James Clifford Solt

James Clifford Solt, 74, passed away Saturday, May 3, 2008, at Bonner General Hospital in Sandpoint.

Funeral services will be held 10 a.m. today, May 8, at LDS Church in Bonners Ferry with burial following at Grandview Cemetery in Bonners Ferry.

Jim was born in Chicago on Aug. 2, 1933, to James Lee and Anna Barbara Solt.

Jim’s parents and brothers David and Albert moved to Bonners Ferry from Artesia, N.M., in 1946.

After his education, Jim joined the U.S. Army in the early 1950s.

Upon returning to Boundary County after his discharge from the military, Jim farmed in the Porthill area. In 1959 he went to work for Moyie River Lumber Co. — first in the woods operating a bulldozer and then in the mill, where he spent 15 years as a millwright before retiring from LP Lumber Co. in 1996.

Jim married his first wife, Nola, in 1954 and was subsequently divorced. In 1958, Jim married his second wife, Ellie, a widow with four children and raised them as his own along with three of their own children. In 1994, Jim remarried his first wife after his second wife passed.

Jim greatly enjoyed his family. Some of his many interests were hunting, fishing, gardening and woodworking.

Jim deserved the “Life Time Achievement Award” for being a great father.

He is survived by family that will miss him greatly including his wife, Nola; daughters Kathy, Julie and Annie; sons Dick, Hank, John and David; stepchildren Donald, Adam and Misty; 29 grandchildren; and 23 great-grandchildren.

The family suggests that since planting trees was Jim’s passion, plant a tree in his memory.