James "Jim" Batdorff

A memorial service for James H. Batdorff, 83, of Coos Bay, will be held at 4pm, Sunday, August 24, 2025 at the First Baptist Church, 1140 South 10th Street in Coos Bay. Private urnside will be held at Sunset Memorial Park in Coos Bay.

James passed away Saturday August 16 in 2025. He was the husband of Rev. Alfreda Louise (Pinther) Batdorff. They were married 60 years ago on December 27, 1964 in Nampa, Idaho.

James was born 09 September 1941 in Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan, and resided in nearby Rudyard, with his family, for 22 years before moving to Coos Bay, Oregon. He was the son of the late L. Dale Batdorff and Etta Dorothea (Radtke) Batdorff of Rudyard.

While growing up in Rudyard Jim was an active member of the Presbyterian Church in Rudyard where his grandfather was a charter member and his father an elder. He sang in the choir and served in the Sunday School as treasurer. He was a member of the Boy Scouts where in 1955 he was the first scout in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan to receive a National Award for saving a life. He attended the Boy Scout National Jamboree in Valley Forge, Pennsylvania in 1957 and served his jamboree scout troop as Quartermaster. In 1958 he was selected by the Lion's Club to attend Wolverine Boy's State in Lansing, Michigan where he was elected State Representative in a week long training event. Jim graduated from Rudyard High School in 1959 and was the editor of the school newspaper and the school annual. He was awarded the Citizenship Award by his graduating class. He also sang in the high school choir and played in the band. In his senior year he directed the school's pep band when funds weren't available to hire a band director.

Since early childhood Jim enjoyed the outdoors. Coupled with this interest and his interest in God's creation, Jim in early life accepted the Lord as His Savior and endeavored to live a Christian life style all his life. In Junior High Jim felt directed to become a forester and with his father's interest they created their own Christmas tree farm on 40 acres of old farm land north of Rudyard. Jim remembers vividly the day he planted 10,000 trees working for a friend of his father's. Of course that was with a single row tree planting machine driven by a farm tractor on flat ground. From 1954 to 1961 he planted 40,100 tree seedlings, mainly Red Pine, on the 40 acres.

Jim entered college at Michigan Technological University (MTU) in the fall of 1959 at the Sault Branch of MTU in forestry and graduated from MTU in Houghton in early 1964 with a B.S. Degree in Forestry. During his college days he was active in the Inter Varsity Christian Fellowship Group where he sang in a quartet and went to different churches to sing and speak. He was also active in the college band and pep band.

Prior to graduating from college, he worked one summer with a construction company where he was involved in a housing project at Kincheloe Air Force Base. Another summer he worked for the Kimberly-Clark Corporation doing forest inventory work in the Newberry area. A third summer he worked for the US Forest Service in Harrisburg, Michigan.

Before the ink was dry on his diploma Jim was headed to Coos Bay, Oregon for a temporary job with the U.S. Bureau of Land Management (BLM) putting up timber salvage sales as a result of the 1962 Columbus Day storm.

Shortly after arriving in Coos Bay, Jim met Rev. Alfreda Pinther from Nampa, Idaho who was teaching school in North Bend, and directing the choir at First Baptist Church in Coos Bay. After school was out in 1964 Jim and Alfreda became engaged. Jim's Michigan Draft Board was soon to deliver a draft notice, and Jim was inducted in the US Army (Oct 1964). They were married on December 27, 1964 at the First Baptist Church in Nampa, Idaho while Jim was still in boot camp at Ft. Leonard Wood, Missouri.

After boot camp he volunteered and was selected to attend Chaplain's Assistant School at Fort Dix in New Jersey. Upon graduation Jim was assigned as the Chaplain's Assistant at Torri Station Chapel on Okinawa, a joint services security base. Jim found a job for Alfreda as a missionary/teacher at the Okinawa Christian School where students were of some ten nationalities. Alfreda was also hired as choir director at the chapel on Torii Station. While in the orient they had opportunity to travel to Japan and Taiwan visiting various mission schools and military Servicemen's Centers. Jim was honorably discharged in October 1966 as a Specialist E-5 Chaplain's Assistant.

Returning to civilian life, Jim once again applied for a job with the Coos Bay District BLM and this time was hired to work on the Oxbow Fire Salvage sales resulting from the 1964 Oxbow fire. Alfreda returned to her job teaching school in North Bend.

In 1969 Jim and Alfreda built their house under the Oregon Veteran's Affairs program. It was a busy year building their house and still working an eight hour day.

Jim along with his wife had the joy and privilege of raising three children James, Jon and Janice.

They lost their first child, Cindy Louise, at birth.

From 1969 to 1987 Jim served as local Executive Director for World Wide Pictures, the film arm of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association for the area wide theatre showings of: Time to Run, For Pete Sake, The Hiding Place, Joni, Caught, The Prodigal, and Cry from the Mountain. He was also was local Executive Director for the local theatre showings of, 'the Cross and the Switchblade' and the 'The Late Liz'. This effort was coordinated with some 100 churches from Brookings north to Florence. This in addition to working his normal BLM job.

Jim was also highly involved in several other local evangelistic outreach programs such as: "Key 73', 'The lay Institute for Evangelism' and 'the Kroeze Brothers' Crusades.

While working with the BLM, Jim transitioned from Forest Management to the Forest Development program, where he focused on reforestation practices ranging from tree planting to preparing stands for commercial thinning.

In 1979 Jim completed a graduate program, the Silviculture Institute, sponsored jointly by the U.S. BLM and the US Forest Service, a contracted program at Oregon State University in Corvallis and the University of Washington in Seattle.

Jim served as the District Silviculturist for the Coos Bay District BLM from 1975 to 1997 when he retired. Jim was proud to have been part of the reforestation and young growth management program. During his career 124,000 acres of BLM forest lands were planted with an estimated 56 million tree seedlings grown in thirteen nurseries in Oregon, Washington and northern California. The forest development program during his tenure grew to the largest program on the district and at one time had a budget of $5 million dollars for which he was overseer. He served for several years on the Coos County Weed Control Board.

During his career Jim was co-author with Oregon State University's School of Forestry on three published forest management research studies.

In 1981 Jim began section hiking the Pacific Crest Trail (PCT) with his two sons James and Jon and others. The PCT begins on the California/Mexico border and terminates on the US Canadian border, a distance of 2,650 miles. He finished the trail in 2007 at the age of 65, also with sons James and Jon. Because of his normal job and family obligations, Jim backpacked approximately 100 miles each year for 26 years in order to complete the trail. Some of these experiences were near death threatening.

Jim started his running career in 1982 with the annual local Prefontaine Run. In 1984 he completed two marathons (26 miles) and continued to run until 1997, at which time he had run 13 marathons and numerous local Prefontaine Runs.

Jim was active in church work at the First Baptist Church of Coos Bay from 1964 to 1997 teaching an adult Sunday School Class and singing in the choir. From 1969 to 1978 he was Chairman of the Board of Deacons; and from 1987 to 1989 he was Church Moderator. In 1972 he founded the official newspaper of the church, 'The Lifeline' which is still published. Beyond the local church he served from 1994-1997 as Secretary/Treasurer of the Umpqua Baptist Association; and from 1981 to 1993 as Moderator of the Umpqua Baptist Association.

From 1986 to 1997 Jim served on the American Baptist Churches of Oregon (ABCO) Board of Directors, holding all the board positions at different times during which time he served as President of the 10,000-member church body for two years (1992-1993). From 1986 -2000 Jim also served either as Sec./treas. or President of the American Baptist Men of Oregon.

Following retirement from the BLM in 1997, Jim became involved in traveling and tracing his family who came to America from Germany in 1710. So, from working with forest trees he went to family trees. He, being a 9th generation Batdorff born in America, has written several books and papers on his family. In searching those roots Jim and Alfreda have, since 1997 made three trips to Germany, and have made 24 annual trips to Ft. Wayne, Indiana Allen County Public Library to do genealogy work and visit with their son. Jim has lectured several times at the local Family History Center, at family reunions, and genealogical societies in Oregon, Michigan and Indiana.

In 1999 Jim began attending the North Bend United Methodist Church, singing in the choir and co-teaching an adult Sunday School class. In 2004 he became a Certified Lay Speaker for the United Methodist Church. He has also been a member of the Board of Trustees and Finance Committee. He has preached in several area pulpits throughout the years.

Even though Jim retired from BLM in 1997 he continued to work as a volunteer until 2014, doing field measurements of some forest development research plots he had established twenty years previous. He also continued to help the Lower Umpqua school children on their annual Lower Umpqua Tree Planting day. In 2015 at the age of 74 he published his research report on his study.

Jim enjoyed traveling and with his wife and family and has been to Austria, Canada, Denmark, Egypt, England, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Israel, Japan, Jordan, Liechtenstein, Mexico, Okinawa, Switzerland, Taiwan, Turkey, and Wales. In 2000 he and his wife attended the world famous Passion Play in Oberammergau, Germany.

In addition to the above, Jim sang in the Southwestern Oregon Community College choir for several years, was a member of the Coos County Community Concert board for 25 years (since 1995), a member of The Gideon's International, member of the National Genealogical Society as well as seven state genealogical societies. He has worked on the Prefontaine Memorial Run committee for over 35 years.

Jim enjoyed his wife and family, and working with wood. In addition to building their own home, Jim built a barn on his residence, worked on an assortment of earth moving and remodeling projects for his children, and building many storage cabinets for his children and grandchildren.

Jim was preceded in death by his daughter, Cindy; his father, Leslie Dale Batdorff; his mother, Etta Dorothy (Radtke) of Rudyard, Michigan.

He is survived by his wife, Rev. Alfreda (Pinther) Batdorff; his children, James A. Batdorff, Jon Batdorff, and Janice McClary and her husband, Andrew McClary; his grandchildren, Talitha Delyria and her husband, Michal Delyria, Andrew McClary and his wife, Shaily McClary, Jonas Batdorff, and his wife Aria Batdorff, Jamison Batdorff, and Kaydence Batdorff; as well as his great-grandchildren, Paisley Delyria and Oaklee Delyria.

Arrangements are under the care of Coos Bay Chapel, 541-267-3131. Family and friends are invited to sign the online guestbook at www.coosbayareafunerals.com