball, golf and snow or water skiing. He attended Super Bowls, Olympic events, professional and college football, hockey, basketball, baseball games and training camps taking his family with him whenever he could. If he couldn’t be there in person he would watch his teams at home with family or with his extended family at the VIP or Cheers. After retirement from Mobil he owned The Buoy & Legends in Morro Bay.

For five years, he had his own sports bars where he could cheer on his Vikings, Twins and Gophers. After Cindy’s passing, Mark took time out from his career to be Dad’s personal chef, driver, travel agent, handyman and sports watching companion. Before you knew it Dad and Mark had another traveling partner in Sandra. They moved to Oceanside, Calif., for a brief time, and started crisscrossing the continent visiting grandchildren, relatives and attending spring training in Fort Meyers, Fla., for the Minnesota Twins on a couple of occasions in their Winnebago.

Dad loved sports, but he loved his grandchildren even more, A.J., Krystalyn, Maria, Jack, Isabella, Samuel, Brennen, Markus, Josh, Jake and Tom. Grandpa loved them so much and couldn’t stop talking about their accomplishments. He also cared for his daughter and son-in-laws Rhea, Marci, Victoria, Keith and Cindy very much. When he was home, Dad was always a topic of conversation as he would go on his daily walks with his dog Precious and cat Kitten through the neighborhood. Yes, he had that crazy cat trained to think it was a dog and off they would go on their daily rounds. If Dad knew you, you had a friend for life. Dad lived a good life, the way he wanted to live it, with no regrets; his earthly body just couldn’t keep up. “God bless you Dad until we see you again in heaven,” wrote Ronald’s family.