Joel James Schell

1952 - 2025

Joel was born March 1, 1952 to Jim and Dana Schell of Edwardsville, Illinois. He attended Edwardsville public schools and graduated high school in 1970. He played Little League baseball and junior high football, his 9th grade team undefeated and unscored upon. He played trombone in band, including marching band and jazz combo.
He attended Purdue University where he majored in chemical engineering and minored in theater tech. He played trombone in the Purdue band. He graduated in 1975 and began his engineering career at Kellogg (engineering, not cereal) in Houston, Texas.
He did one 18-month tour in Algeria working on a liqufied natural gas facility. He continued to work for a number of different engineering firms in Houston.
In the early 90's he began exploring living options in west Texas and New Mexico settling on Silver City and Mimbres for the mountain and forest beauty and remote location. After repeated extended breaks from engineering he retired in 2015.
He liked to build things on his property he called the "Fish Ranch". He built a nice Japanese style garden with fish ponds, a stone wall, and artfully arranged stones. He was interested in building electronic apparatus using the Arduino microprocessor. His abiding love of opera took him to numerous performances at various southwestern venues including an annual trip to the Santa Fe Opera. He took up tango while in Houston and danced at many tango gatherings and traveled to Argentina with his class.
In August 2024 he was diagnosed with a brain tumor. He started declning rapidly in the summer of 2025 and died at home in Mimbres September 23, 2025 with his brothers, Eric and Tad, and his best friend Brenna Brown in attendence. He is survived by Brenna, his two brothers, and Tad's children and grandchildren.
His ashes will reside in an urn in his garden in Mimbres, New Mexico.