Noah Stephan Mayo
A memorial for Noah Stephan Mayo will be held 6 p.m. Tuesday, Sept. 27, at the Sheet’ka Kwaan Naa Kahidi community house. It will be a potluck dinner.
Friends can call Prewitt Funeral Home at 747-7321 for hours of a viewing.
Noah died Sept. 20 in Sitka. He was 37.
He was born at home in Juneau on March 2, 1979, to Michael Mayo and Sherie Morrow. Home at the time also was their fishing boat, the F/V Helen. Noah spent the first four years of his life on the docks. In 1981, after his brother Ocean and sister Coral were born, the family moved to their home on Kaagwaantaan Street in Sitka, where he spent most of his childhood.
Life was adventurous, with seasonal fishing and boat work in Port Townsend and Seattle.
Noah was interested in animals, biology and mythology as a child. He was a voracious reader and good student.
He began wrestling in high school, and joined the Sitka-Edgecumbe Youth Football League in its first year of existence, in 1996.
During his high school years and later, he traveled to Kamchatka, Russia, India, Bhutan and Australia.
After graduation from Sitka High School in 1997, he helped coach wrestling in middle and high school, and also was a referee.
His other interests were playing Magic with friends, science fiction, City League basketball, weight lifting, subsistence hunting and fishing, and working the daily crossword puzzle in the Sentinel.
He bought his first boat, the F/V Sea Dog, and a home in his mid-20s, and married Jessica Blankenship in 2006. They had two daughters, Autumn and Lily Mayo, and he took on the parental role of Dad to Evelyn and Lila Widmeyer, Autumn’s and Lily’s half-sisters.
Noah was a commercial longline fisherman his whole life, and three years ago bought his second boat, the F/V Resource, and learned to gillnet.
Noah is survived by his daughters, Autumn and Lily Mayo of Sitka; his father Michael Mayo and mother Sherie Mayo, both of Sitka; brothers Jeb Morrow of Petersburg, Dan Hoffay of Cottage Grove, Ore., and Ocean Mayo and Cedar Mayo, both of Sitka; sisters Coral Crenna, Ilona Mayo, and Song Mayo, all of Sitka, and Amber Mayo of Los Angeles; brothers-in-law Patrick Crenna and Mike Davidson, both of Sitka; his mother-in-law, Ramona Kirkman of Sitka, and numerous aunts, uncles, nieces and nephews.
In lieu of flowers, memorial donations may be made to the Sitka School District wrestling program.
“Noah had a huge heart and touched many lives,” his family said. “He was a caring and compassionate man and was always willing to help a friend in need."
“We love you, Noah, and always will.”
