Jerry Mendoza

Love you Grandpa

Jerry is a dear friend of my( Dad Joe Collins) The many many yrs .The games football baseball basketball.Coming over every other weekend for the couple yrs to watch games of Iowa and all the others with food and laughter .Thank God for Jerry He will be missed Love Joe Collins & Family.We all love you

I just remember uncle Jerry as always being just a really good guy , always treated me kindly. He will be missed by all who knew him RIP Jerry .

We’re sorry for your loss. Wishing your family the best! Only got to meet my cousin at the reunion a couple of times but will always treasure the memories. God bless the Cortez family as they lost another.

MY DADS EULOGY: My name is Rick Mendoza and we are gathered here today to pay respect to my father, Jerry Mendoza. I am the oldest of his 3 children. I have a younger brother John Mendoza, and a younger sister Kimberly Mendoza. Dad and I had a very close relationship, we talked almost once per week since I moved from Cedar Rapids in 1999. Most phone calls from dad always started out with, “Yeah Rick, this is dad”. Like I didn’t know the sound of my dad’s voice, he felt he had to declare who he was or otherwise I wouldn’t know who had just called me. Each call usually evolved into him asking me how my family was doing, how was work going, and then it was his turn. He’d tell me the latest gossip he heard – if any – then I would get the lowdown on the Iowa Hawkeyes. That part of the conversation was pretty much one sided since I didn’t have much first-hand knowledge of Iowa sports any longer after living in Florida and Texas the past 20 years. I would often times find myself just sitting there, quietly listening to him as he went on a good 15-20 minute rant. I wondered where he was finding time to breathe between all those words he was rapidly firing at me. My wife Trisha would always say, “you must have been talking to your dad because you didn’t get a word in”. I’ll miss those calls, our talks, and our annual visits. I’ll also miss his sharp, dry sense of humor. He was quick with a comment, sometimes they stung but it was never out of malice. He liked to call it “razzing”, some called it annoying, I looked at it as opportunities to “razz” him back. Dad had 5 grandchildren. My children, Cameron Mendoza, Lauren Chavez, Ashley Raulerson, and Isabella Mendoza and Kimberly’s son, Korey Taube. Dad also had 3 great-grandchildren – Lauren’s sons Maddox and Kinnick , and Cameron’s daughter McCartney. He loved spending time with his grandchildren. Always intrigued with what was going on in their lives, eager to hear about their accomplishments in school and sports. He attended their sporting events to root them on, traveled to Florida to attend their high school graduations, and celebrated in their successes. He never missed a birthday or Christmas. Each grandchild would receive a card in the mail with cash. He made sure he was present in their lives because he loved them. In turn, each grandchild loved him unconditionally. Grandpa Jerry, you will be missed. Dad grew up in a neighborhood near Quaker Oats called “Little Mexico”. I don’t know much of the history of Little Mexico, but from what I do know, the neighborhood was populated by several Mexican families, many of them relatives and all of them friends. Dad ran mostly with the same core group of friends and relatives from childhood all the way up through his adult life. I would like to recognize a few of them now: Thank you, Jim Vasquez, Ray Pena, Joe Collins, and Dave Gutierrez. Dad appreciated your visits and phone calls. He was comforted by the fact that you cared enough to spend time with him and tried your best to give him hope and encouragement in what was to become the final year of his life. The Mendoza family very much appreciates you all. One of my earliest memories of my dad takes me back to 1970-71. I’m 4 or 5 years old. I’m sitting on the living room floor and he is watching an Iowa Hawkeye’s basketball game. I can remember the figures moving across the black and white television screen. I can remember dad sitting there with his bowl of popcorn while watching “Downtown Freddie Brown. Anyone that truly knew dad knew that he loved the Iowa Hawkeyes and popcorn. Dads love for sports fostered my love for sports. I watched because he watched. I saw how much fun and excitement he seemed to get out of watching sports, so I asked questions and he explained what balls and strikes were, what it takes to make a first down, and how basketball is played. As I grew older he started teaching my brother and me how to play baseball. He would pitch balls to us, hit grounders to us, and often times ask if we wanted to go out and play catch. Dad was thrilled that his boys loved sports as much as he did. It was a bond that started when I was young and grew stronger as we both aged. He was the only dad in our neighborhood that would go and play ball with us at Fillmore Elementary or Roosevelt Jr High. If we only had 4 players, we’d play a form of baseball called Indian Ball. I appreciated my dad for this, more than he ever really knew. Dad, you taught me that being a parent meant being present in your children’s lives and participating in their interest. I can only hope that my kids can say the same of me someday. You may have been trying to teach me how to play baseball and what you really taught me were more important life lessons. I wish I would have told you that. Dad, John and I used to try to be the first one to grab the Gazette off the front porch after it was delivered around 3:30 in the afternoon. Understand, the 2 slowpokes would have to wait for an hour or more while the winner of the daily “Front Porch Gazette Sweepstakes” took their time scouring through the sports page with the other 2 relegated to the front page and other “less” important sections. At that time, we were a baseball family so box scores and standings were always what peaked my interest. Dad was a fan of the San Francisco Giants, John the Cincinnati Reds, and I was a Los Angeles Dodgers fan. It always made for some good family competitiveness as all 3 teams resided in the National League West in the late 70’s as we grew into 80’s. My first Major League Baseball game was at Chicago’s Wrigley Field. Dad took my brother and me on a charter coach bus sometime in the late 70’s. We had tickets to see the Cubs vs. his San Francisco Giants. Driving into the skyline of Chicago, walking up to Wrigley Field, walking through the tunnel of the stadium and getting my first glimps of the plush green Ivy wall – I was in awe of it all! I remember feeling so happy that day, I was getting to spend a beautiful sunny summer day with my dad and brother watching a game I had grown to love. I remember dad buying me a miniature souvenir Cubs bat and who knows how many snacks John and I begged him for that day. Dad’s life was more than just sports. His parents were very important part of his life. He would take us over to my grandparents, Richard and Zenaida Mendoza’s often. Sometimes for a quick visit and other times for one of grandma’s delicious Mexican dishes. Dad loved grandma’s homemade Mexican food and she loved cooking for her family. He always told me that grandma’s Mexican food was the best and I would have to concur, she was an amazing cook. If a friend needed something from dad, he was there to offer support or help in any way he could. Like a time when a co-worker was unable to complete a task, dad stepped in to finish the task for him off the clock and unpaid. Another example of dad helping someone during a time of need was during the great flood of 2008. As my cousin Tony Vasquez tells me and I’m paraphrasing; Jerry did some of the most difficult work down at CJ’s trying to get the bar cleaned up after the flood ravaged the bar. He removed the backroom tile, along with the linoleum and adhesive which was very difficult work, but he kept at it until it was done. Your dad just wanted to help, and he did in a big way. Dad didn’t do this for money or recognition, he did it because family needed help and he wanted to do his part. Dad was very proud of his tenure at Midland Forge. He worked there 40 plus years before he retired. He was a hard worker and rarely took a sick day. I can remember days when he looked and sounded so sick that he should have called in but didn’t. He powered through when most of us would have picked up the phone and called out. I was very proud of dad and his work ethic. He instilled in me that hard work, reliability, and punctuality are important character traits that all employers value. Words of advice that stuck with me. Food was not much of an adventure with dad. His palette was pretty simple by most standards. If there are any Midland Forge co-workers here today, they may remember that dad brought the same lunch every day for 40+ years. One slice of Oscar Meyer bologna on Colonial Bread with a light layer of Miracle Whip and a cream filled chocolate Hostess cupcake for desert. Dad, you obviously took that Oscar Meyer jingle to heart where the kid says “oh, I love to eat it every day” because that’s exactly what you did, eat it every day. Eating steaks with dad created visuals that were horror movie worthy. When he ate steak, you didn’t want to look at his plate if you had a queasy stomach. He liked them rare and cooked 1 minute on each side with just enough browning that it could pass the eye test for a cooked steak. These steaks were so rare that the meat was practically still mooing. Pretty soon, the baked potato that was also on his plate turned and a haunting shade of red. An all-time favorite meal of dads was pot roast. “Pot Roast Sundays” is what we affectionally called it. Other than Grandma Mendoza’s Mexican food, pot roast was one of dad’s favorite meals. Dad was a creature of habit. Every Friday on his way home from work, he would stop at the old Naso’s Pizzeria and pick up a large half pepperoni and half ground beef pizza for us. Of course, dads side was the ground beef side – simple tastes. Then every Saturday morning he’d wake up early and head over to the Hy-Vee on Johnson Ave and pick up a gallon of chocolate milk along with chocolate covered long johns for us kids and glazed donuts for himself. Again, simple tastes. Dad was content with the simple pleasures in life. He lived his life in a minimalistic fashion never wanting more than what he needed to get by. He could have taken extravagant vacations, drove an expensive car, lived in a big house but he chose not to because in his mind, it would have been wasteful. He planned well for his retirement and for the future of his children and grandchildren. I just wish he could have been here longer to enjoy the fruits of his hard work. For those of you that aren’t aware, this had been a challenging year for dad. He was in a fight that he didn’t ask for and it was a fight where the odds were not in his favor. 2018 started with a 2 week bout with influenza in February, starting chemo treatments for leukemia in March, an emergency tracheotomy at the end of June so he could breathe, a stage 4 throat cancer diagnosis in July, chemo and radiation treatments for the throat cancer from August through September, a feeding tube for nutrition because he could no longer swallow due to the intense radiation targeting his throat also in September, to multiple infections and bouts with pneumonia upon completion of his radiation treatments. After chemo and radiation treatments commenced, we all thought dad would now be on the road to recovery. Call it wishful thinking or naivete, but we were expecting dad back to 2017 Jerry by now. Turns out, the fight was much tougher than we ever realized but the outcome was something that dad was keenly aware of all along–he may not win. I will admit, there were times where I felt dad wasn’t trying hard enough, wasn’t following doctor’s orders and doing the physical and occupational exercises he needed for his recovery. I felt that dad maybe giving up on a fight that he could surely win. I just wanted him here with us so badly, I didn’t fully appreciate the devastating affects this disease had on his body and how tight its grip was. Dad, your opponent was relentless, it never gave an inch and you fought with all the energy you could summon. I know that now and I’m proud of you. We weren’t supposed to be here today, not for this. This was not part of our plan. Our plan was to drive from Dallas to Cedar Rapids this past Saturday, pack dad’s personal belongings on Sunday, get dad discharged from the Hiawatha Care Center on Monday, then drive back to Dallas on Tuesday – maybe stretching the 12hr drive over 2 days if that’s what dad needed. Today, I should be helping him get comfortable in his new surroundings, helping him get organized in his new bedroom, and planning his medical appointment with new doctor’s in Texas. Unfortunately, things did not go according to our plan. I still made the drive to Cedar Rapids on Saturday as initially planned but instead, I arrive to Cedar Rapids to lay my dad to rest. Dad, I will miss the weekly phone calls and talking about what’s going on in your life and sharing what’s going on with us in Texas. I’ll miss getting the lowdown on the Hawkeyes, what Coach Ferentz did to irritate you in the most recent game, who the potential new recruits are, and just anything related to sports. I’ll miss hearing the excitement in your voice when I would tell you about the next great accomplishment that Bella had in school or gymnastics. I’ll miss your visits to Texas, our visits to you. Most of all dad, I’ll miss just knowing that you are here. Here on earth, here with us, here for us. I want to again thank you all for coming to say goodbye to dad today. I also want to say a special thank you to my brother John, his wife Shelley, and my son Cameron. The 3 of you took such good care of dad this past year. Running him to his many appointments, checking in on him to see how he was doing, visiting him during his many hospital stays, and essentially managing the last year of his life when he could not by himself. You gave selflessly of yourselves to him and I know for a fact he was very grateful. Dad was truly loved by his family and will be missed dearly. Our broken hearts will mend over time, especially as we allow those fond memories of him to become more prevalent then the sadness we now feel. Goodbye dad, I love you, I miss you but feel comfort in knowing that I will someday see you again.