Long-time Keremeos resident Joe Reichert is being remembered by his wife Rejeanne through a $50 thousand donation to the South Okanagan Similkameen Medical Foundation’s PRH campaign.Joe Reichert didn’t consider life in a wheelchair to be much of a hindrance.

Born in Humboldt, Saskatchewan in 1935, Joe and his family moved to Keremeos when he was 10 years old.  Tragedy struck when Joe was involved in an oil rig accident in Alberta in 1959 which left him a paraplegic. While recovering in Edmonton, he soon got involved in Alberta’s newly formed Paraplegic Sports Association – and became an active wheelchair athlete, participating in such sports as archery, table tennis and shot put.  He went on to represent Canada at various international Paralympic Games. In 1977, he met his future wife, Rejeanne who worked as a Licenced Practical Nurse at the extended care facility where he lived. The couple married in 1981, shortly after they moved to Keremeos from Edmonton.

Source: SOS Medical Foundation