Michael Metcalfe Crawford
1944-2024
Michael Metcalfe Crawford, West Virginia Licensed Land Surveyor #534, of Berkeley Springs, West Virginia, passed away Sunday, April 7, 2024, at the Hospice Palliative Unit of the Martinsburg VA Medical Center.
He was born in Dallas, Texas, on August 24, 1944, to Jeanne Wilkerson Crawford and Roscoe Campbell Crawford, Jr.
He comes from a dedicated military line, his grandfather having been in the Army Corps of Engineers building the Panama Canal, and his father having been a pilot and base commander for the United States Air Force as well as a teacher of cartography at West Point.
He graduated in 1962 from Hammond High School, Alexandria, Virginia, as a member of the champion rowing team, after being stationed with his family on bases all over the world, including Japan, the Philippines and Greece. He was enrolled in several colleges in Japan as well as St. John’s College in Annapolis, Maryland, with its curriculum based on the Great Books which sparked the beginning of his appreciation for surveying. He then enlisted in the Army, was sent to Vietnam, returning in 1967, to marry Linda Cecile Lusk in December of that year and settled in Colorado Springs, Colorado to finish his Army hitch at Ft Carson. He enrolled in what then was Oregon Technical Institute, Klamath Falls, Oregon, and graduated in 1972 with a BS in Land Surveying.
After serving an apprenticeship in Colorado Springs, he was hired by Thomas Biggert, LLS, in Berkeley Springs and moved here in August, 1973. Mr. Biggert later sold the business to Michael and Wayne Stotler, as Berkeley Land Surveys, Inc, which eventually was sold to Cindy Born, LLS.
Michael was a man with a wide range of interests and talents: music of his guitar and mandolin, blues, motorcycles with his Harleys and 1947 Indian, their 1956 Porsche, cousin to 1963 VW Beetle, all types of guns and swords, creative carpentry, reluctant plumber and electrician, sailing the Chesapeake and Intracoastal Waterway as well as to Bermuda, hunting and trips out west to wrangle horses, camp and hunt elk in Colorado, forestry management and trees, working for the Forest Service in Oregon as a fire fighter, house building, reading history, including the history of surveying.
A quiet man with a sly sense of humor, he was dedicated to serving the people of Morgan County in ways he never liked to be known. He honored this county, and loved the people in it, people he had only to shake hands with on any project as his word was his bond. His gentleness, quiet generosity and acceptance of all for who they were was unshakable. Horses especially responded to his calm demeanor and he even had a western magazine publish his pictorial article on pack horses featuring the wonderfully ornery Concho.
At his request there will be no funeral.
He was predeceased by his parents and his son, Benjamin Thompson Crawford.
He is survived by his wife, Linda Cecile Lusk Crawford; brother, Roscoe Campbell Crawford, III and his wife Linda, of Slaton, Texas, and his sister Cathy Kehrwald and her husband, Tom, of Minneapolis, Minnesota, and their daughters Natalie and Zoe.
Donations in his memory may be made to the church of your choice, or to the Thurman W. Whisner Memorial Scholarship, by check made out to Morgan Student Aid, with Thurman Whisner written on memo line, c/o Rebecca Stotler, Citizens National Bank of Berkeley Springs, PO Box 130, Berkeley Springs WV 25411, or to the Martinsburg VA Medical Center, and on memo line of check, Hospice Palliative Care Unit, for Michael M. Crawford, addressed to Martinsburg VA Medical Center, Voluntary Service, 510 Butler Ave, Martinsburg, WV 25405, or to the Chapter 8, DAV Transportation Dept, 466 Valentine Dr., Martinsburg, WV 25405, whose volunteers transport veterans free for any medical procedures.
After a life well-lived Michael now can ‘cross the river and rest in the shade of the trees……’
Online condolences may be expressed at www.helsleyjohnsonfh.com.
Arrangements are being handled by Helsley-Johnson Funeral Home & Cremation Center, 95 Union Street, Berkeley Springs, WV.
