Wolfgang Helmut Kummer

1925 - 2021

1925 - 2021 To our dear departed husband, father, father-in-law, and grandfather, Dr. Wolfgang Helmut Kummer, who passed away on January 1, 2021. Yours was the life of a husband, father, immigrant, scientist, and world traveler. Your love for life was evidenced by a life so well and fully lived. For those of us who knew and loved you, our lives were all the better for having you in them, and all the worse now you've departed us.Born in Stuttgart, you grew up with the backdrop of a rising Nazi party, which forced your family to flee. The night Hitler was appointed Chancellor in 1933, you and your mother left your home and possessions behind taking only a small bag to carry. Your father fled to the United States in 1934. This formative experience impressed upon you, and upon all of us through your retellings, the transience of one's circumstance and the truly valuable things in life. If you had to leave tonight, what would you carry, but more importantly who would you take with you?You and your mother spent the next several years living in Belgium then Paris, while waiting to join your father in the United States. But before the three of you could be reunited, your father was killed in a traffic accident in 1937. The tragic irony of his death, having escaped political persecution and imprisonment in Nazi Germany, was not lost on you. Perhaps it contributed to your zealous installation of seat belts into our family car (before such things were compulsory).Still determined to achieve a better future in this country, you immigrated to Michigan where you had relatives, but their hospitality was short-lived. Recalling your father's fondness for San Francisco, where he had worked as a welder on the Golden Gate Bridge, your mother moved the two of you there. Sight unseen, and barely speaking a word of English, she took her 13 year old son across an unknown country to a city she only knew from a photograph.Growing up, you always emphasized the importance of education to us kids. You often told us how after arriving in America (though you knew German, French and Flemish), you didn't speak a word of English. So teachers relegated you to a desk at the back of the classroom. It was a mere six weeks before you assumed your seat at the front, a designation reserved for the top student in the class. And as you would proudly recall, you never left it. It served as a reminder to us that with all the advantages afforded to us, there is no reason why we shouldn't succeed.You spent the remainder of your teen and college years in the San Francisco Bay Area, attending Lowell High School and then University of California Berkeley. Your passion for science and engineering captivated you throughout your life. After receiving your Ph.D in electrical engineering in 1954, you moved to New Jersey for your first job at Bell Labs. There you met your future wife Mary Mau, who was working as a nurse at Columbia Presbyterian at the time.In 1959 you moved to California to work for Hughes Aircraft Company and raise a family with your now wife Mary. The two of you built the first house on top of a hill in Santa Monica overlooking the city. Because you were one of the first on the street, you got to choose your house number: 13 for Mary's birth date and 10 for yours. While other homes and families sprung up around, 1310 played host to countless music lessons, girl & boy scout meetings, and neighborhood get-togethers.You and Mary raised four children in that yellow house on top of the hill, instilling in us your ethos of self-sufficiency and resilience. Hiring someone to do your work for you was anathema to your sensibilities. Anything that needed to be done, we could do ourselves. Before we kids went off to make our own ways in the world, you made sure we could change our cars' oil, do a valve job by hand, and sweat copper pipes together. It wasn't until you entered your eighties that you relented and hired a gardener.At Hughes Aircraft you were a technical leader in the fields of antennas and radio-wave propagation, but despite your passion for your work you always made your family a priority. For you and Mary, retirement entailed traveling to the far reaches of the world. From traversing Burma's jungles to taking a boat up the Nile, you left no stone unturned, no sight unseen. Your unending curiosity propelled your travels far and wide, as you soaked up every bit of life that you could. When grandchildren came, you were reliably there to pick them up from school in the Rambler or teach them more than they wanted to know about their math homework.You will be remembered for your caring personality, distinguished character, and perhaps a weakness for sweets. You had a positive impact on and showed appreciation for everyone you met. You would never let anyone accept "a penny for their thoughts," instead urging them to always ask for at least a quarter. Because of the way you lived, you will be missed and never forgotten.Survived by your wife of 64 years, Mary; daughters, Winnie and Johanna; sons, Edward and Arthur; and seven grandchildren.In lieu of flowers, please send a donation to the Cure Alzheimer's Fund and 100% of your donation will go directly to research. https://curealz.org/giving/donate/