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Donald F. Gilbert Sioux Falls, SD QCWA # 17673 Chapter 9 |
Sioux Falls - Donald F. Gilbert, age 95, Sioux Falls, SD, died February 8, 2018. He was the grandson of renowned South Dakota "Builder on the Prairie" architect Wallace L. Dow.
Donald Floyd Gilbert was born to Elmer and Annie Heiress (Dow) Gilbert on July 31, 1922 in Pipestone, MN. His earlier years were spent on a farm near Pipestone until the family moved to Jasper, MN in 1934.
Don left high school during his senior year and joined the U.S. Navy in 1942. After boot camp, he was sent to Purdue University for electrical aviation training. He served in WWII at Key West, FL; San Diego, CA; and Saipan. After the war, Don attended South Dakota State University and graduated in 1949 with a degree in Electrical Engineering. After college, he worked on the McNary Dam in Ephrata, WA; at the Aberdeen Proving Ground in MD and then for more than 20 years at Wright Patterson Air Force Base in Dayton, OH as an electrical engineer. He retired in 1976.
Don married Lois Thaden on October 29, 1950. They enjoyed traveling and their sail boat. Don and Lois moved to Trail Ridge Retirement Community in Sioux Falls in 1996. In 2012 Don moved to Covington Heights Care Center in Sioux Falls. He was a member of Asbury Methodist Church.
Don's family will be forever grateful to Don and Lois for the extensive research they did in the 1950's, before the Internet, to compile the Gilbert/Dow/Whipple genealogy--tracing our ancestry to 1638 in the Massachusetts Colony, as well as documenting at least 156 buildings in Minnesota and the Dakotas that were designed by his grandfather, Wallace L. Dow.
Survivors include one brother, Wallace Gilbert of Pipestone, MN and many nieces and nephews. He is preceded in death by his wife in 2006; his parents; four sisters, Alice Hohn, Ruth Fox, Cecil Lugg and Hazel Gilbert; and three brothers, Lester, Clifford and Robert Gilbert.
Memorial Services will be held at 1:30 p.m. on Saturday, April 7, 2018 at Miller Funeral Home, 507 S. Main Avenue with burial at Mt. Pleasant Cemetery.