Joseph Charles Bateman, Jr

Joseph Charles Bateman, Jr. (Joe, Pop) was born May 1, 1947, to Joe and Betty Bateman in
San Antonio, Texas. His family moved from San Antonio, to Amarillo, to Ft. Worth, and finally to
Austin, Texas.

 Joe passed away suddenly on June 8, 2023, in Farmington, Utah at the age of
76. He leaves behind his wife of 50 years, Rosann Bateman, son Joe Bateman (Heather),
daughter Kimi Bateman (Kara), grandkids Bailey, Hayden, Grey, and Griffin. He is also survived
by his sisters Cheryl Bateman and Susan Mora, brother-in-law Ric Redfearn, and numerous
nieces and nephews.

He is preceded in death by his parents, Joe and Betty Bateman, sister Betty Jo Redfearn, and his in-laws Ed and June Sasaki. Joe was a life-long Texan, although he  came to love his new state of Utah with its beautiful mountains, hiking, walking, camping opportunities, and waterways. He had a deep connection to nature. His love for his family was unconditional. Joe graduated from the University of Texas at Austin, Texas with a degree in Business Management. Prior to being a full-time student, he proudly served in the U.S. Air Force from 1968-1971 and spent a year in Vietnam. Joe was an artist, guitar player, tennis  player, perfectionist, handyman, backpacker, and all-around adventurer. He enjoyed his music,  nature, his dogs, Ollie, and Marley, and always wanted the dogs with us on our adventures.

Joe and Rosann met at Sage Department Store in Austin, Texas in 1971, at that time they were
enrolled at UT and married in 1973. They traveled to Matamoras, Reynosa, and Nuevo Laredo,
Mexico for their honeymoon. There was a huge snowstorm so to get from San Antonio to Austin
took 3 hours! Joe and Rosann were lifelong Texans and didn’t move from Texas until 2016,
when they moved to Utah. He loved his family more than anything and would do anything for
them.  

The grandkids shared their memories of Pop: Bailey remembers the “millions of times” she would climb high on a tree, or to the top of things in general, and Pop would get “really worried in a funny way”. A recent memory was while on
Facetime playing her favorite band for Mimi, Pop grabbed Mimi’s phone and took it into his
music room to play his music, then returned and gave the phone back to Mimi stating that Bailey
actually liked his music better. Little did he know Bailey was shaking her head no the whole time
to Mimi as he was boasting this.
  Hayden recalls the countless times he played in cardboard boxes that Pop had collected and
creatively turned into kid “washing machines”, forts, and even slides, one of Pop’s specialties.
Another memory Hayden shared was when he would go on walks with Pop that Pop would
always tell him haunted stories.
  Grey loved that Pop would sit and listen to whatever stories they had to tell for however long it
took. They could sit and talk for hours. Grey would wake up extra early just to chat with Pop
about their dreams for the future. He believed in his kids and grandkids, often letting them know
they could do whatever they set their minds to do.  
  He called Griffin, GJ most of the time. Griffin loved that Pop was funny, wise, thankful, kind, and
always made him laugh. He loved his knife collection and playing the guitar every morning. He
also loved his patriotism and stories from his days in the Air Force. Pop also liked to look things
up in his large dictionary, so that impressed GJ. He taught GJ to play chess. GJ laughed when
Mimi and Pop bickered over silly things such as where to place the bricks in the backyard. Both
GJ and Pop also caught bugs of all kinds to show each other.  

Joe was a very private person, so requested no services be held.