Donald Jerome Rainford

Donald Jerome Rainford, affectionately known as “DJ”, was born to Donald and Sharon Rainford of Bear, Delaware, on January 25, 1988. He was the middle child of three blessed children. DJ was educated in the Colonial School District. He graduated in 2006 from William Penn High School in New Castle, Delaware. He continued his education by attending college at Liberty University in Lynchburg, Virginia where he received his Bachelor of Science in Pre-Law Government in 2010. He also attended Widener University in Wilmington, Delaware where he earned his Paralegal Certificate in Corporate Law in 2011. During his free time, DJ enjoyed various hobbies including fishing, bicycle riding, skateboarding, airbrushing, barbering, and making music on his sound board. In high school, DJ was baptized at Cornerstone Church in Bear, DE where he also served as a youth group leader. His close friends note his most admirable trait as being able to find comedy in everything. He loved spending time with his childhood friends, Ben Cole and Joe Higgin, who remember taking long road trips with DJ hanging his leg out the window. DJ also enjoyed writing, hiking, walking nature trails and faithfully volunteering at the SPCA. His college friend, Nick Thomas, remembers DJ as being loving, smart, charismatic, and playfully stubborn. DJ also honored and valued his family and heritage; and all those who loved him knew him to be obnoxiously proud of being Jamaican. DJ’s employment background included being a Locomotive Engineer at Savage Services in Delaware City, DE and a Locomotive Conductor at Watco Companies in Houston, TX. He was last employed as a mechanic at Gulftainer USA at the Port of Wilmington (Delaware). DJ departed this Earth on Friday, September 11, 2020. He leaves to cherish his memory his parents, Donald and Sharon Rainford; 2 brothers, Yanique Sr. and Jason Rainford (Samantha); his paternal grandmother, Rosamond Rainford; his maternal grandmother, Cherril Anderson; 1 niece, Yazlynn Shackleford; 2 nephews, Yanique Rainford Jr. and Liam Rainford; as well as a host of special aunts, uncles, cousins, neighbors and relatives in the United Kingdom, Canada, Barbados, and Jamaica. A visitation for family and friends will be held from 5 pm until 7 pm on Thursday, September 24, 2020, at Spicer-Mullikin Funeral Home, 1000 N. DuPont Parkway, New Castle, DE. A second visitation will be held from 11 am until 12:30 pm on Friday, September 25, 2020 at Cornerstone United Methodist Church, 3135 Summit Bridge Road, Bear, DE, where a funeral service will begin at 12:30 pm. Interment will follow at Gracelawn Memorial Park, 2220 N. DuPont Parkway, New Castle, DE. Facemasks will be required for all in attendance.

Donald Jerome Rainford

January 25, 1988 - September 11, 2020