Randall Paul Haynes

Randall Paul Haynes fit a lot into his life.

He was the Windsor school district’s first music director. He brewed award-winning India pale ale (and a beer he named Lawnmower). He sang competitively in Europe. He umpired the first Sonoma County Crushers baseball game. He booted the mascot from that game. He delivered mail throughout northwest Santa Rosa.

Haynes died Oct. 17 at the Care Meridian facility in Fairfax from injuries he suffered on the job with the U.S. Postal Service in 2004, when he fell and hit his head after being startled by a dog. He was 61.

The cause was complications related to that severe head injury; it left him in a coma for nearly two months and he never fully recovered, said his wife, Wendy Haynes of Santa Rosa.

“He was in the wrong place at the wrong time,” she said.

Haynes joined the Postal Service in 2000, loving the work and the job, because he got off early and could make it to games. He also started refereeing high school basketball in the winter.

source: Former Sonoma County music teacher, postal carrier Randall Haynes dies at 61