Daniel Robert Branson

Note: When this website went live in 2005, Dan was one of the surviving great-grandchildren of John Sevier Branson and Martha Jane Ousley. Inasmuch as the website does not profile living individuals, his biography was held in reserve. Now that he has died, this page can be filled in. What you see below is still in draft mode and should be regarded as a placeholder. More details and another picture or two will be added soon.

Daniel Robert Branson, son of Robert Lee Branson and Nellie Margaret Reed, was born 15 March 1928 in Randsburg, Kern County, CA, where his father was a pump engineer in charge of the community water supply.

After graduating high school, Dan joined the U.S. Army and spent two tours in the Korean War as a forward observer for a mortar platoon. His soldier years more or less coincided with his first marriage, a brief union that resulted in two children.

In 1958, Dan met Margaret Ann Pickelheimer, the woman with whom he would spend the rest of his life. They wed on the 22nd of November of that year. She had been raised locally, but had recently come back to the area after a short interval in Texas with her first husband, Buford Olen “Tex” Milson. Tex had died in the summer of 1956 at only twenty-one years of age. Margaret had been six months pregnant when that tragedy had occurred, and as widow gave birth to a son, Buford Olen Milson, Jr. (22 September 1956 - 23 December 2011). Young Buford was adopted by Dan and was given the surname Branson, retaining Milson as an extra middle name.

Dan and Margaret produced two biological sons, so altogether they ended up raising five boys.

By the 1950s, Dan’s parents were long since well settled in the China Lake/Ridgecrest area, and Dan saw every reason to do likewise. He went on to a long and successful thirty-six-year career as a machinist and technician at NOTS China Lake, mostly in Michelson Lab. A son and a grandson followed in his steps and also became machinists in the Ridgecrest/China Lake area.

Among his pastimes, Dan liked to bowl, playing in Ridgecrest leagues for more than three decades. He once scored a perfect 300 game. (Margaret shared this pastime, as did the whole family.) His other interests included camping and fishing. Dan also managed his sons’ Little League games.

Dan passed away 15 February 2012. A memorial service was held Saturday, 25 February 2012, at Grace Point Church in Ridgecrest. Margaret survived him by only three months. Born 24 May 1937, she died 26 May 2012.

Dan and his sisters Gloria and Norma take a walk with their uncle Burrell Reed’s young sons at the Reed ranch during the winter of 1937-38.

Descendants of Daniel Robert Branson

Details of Generation Five, the great-great-grandchildren of John Sevier Branson and Martha Jane Ousley, are kept off-line to guard the privacy of living individuals. However, we can say that Dan’s line includes five children (counting adopted stepson Buford), thirteen grandchildren, and twenty-five great-grandchildren.

To go back one generation, click here. To return to the Branson/Ousley Family main page, click here.