David "D2" Drucker

David "D2, Dave" Drucker

David "D2, Dave" Drucker, 57, passed away on Sunday evening, December 5, 2010, at home surrounded by his loving family, after a three year battle with lung cancer.

He began his life in Cleveland, Ohio, the third son of Dr. William R. and Barbara Victor Drucker. He moved with his family to Canada when he was 12 and finished most of high school there. The family moved to Charlottesville in 1973 and he graduated from Albemarle High School before returning to Toronto, Canada, to York University for college. He claimed to be a Canadian at heart and loved the cold weather.

After four years at York, he returned to Charlottesville, to work at the Children's Rehab Center (now the Kluge Children's Rehab Center), for a year. He worked to save money to move to Los Angeles to break into the acting field, as that was his degree area. While working that year, he met and started dating his boss, Jayleane Bell.

He moved to Los Angeles, the spring of 1978, and they maintained a four year long distance relationship while he struggled to become an actor. He did a few acting jobs over the years, the most memorable being his appearance on "Fantasy Island" and a character in the movie, "Wacko." He is still receiving residual checks from the "Fantasy Island" appearance.

In 1982, he finally decided the acting business wasn't going to be his life long work and proposed to Jayleane by audio tape sent UPS. He returned to the East coast staying with his parents in Rochester, New York, to finish the last credits he needed for his BFA degree.

He married Jayleane in October that year and thus began a 28 year long loving marriage. He worked at Daly's Rent-all for a year and then got a job at Piedmont Virginia Community College. It was his favorite place to work, but a new adventure was presented to him in 1986 at the Curry School of Education at the University of Virginia and he moved there to live out his career. He knew absolutely nothing about computers when he started and yet became the computer guru at Curry in very short order.

He is renowned for his sense of humor and great easy going attitude toward life. When he was diagnosed with lung cancer in 2007, his positive attitude made him a "miracle" according to his doctor at the HOPE center at Martha Jefferson Hospital. This fall when we learned the cancer had spread to his brain and they thought he had two tumors, he gave them names. After learning there was actually only one tumor he named his walker with the other tumor's name.

He was predeceased by his mother-in-law, Barbara Ramp.

David is survived by his wife, Jayleane; his children, "Nick" David Nicholas and daughter, Kirstin Alexis; stepdaughter, Dawn M. Isner and her husband, Scott; and his grandsons, Nate and Sam Isner; his parents, Bill and Barbara Drucker of Jericho, Vermont; his brothers and their wives, John and Terry of Minneapolis, Minnesota; Dr. Bob and Dr. Joan of Durham, North Carolina; his sister, Dr. Nancy and Peter Drucker Macone of Underhill, Vermont; father-in-law, Wallace Ramp of Jackson, Michigan; brothers-in-law, James and Robin Ramp of Rincon, Georgia; Daniel and Peggy Ramp of Jackson, Michigan; Jack and Sally Ramp of Gurnee, Illinois; a sister-in-law, Christine and Sam Hammond of Parma, Michigan. There are also many nieces, nephews, great-nieces, great- nephews, and cousins who will miss his bigger than life presence. We would be remiss not to also mention the light of his life for the past three years, Ducky Dawg Drucker.

The family would like to acknowledge all the support and care that David and the rest of us received from Dr. Sanusi and the Albemarle Center for Family Medicine staff, Dr. Stefan Gorsch and the HOPE Center staff and Radiation Oncology staff of Martha Jefferson Hospital, and the Hospice of the Piedmont.

A small private service will be held later this month. A Celebration of David's life will be held in the spring.

Cremation service provided by Cremation Society of Virginia in Richmond, Virginia.

In lieu of flowers, please send donations to Hospice of the Piedmont, 675 Peter Jefferson Parkway, Suite 300, Charlottesville, VA 22911 (hopva.org) or CARS, P.O. Box 160, Charlottesville, VA 22902-0160, http://donate-rescue1.org or the Drucker Outstanding Staff Award at the Curry School of Education, P.O. Box 400276, Charlottesville, VA 22904-4276. Please follow the plans for services posted on Carepages.com (search for D2, David Drucker, or Curry School) or his memorial page on Facebook http://www.facebook.com/#!/home.php?sk=group_122994064429531.


This obituary was originally published in the Daily Progress.