Manuel Moreno Franco

Manuel Moreno Franco, 79, of Indio died Monday, Sept. 18, 2017, at John F. Kennedy Memorial Hospital in Indio. His health had been declining for several years.
Mr. Franco, a longtime resident of Blythe and later Indio, was born to Manuel Franco Leyvas and Magdalena Moreno Franco on May 19, 1938, in Agua Prieta, Sonora, Mexico. He immigrated to the United States and the Palo Verde Valley in 1960, where he met the former Ramona Sanchez Zavala. They married on Sept. 30, 1961, and would have celebrated their 56th anniversary this month.
Mr. Franco worked in many fields during his life.
He used the skills learned as a photographer's apprentice in Mexico after his arrival in Blythe, working for Smith & Wolford Photo. Among his duties were photographing and processing class photos for Palo Verde High School.
He also worked in the mining industry, first at U.S. Gypsum in Midland, California, near Blythe in the early 1960s and later as an operating engineer during more than 16 years at the Kaiser Steel iron ore mine at Eagle Mountain, California. He was among the last wave of employees let go when the facility ceased operations in the early 1980s. He also worked for a time at Modern Ginning Co., in Blythe.
A naturalized U.S. citizen, Mr. Franco believed that it was his responsibility to give back to the community that had done so much for him. He was an active parishioner at St. Joan of Arc Catholic Church, where he and his family performed the music for Christmas Midnight Mass for many years. He also played the "standing" bass in The Nostalgics, the Palo Verde Community College jazz orchestra.
He served on the school site committee in the 1970s for Palo Verde Unified School District. Later, after serving as maintenance director at Palo Verde Community College, he sought and won a seat on the community college's board of trustees, serving for eight years. He was a member of the board that approved what would become the new "college on the hill" a 200-acre campus on the mesa overlooking the city of Blythe that opened in 2001.
Beginning in the early 1960s in Blythe, Manuel and Ramona began buying properties and building apartment complexes. During the next five-and-a-half decades they owned and managed several dozen rental homes, apartment units and condominium units in Blythe, Indio, Cathedral City and Palm Springs.
Manuel and Ramona moved from Blythe to the Coachella Valley in 2005, landing first in Cathedral City before buying a home in north Indio in 2006. They had many friends and were part of an active group of line dancers and karaoke aficionados that frequented various desert area venues from the various tribal casinos to Neil's Lounge in Indio and the Rock Garden in Palm Springs and out to Willie Boy's in Morongo Valley, to name just a few.
Mr. Franco is survived by his wife of nearly 56 years, Ramona; son Manuel Franco and daughter-in-law Christine Farmer Franco of Henderson, Nevada; son Alberto Franco and daughter-in-law Kathryn Frances Misurek Franco of Palm Desert; grandsons Manuel Franco of Las Vegas and Martin Franco of Henderson, Nevada; granddaughter Krysteena Moraga Meredith and her husband, Brian Meredith, and great-grandchildren Colton and Dean of Murrieta; and granddaughters Cassidy Rodriguez and Jordan Rodriguez.
He also is survived by sister Maria de Jesus Somoza and her husband, Pablo Somoza, of Phoenix; sister Lupita Romero of Scottsdale, Arizona; sister Maria Elena Moreno Ramos and her husband, Hector Ramos, of Agua Prieta, Sonora, Mexico; and brother Ignacio Franco and his wife, Raquel Franco, of Norwalk, California; as well as numerous brothers- and sisters-in-law, cousins, nieces and nephews in the United States and Mexico.
He was preceded in death by a daughter, Rosa Maria Franco Rodriguez mother of Krysteena, Cassidy and Jordan in 2002.