Dale Eugene Trautman was a longtime LBCC instructor who passed away last year. He retired from the college in 2002.
Trautman was born to John J. and Hazel Bruschwein Trautman on Dec. 11, 1938 in Bismarck, North Dakota, the son of North Dakota farmers.
He attended the Thelma Township one-room school during his first year of education. The remaining years between first grade and graduation from high school were spent in the Driscoll, North Dakota, public schools. He graduated in 1956.
He joined the U.S. Navy in 1957, where he spent the next four and one-half years. Most of this time was spent on a submarine, patrolling the waters between Florida and Cuba (most notably during President John F. Kennedy’s Cuban crisis). This was the time when therevolutionary Fidel Castro became the ruler of Cuba, ruling from 1959 to 2008.
After his stint in the Navy, Dale worked for the U.S. government at an early warning radar station near Fairbanks, Alaska, as a maintenance electrician for 5 or 10 years.
He then moved to Tower, Michigan, married Jeanne Crowe, and became the father of Terrence Ashley Trautman. At this time they owned and operated a motel in Cheboygan, Michigan.
In 1970 they moved to the Corvallis/Philomath area of Oregon to take advantage of the GI Bill, complements of his time spent in military service in the Navy. In four years at Oregon State University he earned a master’s degree.
He went on to become an instructor at LBCC in Albany, where he taught engineering technology and worked in the Apprenticeship program. He worked at LBCC for 24 years, retiring in June 2002.
When he wasn’t teaching, Trautman was an avid sportsman, an NRA member and supporter of the Oregon Hunters Association. Any spare time during his working years, and most of his retirement time was spent hunting (deer, elk, geese, etc.), fishing on the Columbia River and crabbing on the Oregon Coast.
In 2011, he and Jeanne divorced.
Trautman was pre-deceased by his parents. He leaves his son, Terrence; brothers: Lee (Betty) Trautman and Neil (Patricia)Trautman; sisters: Janice (Ted) Cook; Valerie Mulles; and Dawn (Loren) David. He also leaves numerous nieces and nephews, and dozens of cousins to mourn his demise. His was 86 years well-lived.
Editor’s note: This tribute to Dale Trautman was published at the request of his sister, Janice Cook.
