Donald Lynn Simms

Donald Lynn Simms unexpectedly passed away November 28, 2022 in his home in Manistee Michigan.

He was born November 1,1944 in Detroit Michigan to Donald R Simms and Rachel Elois (Robison) Simms. He is survived by his wife Wangchun (Cheyenne) Zhang-Simms, his son Stephen Simms of Manistee, and his daughter, Kari Mcginnis (James) of Peoria, IL and his granddaughter, Regan Simms.   Also surviving are his siblings, Terry (MaryJo) Simms of Middletown, DE, Larry (De)Simms of Macomb, Sharon (Don) Daly of Rapid City, Jane (Ken) French of Odessa, FL and Charlotte (Ed) Gizowski of The Villages, FL. He was predeceased by his brother Jim Simms in 2003.

As a youth he participated in Boy Scouts, delivered newspapers, played the saxophone and baseball, had a great sense of humor and had lots of friends growing up on the eastside of Detroit. He graduated from Wilbur Wright High School in Detroit in July 1962 and continued to work for JN Fauver company where he had worked as a co-op student prior to his graduation and where he met Cheryl Lynn Spencer and married in 1967. Shortly after their marriage, he enlisted in the US Army Reserves and was called up to serve in Vietnam for 22 months.

He had a very successful career in the fluid power business, both designing systems, trouble shooting them and installing them. He retired from Parker Hanafin in 2014 where he did consulting on Specifications and Optimization and managing machine tool systems for manufacturing processes, and won many awards for his consulting work on Ford Powertrain for Parker.

After retiring he was able to spend more time enjoying his many passions which included golf, sailing, woodworking, playing in Euchre tournaments (& hosting them), volunteering for DAV and gathering family histories. He was a very supportive husband, father, brother and friend. He was always willing to help someone in need and will be missed by all.

The Herbert Funeral Home of Manistee is in charge of funeral arrangements.