In 1947, a returning WWII veteran named Gordon Bronleewe accepted an offer to purchase the business where he worked during high school, and changed the name to Oregon Memorials.
Over the next 50-plus years, Gordon (with the help of his wife, his five children and a host of highly skilled people) expanded his one-person operation to provide wholesale-only memorials to a five-state area.
Gordon also invented and founded PermaVase, a solid and practical vase featured in dozens of cemeteries today.
Gordon's legacy remains not only in Oregon Memorials and PermaVase, but in the family he loved.