Clarence Allan Paulson

Clarence Allan “Paul” Paulson died Friday, December 21 at the Mississippi State Veterans Home, Oxford, MS. He was 93 and died of pneumonia. Mr. Paulson, a resident of Memphis for the past 60 years, was born on July 12, 1919 in Duluth, Minnesota to Emma Johnson, of Pine City, Minnesota and Paul Paulson, originally from Norway. Mr. Paulson’s father died when he was five and Paul moved with his mother back to Pine City, where he lived until college. His mother remarried a childhood friend, Matt Youngbauer, when Paul was 10 and had four more children. Mr. Paulson studied agriculture at the University of Minnesota, St. Paul, and then joined the U.S. Coast Guard in 1940. During World War II the Coast Guard became part of the U.S. Navy and Mr. Paulson served in the Pacific Theater, achieving the rank of chief petty officer. Mr. Paulson met Mary Ann Grady in 1947 in Springfield, Illinois and they were married the following year. They moved to Memphis in 1951, where they lived for the rest of their lives. They had five children. They had been married 62 years when Mary Ann Paulson died in 2010. Mr. Paulson had a distinguished sales career. He traveled throughout the US selling successively for companies that made agricultural chemicals, household appliances, precision equipment, office furniture and advertising flyers for retailers. Mr. Paulson worked into his late 80s, becoming increasingly involved in volunteer work. His service career began with the Boy Scouts of America during and after the time when his three sons were boy scouts. Mr. Paulson belonged to The Order of United Commercial Travelers of America, a fraternal benefit society. He has for the past 25 years been a member of the Germantown Lions Club and twice was named a Melvin Jones fellow for the Lions Club International Foundation—the world’s largest service organization. Mr. Paulson was a member of Our Lady of Perpetual Help Catholic Church in Germantown. He belonged to the Merrymakers social group there. He was also a third degree knight with the Knights of Columbus—a global sacred fraternity of Catholic men. Mr. Paulson is preceded in death by his daughter Kathy Paulson Streck, his brother Jim Youngbauer and an infant brother Charles. He is survived by his daughter Christine Paulson McCool of Los Angeles, California and by his sons Michael Paulson and Terry Paulson, both of Memphis and his son Tim Paulson of Los Angeles. He is also survived by his sister Charlene Schwarz and brother Ernest Youngbauer all of Pine City. Mr. Paulson had 11 grandchildren and 4 great grandsons. A visitation was held Thursday, January 3, in Memphis, Tennessee. Monsignor Alexsander Suchan will officiate a Mass of Christian Burial at 10:30 a.m. on Friday, January 25, 2013 at Immaculate Conception Church in Pine City. A time of visitation will be held one hour before at the church. Interment will be in the Johnson Memorial Cemetery in Royalton Township, West Rock Creek. The family asks that in lieu of flowers, donations may be made to the Lions Club International Foundation—www.lcif.org or phone 630-571-5466—or to St. Jude Children’s Hospital—www.stjude.org, click on “ways to help” and add the number 32463925, or phone 901-495-3300 Funeral arrangements were entrusted to the Funeral and Cremation Service ~ Swanson Chapel