Karl Joseph Max Dalla Rosa Obituary (1934 - 2021)

Karl Joseph Max Dalla Rosa passed on Saturday, March 27, 2021 near his home in Oro Valley, Arizona. He is survived by his wife Rosemary, daughter Julie, sons Karl and Kurt, and grandchildren, Liam, Lukas, and Miranda. We will all miss him terribly. Karl, Dad, or "Pops" was born in in Huntington Park, California, on June 24, 1934, the last child and only son of Carlo and Francesca Dalla Rosa, who came to the United States from northern Italy in 1917 and 1922 respectively. An accomplished carpenter and woodworker, he spent most of his career designing and constructing eye-catching billboards advertising major motion picture releases along the "Sunset Strip" in Hollywood. He and Rosemary raised their children in nearby Sierra Madre, and following his retirement in 1995, he realized his lifelong dream of designing and building a welcoming mountain retreat near Nevada City. When the property upkeep and the winters became too much for them, he and Rosemary moved to Oro Valley in 2009, trading the mountains for the dessert. Karl loved his family, the L.A. Dodgers and Rodney Dangerfield. He was an enthusiastic bocci ball player, and his family will always remember long games of horseshoes played in Nevada City. He seemed content with whatever life threw his way. Constantly telling silly and off-color jokes, he found humor in virtually every circumstance. All were drawn in by his positive, content energy and his easy way of being. He had a well-meaning way of telling potentially offensive jokes that mostly silenced likely detractors. He loved to just sit and shoot the "breeze". The world needs a lot more of whatever he had.