Dr. John Leif Ritan

News Death Notice

RITAN, Dr. John Leif passed away December 18, 2010 and just missed celebration of his 78th birthday on January 5, 2011. John was born in Ames, Iowa in 1933. The son of Dr. Andrew and Mary Ritan, his early childhood was spent in the South and North Dakotas living with his family on Indian reservations where his father served as a physician with the bureau of Indian Affairs. In 1938 the family relocated to Tahlequah, Oklahoma where Andrew opened the W.W. Hastings Indian Hospital. Following World War II, the family relocated to Muskogee, Oklahoma where his father worked in the Veterans Hospital. John graduated from Muskogee Oklahoma High School in 1951, from Northeastern State in Tahlequah, Oklahoma in 1954 and medical school at Oklahoma University in Oklahoma City in 1957. After completing his Radiology residency at University Hospital in Tulsa, Oklahoma, he joined the U.S. Air Force and was posted at the USAF Maxwell Hospital in Montgomery, Alabama. After his discharge in 1963, he joined the Tulsa Radiology Associates and resigned in 1972. John came to Middletown, Ohio to join Middletown Radiology Associates in 1972, and became an associate with the Middletown Ohio Hospital Radiology Department. He retired in 1998 as director of the Middletown Hospital Radiology Department. John was active in many civic organizations throughout his adult life. Among those in which he was most involved included All Souls Unitarian Church, the founding of Hope Unitarian Church, discussion leader and president of Great Books Reading Program, all in Tulsa Oklahoma. In Ohio he served as president of the Butler County Medical Society, president of Butler County Planned Parenthood, and a member of the Greater Cincinnati Planned Parenthood Board. He was president of the Middletown Symphony and guest conductor two years. John was also a member and chair of numerous hospital committees as well as on the Middletown Hospital Foundation Board. Preceding John were his parents Dr. Andrew and Mary Ritan. John is survived by his wife of 33 years Virginia Ritan, children Andrew Ritan (Atlanta, GA), Elizabeth Ritan (Salmon, ID), Maria Taylor and husband Ken Kraus (Dayton, OH), grandchildren Justin Ellis, Cole Taylor and Logan Kraus, sister Mary Ellen and husband Charles Simms (Albuquerque, NM), and three nieces Wendy Tanner (Albuquerque, NM), Jill Garland (Rio Rancho, NM), and Dixie Gunderson (Tempe, AZ). The Memorial Service will be held on Wednesday, January 5, 2011 in the Chapel at Woodside Cemetery and Arboretum. The prelude will start at 3:30 pm and the service will begin at 4:00 pm. The family will greet friends after the Memorial Service from 5:00 7:00 p.m. at the Woodside Community Center. Contributions in lieu of flowers may be made to the Alzheimer's Association of Greater Cincinnati Chapter, 644 Linn Street, Suite 1026, Cincinnati, Ohio 45203 and the Middletown Symphony Orchestra, PO Box 441, Middletown, OH 45042. Arrangements by Herr-Riggs Funeral Home, 210 S. Main St., Middletown