Dr. Barry Hall

1936 - 2020

Dr. Barry Hall
6/29/1936 - 3/5/2020
Dr. Barry Hall - optometrist, business owner, and gentleman farmer died peacefully in sleep at his home in Veneta on March 5th. Barry was born in Rapid City, SD to Lester Hall and Margaret Tompkins but moved to Seattle when he was five and graduated from Franklin HS in 1954. He met the love of his life, Sonia, in a sheep husbandry class at Washington State in pre-vet medicine, although they both ultimately selected different professions. Barry graduated from Pacific University in Optometry in 1962 and soon established his practice in the River Road Villa Mart. In 1968, he moved his practice to the Bi-Mart on River Road, and eventually established an optical lab in the Bi-Mart on Mohawk and a satellite optometric office in the Florence. He retired his practice in 1995.
There were three loves in Barry's life besides his family; fishing, music, and having a good story to tell. When it came to fishing, Barry always considered himself a student, but over time he developed a mastery in the pursuit of many types of fish. Barry loved them all; saltwater fishing for salmon, tuna, rockfish, wahoo and dolphin, fresh water fishing for steel head, trout and shad, and lake fishing for bass and Kokanee. If it lived in the water, he had likely dipped a line with the appropriate deception at the end of it. And it wasn't enough just to catch; you also needed to barbecue, or smoke, or bake or fry these spoils from the adventure and share them all around, and Barry became masterful at those processes too, in his own enigmatic way.
When it came to music, Barry had hardly a musical bone in his body, but he never let that slow him down when it came to appreciation and as an early listener to alternative radio, he was constantly bringing home new album treasures far before they hit the mainstream. Musical artists ran the gamut from Peter Paul & Mary and the Kingston Trio, Fleetwood Mac to the Doobie Bros, Elton John to Peter Frampton, or David Bowie to Creedence Clear Water. Folk, Rock-n-Roll, Blues, Zydeco, Country, and Jazz; they all found a place in his collection that he loved to spin. Live concerts were also a big item and again spanned the spectrum from Grateful Dead to Taj Mahal to Jimmy Buffet.
And that leads us to Barry's love of telling a story, and in order to have one to tell, you had to harvest those adventures in real time. As such, whether it was travel to England, Portugal, Spain, Mexico, Guatemala, or state side as far afield as Alaska to New Mexico, Hawaii to Massachusetts, there was always another hill to climb to see what was on the other side as he used to say. He camped, hunted, fished, and boated throughout Oregon, and was an avid Pendelton Roundup and Country Fair attendee. Then came the myriad of day trips from cabins in La Pine and Florence that served as home base for trips spelunking ice caves, harvesting clams, crawdadding, or just mossy rock hunting. But stories are nothing without the friendships to share them with, and one of Barry's unspoken talents was to find points of interest in most everyone he met, and to work at keeping in contact with close friends he had made across a life span. From grade school classmates, pool players at the Overtime Tavern, Macintosh User Groups members, fly tying and tai cooking klatches, horse shoe competitors at the Aqua Skippers, or fellow Sertoma members; they all added to his repertoire of people he thoroughly enjoyed. And they enjoyed him, with his ready laugh, unassuming manner, and that slightly mischievous twinkle in his eye.
Barry is survived by his wife Sonia, a retried school teacher who put up with this whirlwind, and their three children including son Eric Hall, and his daughters Laura Gross, and Dawn Mitchell. He is also survived by grandchildren, Aliya Hall, Ian Hall, Dakota Gross, Hayden Mitchell, Payton Mitchell, and Morgan Mitchell. In keeping with Barry's love of a party, one last good hurrah is planned for June. In lieu of flowers or cards, we invite you to drink a toast, laugh a laugh, and find a new adventure.
Please sign the guest book at www.registerguard.com/legacy