Paul Ebaugh

Paul Ebaugh August 17, 1914-August 31, 2005 Paul Ebaugh, 91, of State College, emeritus associate dean for research in Penn State's College of Engineering, died Wednesday, August 31st, at the Fairways at Brookline. He was born in Salt Lake City, Utah, on August 17, 1914, son of William Clarence and Edna Grace Hart Harrington Ebaugh. On December 10, 1938, he married Jean Huesmann, who preceded him in death on January 1, 1980. Dean Ebaugh, who received a bachelor's degree in physics from Denison University, Granville, Ohio, in 1935, joined the Penn State faculty in 1945 as assistant professor at the then-Ordinance Research Laboratory. In 1959 he served as Acting Director of the Laboratory. Previously, he worked with the Owens-Corning Fiberglas Corp., where he developed the original coatings and lubricants for fiberglass textiles. He spent a year researching low and intermediate temperature bonds for basic open-hearth steel furnace refractory aggregates, working for Basic Refractories Inc. of Tiffin, Ohio. From 1943 to 1945 he was a research associate at the Harvard Underwater Sound Laboratory, developing guidance systems for torpedoes. In 1957, he became associate dean for research in Penn States College of Engineering. Among his many administrative duties, he directed the Space Science and Engineering Laboratory for 13 years; and was acting director of the Pennsylvania Transportation and Traffic Safety Center, when it was established in 1968. Paul and Jean are survived by four sons: Walter and his wife Michele in State College, Pa., William and his wife Danielle in Tallahassee, Fla., Joseph and his wife Tammy in Arnold, Md., and Philip and his wife Nancy in Purcellville, Va. They have six grandchildren and one great grandchild. His civic activity included membership from 1962 to 1969 on the State College Planning Commission for which he was chairman from 1964 on. He took credit for the installation of street trees in the downtown district, despite the claim for same by his friend Arnold Addison. Paul lived an interesting and full life. Fifty years ago this summer, he introduced his sons to the joy of bass fishing on the Rideau Lakes in Ontario, a pleasure they continue to enjoy and share at a cottage near Chaffey's Locks. As a schoolboy in Granville, Ohio, he won the State springboard diving championship. At age 16 he swam across the Bosporus from Europe to Asia. And, he claimed to be the only resident of Pennsylvania present in the bleachers to watch Apollo 11 take off to first land man on the moon. For the past several years, his son, Walter, has been reading every day to him, and to his good friend in the next room, coach Jim O'Hora. The books were the twenty-volume Master and Commander series by Patric O'Brian. In August they were in book fourteen for the second time through, and both Paul and Jim died during the latter half of The Thirteen Gun Salute. Friends will be received at the home of Walter and Michele Ebaugh, 107 Redwood Lane, from 2 to 5 o'clock on the afternoon of Saturday, September 24th.