Jim Elsen passed away at home with family by his side on September 5, 2019 after an illness. Born in Kenosha, Wisconsin on September 8, 1940 to Harold and Catherine Elsen, he was the second oldest of six children. In his youth, he spent a lot of time with his Uncle John learning how to fish and hunt, which were strong passions that he carried with him for the rest of his life. Jim lived a full and happy life. In his youth he boxed in the Junior Golden Gloves, drag raced a street legal 1939 Mercury, met the first love of his life Patricia (nee Hains), became a professional baseball umpire and started a family. Eventually he would learn a trade (Machinist) that would serve him well for 38 years on the Hanford Site. He taught himself how to paint beautiful landscapes and ocean scenes and helped the second love of his life Naomi (nee Geer) turn their yard into a perennially beautiful array of flowers for themselves and passers-by to enjoy. During his Senior Year in high school, Jim began umpiring men's softball. Encouraged to consider becoming a professional, he was accepted at the age of 20 to attend umpiring school in Daytona Beach, Florida. After graduating, he was placed in the Florida State League for one year, promoted to the Midwest League in year two and by year three, he had a Northwest League assignment where he got his first taste of Washington State and he liked it! Prior to his fourth year of umpiring, he was expecting a promotion to the Pacific Coast League, but received an assignment to the Texas League, instead. He decided not to move his family again (wife Tricia and 2 year old son Michael), as it was just too big of a sacrifice so the family decided to move back to Kenosha where he got his old job back at Western Coil & Electric as a journeyman machinist. After enduring one more bad Wisconsin winter, Jim saw a job posting from Boeing in the Milwaukee Journal asking for skilled trades at their Seattle Plant and he was offered a job in Seattle, where second son (John) was born less than a year later. After working at Boeing for a year, Jim was hired at Battelle in Richland, WA as they were in need of a Research and Development machinist and the Columbia River was in need of being fished. Jim would continue umpiring for a few years (he really enjoyed doing Pac-8 games with his friend CJ Mitchell) and he would eventually become President of the local KPR Umpire Association for a few more. Jim always had a full plate of activities to keep busy and the tempo almost never slowed. Jim coached both sons youth baseball and basketball teams for several years, drove more kids to and from practice than can be counted, was a great teacher of sports and always had a charitable hand by buying a baseball glove for a kid who needed one. A typical fishing trip with dad would start out at the crack of nine or ten o'clock in the morning. He would typically forget at least one item at the house or in the car, but only realize it after having launched the boat. Usually it was a lawn chair, lucky lure, life jacket, boat paddle or his fishing license - but never lunch. There were almost more "lucky spots" on the Columbia River than one would care to count, but dad would find a way to catch a fish in all of them. To know Jim would mean you had a chance to hear and maybe even understand that crazy laugh of his. It is there and it erupts at all hours of the day, in all circumstances of the issues of life and never seems to be self-conscious of its manifestations. It would come rumbling up from somewhere deep down in his being, disturbing the air about him with its bass sound resonating throughout the room and impossible to be ignored. "I've always wondered how the sky gets its brilliant hues. Pondered the hand that held the brushes. I know, now that you are gone, God selects his painter with love and care. He watches his painter grow in skill and love as he fills canvasses with passion, light and love. God waits until the time is right before asking them to come home. Because his skies are missing something, he needed an expert hand to fill the sky with dreams and hope. So I'll sit outside morning and night and watch you paint the skies forever bright." (Jennifer Elsen Bouslaugh). Jim is survived by his wife Naomi, his sons Michael (Kathryn) and John (Angela), step-son Jeff, four grandchildren, three great-grandchildren (with a fourth on its way and due in February 2020) as well as all of his siblings (Pete, Virginia, Rich, John and Cathleen). Jim's sons would also like to extend a gracious and heart-felt thank you to the entire Geer family for their outpouring of love, compassion and special relationships that they were able to form and nurture with dad over the past 30 years. The family held a beautiful and intimate celebration of life service officiated by Jim's brother-in-law Leland Geer on September 6, 2019.