David Orson Tolman

David Orson Tolman

AGE: 72 • Princeton

David Orson Tolman, 72, of Princeton died Monday, November 23, 2015, at University Medical Center of Princeton at Plainsboro. He had been a resident of Princeton since 2002 and married Dorothy M. Shepard in 2005.

After graduating from Brigham Young University and serving a Latter-Day Saints mission in Vienna, Austria, David came to Princeton to do his graduate work. He studied the history and philosophy of science at Princeton under Thomas Kuhn. David then worked in the budding computer industry. His career titles changed as the industry evolved; he started as a technical writer and retired as a project manager designing complex computer infrastructure systems for large businesses.

A gifted man, David was a fount of information on many subjects, from Einstein to Brahms. He wrote well about history as well as science. In his retirement, he especially loved to travel and continued to collect knowledge and experiences wherever he went.

David was the son of Leo Loveland and Verna Bastian Tolman. He was born in Ames, Iowa; on the early death of his father, the Tolman family moved to Provo, Utah. He had one sister, Christine Tolman Ence, and four brothers: Richard, Glen, Leon, and Brian. A devoted father, he and the late Kathleen Gubler Tolman raised their family in Merchantville, NJ. They had one son, Benjamin Clark Tolman, and three daughters: Miriam Tolman Spencer, Margaret Tolman Hatten, and Ruth Tolman. David had seven grandchildren: John, Rebekah, Lucas, Nathan, Andrew, Seth, and Mirabel.

A memorial service will be held on Saturday, February 13, 2016. Memorial contributions may be made to the Marquand Park Foundation. Arrangements are under the direction of the Mather-Hodge Funeral Home, 40 Vandeventer Avenue, Princeton, NJ.