Wayne Price
Howard Wayne Price, Strafford, was born March 30, 1966, to Howard Lee and Lynda Kay (Melvin) Price in San Leandro, California. Surrounded by family, he departed this life Wednesday, May 13, 2026, in Mercy Hospital, Springfield, at the age of 60 years.
Wayne grew up on his family’s dairy farm west of Marshfield—the same farm where he would later build his dream home. Few people knew how to work like Wayne did; he learned that from his beloved parents, Butch and Kay Price, whom he revered as the hardest-working and best people in the world. He spent his summers hauling hay, milking cows, and running around the hills of Webster County with his many, many friends.
In high school, Wayne met and courted Sherri Taylor. He approached her at her locker one day and asked her on their first date, and the rest was history. Each year Wayne would give Sherri his class ring again to celebrate that anniversary. They married on a snowy, icy New Year’s Eve in 1988. Sherri believed that Wayne hung the moon and stars, and together they built a life, home, and family. In his final moments on Earth, he told his doctors and nurses that he wanted Sherri by his side. That is where she was and where she stayed until he took his final breath.
At the age of twenty-nine, Wayne and Sherri welcomed their daughter, Taylor Kay. Wayne gave her the whole world. Taylor was, by all accounts, the best thing Wayne ever did, and he told this to anyone who would listen. It was his pride and joy to be her father, and he was one of her best friends in the world. Wayne spent thirty years raising Taylor to believe she could do anything she dreamed. He taught her to love books, coffee, music, deep thinking, and traveling, and he undoubtedly taught her how to love people and live life to the fullest. Wayne loved seeing Taylor grow up, marry her high school sweetheart, become a lawyer, and learn to love drinking an Irish whiskey with her old man. Countless people had the privilege of loving him, but only Taylor had the privilege of being his baby. She will never be the same without him as her north star.
Wayne achieved much in his life outside of the family he built. He earned a degree in Finance from Southwest Missouri State University in 1988. During his time in school, he was selected to participate in the coveted New York Study Program, where he got his first taste of the world of business and the career he wanted to build. Wayne started that career at Aetna but soon came back to Springfield and, after working at the local O’Reilly Auto Parts store through high school and college, joined the O’Reilly corporate office. There, he served as the Vice President of Treasury and Risk Management. His contributions to growing the company from roughly thirty stores to the massive enterprise it is today were immeasurable, and he devoted his professional life to that task.
Wayne always used his brilliant mind to its fullest and was an avid reader as well as a skilled (and stubborn) debater. Upon retirement Wayne spent his days cowboying and managing his cattle ranch. He did so alongside his parents; this was one of the greatest joys of his life. He’d tell anyone who would listen that his parents were his heroes and that they made everything possible for him because of the farm they bought decades ago and what they built there. Most of all, he loved to watch the sun set over his farm while enjoying a bourbon and cigar, of course.
He leaves behind countless friends. There may never have been a person who connected more easily or deeply than Wayne. People from all walks of life, places, professions, opinions, and backgrounds now grieve the abiding friendships they had with him. Aside from the life he built for and with his family, those friendships were his purpose and his happiness. He loved any chance he had to hunt and fish with his friends but most loved catching up with them for hours at a time and hearing of their hopes, ideas, dreams, and lives.
Wayne is preceded in death by his grandparents, Alvin and Sylvia Price and Eugene and Vergie Melvin; his mother and father-in-law, Joel and Shirley Taylor; and his brother-in-law, Tony Taylor.
Wayne is survived by his wife, Sherri; his daughter, Taylor Todd and husband Steven of Parkville, Missouri; his parents, Howard and Kay Price of Strafford; his sister, Pam Shockley and husband Richie of Strafford; and many aunts, uncles, cousins, nieces, and nephews.
Funeral services will be Saturday, May 30, 2026, at 10:00 a.m. in the chapel of Fraker Funeral Home, Inc., Marshfield, Missouri.
Visitation will follow services Saturday in the funeral home.
Memorial contributions may be made to Marshfield FFA and may be left in care of Fraker Funeral Home, Inc., P.O. Box 85, Marshfield, MO 65706.