STEVE A. NIELSEN

March 21, 2018

BELLA VISTA, Ark.- A graveside service will be held at 2 p.m. Thursday, March 22, at Lake Cemetery in Lamar, Mo. for Steve A. Nielsen, 89, Bella Vista, who died Tuesday, March 20, 2018, at the Circle of Life Hospice at Legacy Village, following a brief illness.

Arrangements are under the direction of Konantz Warden Funeral Home, Lamar, Mo.

Condolences may be left at www.konantzwarden.com.

Survivors include his wife of 49 years, Thelma Nielsen; a brother, Ed Nielsen, Fargo, N.D.; a sister Lorraine Lake, Sebring, Fla.; a sister-in-law, Edith Walters, Lamar, Mo. and nieces and nephews, great nieces and nephews and great-great-nieces and nephews, too numerous to mention.

Mr. Nielsen was born June 30, 1928, in Winside, Neb., to Carl Jens and Anna Marie (Miller) Nielsen. He graduated from high school in Le Mars, Iowa and attended Westmar College, also in Le Mars, Iowa. After college he served in the U.S. Army for four years.

For most of his working career he served as a foreign service reserve officer for the U.S. Government. He served all around the globe in places most have only heard about. He was in Sudan, Tegucigalpa, Honduras, Vietnam, Congo, Mexico, Afghanistan, Liberia and Washington, D.C., to name a few.

While in Afghanistan he met another foreign service officer, Thelma Walters of Lamar, Mo., and they fell in love and were married on December 6, 1968, in Afghanistan.

After he retired in 1978, he and his wife settled in Hinton, Iowa and than in 1984 moved to Bella Vista.