Charles ODell

Charles Edward O'Dell, 85, of St. Petersburg Florida. Died April 15, 2020, of heart failure. Born in Chillicothe, Ohio in 1935. Moved to St. Petersburg in 1959. Charles was a U.S. Army veteran, and retired as a Lieutenant from the St. Petersburg Fire Department. He, and his group of rescue divers, was among the first on the scene when the Skyway Bridge fell. He was a Civil Engineer, a landlord, a realtor, a scuba diver, a skier, a farmer, and a stock car racer. Among other adventures, he climbed Mount Kilimanjaro, went heli-skiing in New Zealand, met a cannibal tribe in Papua, New Guinea, biked through China, and dove the Great Barrier Reef. He wrote a novel based on his adventures in Egypt. He restored his first car as a teen - a model A Ford that he pulled from a ditch. Over his lifetime he restored many more, including a Willies Jeep and a 1935 Ford truck. He was a resident of Sunset Beach for thirty years and wrote a local history column for the beach's paper. He is survived by three daughters, Rebecca Delaney (Gregory), Dawn Abeita (David), Robin O'Dell, seven grandchildren and one great-grandchild. A service will be held at St. John Vianney Catholic Church at a later date.