12/3/1928 – 12/23/2023
Peoria, Arizona
Charles Nuzum Penny was born December 3, 1928 to Myrl Nuzum and Addie Underwood Penny. Charlie, or Chaz, as he was known as a youth to his friends and brothers, grew up in Lawrence, Kansas. During his teenage and college years he worked for his father at Penny’s Ready Mix Concrete Company in Lawrence.
Charlie was an excellent student and athlete at Liberty High School in Lawrence where he was all-state in three sports. He was co-captain of the state football team, player on the state basketball team, and state champion in the shot put. At the University of Kansas, he played basketball for the famous Phog Allen and graduated with top honors in civil engineering.
After graduating from Kansas University, he joined the US Navy at the beginning of the Korean War. Because of his good university grades and the reputation of his father as a concrete contractor, his commanding officer in Hawaii assigned him to supervise the construction of atomic bomb testing sites on atolls in the South Pacific for three years.
After his four years in the Navy, Charlie began working for the Bechtel corporation, a large construction and engineering company in San Francisco. Although he met Pat Riordan in Hawaii, he married her stateside in the city. She was the daughter of a San Francisco police chief. They adopted two children, Kevin (K.C.) and Eileen. Sadly, after a couple of decades of marriage, Pat died of multiple sclerosis.
At Bechtel Charlie became a corporate estimator and overseer of some of the largest construction projects all over the world. These included large aluminum and iron production plants in the US, hydro-electric generating plants, large copper and nickel mines in Southeast Asia, oil platforms in the North Sea, and entire cities for Saudi Arabia. If the construction project started to have cost overruns or time delays, Charlie personally went on site and re-organized the project to get them back on track.
After Pat’s death, Charlie met Lila Mae at Bechtel, and they joined in a new married life together. Charlie and Lila lived in London and Scotland when he was overseeing major projects in Saudi Arabia and in the North Sea. They laughed about their manor house in Scotland where they worked hard to keep warm since the water in the toilets sometimes froze. In London, Charlie bought a Rolls Royce from an English lord. He and Lila entertained Lila’s aunt, niece, and family members with occasional trips to sights around England and Paris in the Rolls which he called Magnus.
Charlie and Lila retired to Houston. After several decades, Lila passed away in 2015. At an independent living facility in Peoria, Arizona, Charlie passed away on December 23, 2023 at the age of 95. Charlie is survived by his daughter Eileen Feldmann and her children and grandchildren. His son Kevin predeceased him. He is also survived by Lila’s son, Greg Hetzer (Kristin), and daughter, Kathryn Straub (Duane), and their children. In the Penny family, he is survived by his sister Lois Cowan and her children and grandchildren, and numerous nephews and nieces and their children and grandchildren.
Charlie was a son, brother, friend, teammate, caretaker of the family horse, Blacky, father, step-father, Dad, Pops, Chaz, Grandpa, great grandpa, uncle, husband, brother-in-law, mentor, “Friends Forever,” engineer, scholar, Naval Officer, inventor, basketball player, football player, shot put record holder, heaviest baby record holder at the local Kansas hospital at nearly 13 lbs., and writer of “Grandpa’s Notes to his Grandchildren.” He was one in a million, and a blessing to us all.
The funeral service will take place Saturday, January 20, 2024 at 12:00 pm at Oakmont Mortuary in Lafayette, California. A graveside service will follow at 1:00 pm at Oakmont Memorial Park, 2099 Reliez Valley Rd., Lafayette, California.
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