Joe Davenport’s family remembers him as a kind, caring person with a healthy streak of self-reliance.
“We were coming back from a vacation in Florida and a belt broke on our car,” said his wife of 58 years, Wanda “Sunny” Davenport, 75. “He got out and changed it, right there on the side of the road.
“That was his philosophy. If you had a problem, you worked through it. You stuck to it until you found a solution.”
The man students called “Dr. D” died April 19 at age 83 of complications from a heart condition. He was a retired administrator with the Fox C-6 School District.
Mr. Davenport grew up in Poplar Bluff and contracted polio as a toddler.
“His parents didn’t know if he would live or die,” Sunny said. “He was quarantined there in the house.”
Little Joe was luckier than many – his lungs were not involved.
“It affected his lower body,” Sunny said. “He was admitted to Shriners (Hospital) for six- to eight-week stays probably three or four different times. His parents bartered their rationed sugar to get tires and gas to go from Poplar Bluff to St. Louis every Sunday to visit him.”
He couldn’t dance, bowl or roller skate, but he could ride a bicycle.
“For several years, he delivered newspapers in Poplar Bluff,” his wife said. “He pushed his bike through the mud when it rained or snowed, and in bad weather, he’d go up and place the paper on the porch.
“He bought his first car partly with money he saved from the route.”
After high school, Mr. Davenport majored in history at Southeast Missouri State University in Cape Girardeau.
“He was eligible for a disability supplement but he didn’t take it,” Sunny said. “He worked at a supermarket, and he and his older brother worked at the college between semesters, cleaning dorms and the like. No job was too mean for him.”
Halfway through college, Mr. Davenport left to take a teaching job at Oak Ridge School in Poplar Bluff, where one of his eighth-grade students was Sunny Hunter.
“I know, it makes him sound like some kind of a pervert,” she said with a laugh. “But the student-teacher relationship was respected. It was later that the friendship grew.”
After the two started dating, Sunny’s family moved to north St. Louis, and they tried a long-distance relationship.
“One day he said, ‘This is just not working,’” Sunny said. “So, we eloped.”
They were married in a civil ceremony in 1961 and welcomed son Dion 10 months later.
The family lived in Poplar Bluff just one year, while Mr. Davenport finished his bachelor’s degree, then moved to southern Jefferson County, where he taught in the Jefferson R-7 School District. He earned a master’s degree in counseling in 1968.
“In 1969, Jim Rickman recruited him to be a counselor with Fox,” Sunny said. “Joe had six elementary schools, and went to a different one every day. After a couple of years, he was offered the principalship at Antonia Elementary.”
Mr. Davenport earned a doctoral degree in administration from St. Louis University in 1977, and remained at Antonia until he retired in 2001. Sunny also taught at Fox, eventually earning a doctoral degree of her own.
The family enjoyed traveling during their rare summers off.
“We believed in traveling as an education,” Sunny said. “Joe thought it was as important as what goes on in the classroom.”
Although he was limited by the aftereffects of polio, Mr. Davenport never let it get in his way. Family photos show him playing horseshoes, playing catch and other activities with his son.
“We rode bikes, went hiking,” Sunny said. “When we lived at R-7, the interstate was being planned, and we’d take our dogs and walk the wooded area that is now the highway.”
The Davenports built their dream house in 1992 on a 30-acre property in southern Jefferson County. The house was destroyed by fire in 2010, and they lost all their possessions, but they rebuilt on the same spot.
“We shared everything. He helped cook and clean, I trimmed trees and cut the grass,” Sunny said. “Our marriage was a partnership in every aspect.”
Mr. Davenport battled heart disease for the past few years.
“It had nothing to do with the polio. It was in the family,” his wife said. “He had bypasses; he had a stent put in; he had several other heart surgeries. A lesser person would have succumbed a long time ago.”
Just a few days after his latest hospitalization, Mr. Davenport was getting ready for bed when his wife heard him make a strange sound.
“I was not 10 feet from him,” Sunny said. “I started toward him and he made another funny noise. By the time I got to him I knew Joe was gone.”
The Davenports have endowed a college scholarship in their names at SEMO.
“Both of us were happiest when we were involved with students,” Sunny said. “We want it to be presented to kids who, with just a little encouragement, can set the world on fire.”
She said her husband will be remembered for his supportive attitude.
“One teacher wrote in a card, ‘I was so honored and blessed to work with him. He treated me with kindness, but most of all with respect as a teacher.’
“That’s the way he ran his life. He loved doing things for people, and he didn’t make a big show out of it.”
In high school, Mr. Davenport was awarded a medal for courtesy.
“That may sound dorky today, but he had such a gentle heart, a caring spirit.”
“Life Story,” posted Saturdays on Leader Publications’ website, focuses on one individual’s impact on his or her community.