Alan Rutledge Bredin DDS

Alan "Rutledge" Bredin age, 88, of Fort Gratiot passed away on October 24, 2025. He was born March 14, 1937, in Cincinnati, Ohio to the late Alan and Ola Bredin. He married Judy A. Smarda on March 14, 1992.
Rutledge was survived by his wife, Judy, stepchildren; Robin Teubert, Brian (Diane) Finkle, Daniel (Sharon) Perakes, Aimee Perakes, Elizabeth (Matt) Perakes-Cairns, several step grandchildren, siblings, Woody (Jean) Bredin, Todd (Susan) Bredin, special nephews and niece, Brian, Darryl and Julie, along with several other nieces and nephews.
He is preceded in death by his first wife, Sybil Cunningham- Bredin.
Services will be private.
Jowett Funeral Home is privileged to serve the Bredin Family.
DIGGITY DIGGITY
In trying to write a tribute for Rutledge (Dr. Alan R. Bredin, D.D.S.), I found this letter he penned for his BOOK PREFACE: he was attempting to write his life's story when he suffered his first stroke. He never got a chance to finish his story.
His career spanned more than fifty years of dentistry. He started out teaching dentistry at the University of Detroit, which he truly loved, in 1964, from there he opened his Family Dentistry practice in Farmington, Michigan which he maintained until the untimely murder of his beloved Office Manager. After that tragedy and loss Doc found employment working for other dentists which took him from Grand Blanc to Harbor Beach, Port Huron and finally Yale, Michigan. His passion through all the different roads on his journey was his love for his patients.
Rutledge has displayed great strength and courage in the walk he traveled in his lifetime! God has always been his constant companion; he said that was his attraction to me; my love also for God.
Doc's love of God left him with these thoughts and actions toward his patient's and associates - "when you come from love, you project that love to others, and they also return a loving relationship with you". He approached everyone with an open heart, no matter what anyone said. "I come from love almost all the time, they respond immediately, and are "different to me" than they were before. Prejudging someone on "on here-say", judging someone, creates a hostile arena, where no loving or mutual trusting or "rapport relationship can exist".
He would play tapes in the morning on his way to work and prayed to approach every associate/patient with love and without pre-judgment: they made it possible for him to greet each day with joy while still carrying the shadows of guilt and sadness.
We were very, very happy until the horrible tragedy of his beloved Office Manager of 16 yrs.: murder. That was the end of our happy, happy 10 months of marriage. In the aftermath of this heinous event, Doc suffered greatly from PTSD of which he never took/received any counseling (by his own choosing). We were newly wedded/together but the silence was deafening.
In some of his writings Doc states that about 3:00 a.m. every night he relived the bloody carnage that she endured, her eye out of her socket (he knew she was gone), the blood, the futile attempt to disarm her husband's attack. He still carried the overwhelming burden of not being able to protect and save her life. The safe world that he once knew was gone forever. Now, he faced a humiliating lawsuit claiming his incompetence for protection, loss of his practice, loss of his beloved patients, bankruptcy. At his age, the loss is unimaginable, but he perseveres. He had to humble himself and find work, part-time at first, with other dentists, traveling sometimes over 100 miles a day!
After my parents' passing, my inheritance afforded us a change of scenery. My mother passed away on Christmas morning, 2012, Al had his first stoke in Feb. 2013, and his final on 2014, on Ash Wednesday. As he cried, a while after his strokes, trying to communicate that he would no longer be able to render any type of cohesive conversation or tangible help, it was put in my heart that maybe moving to Arizona would be good for both of us. Doc loved Arizona; since my mom and dad had a lovely condo in Scottsdale, we moved. First, to Arizona then later to North Carolina. I won't go into all the stories attached to this move: suffice to say I hope and pray that these moves afforded Doc a refuge from his, not being able to live the life he loved. New adventures, new scenery, a better outlook for the beauty around us!
I know he loved our final home, here. We would walk every day, sit on the swing and look out at the water, watching the freighters float by. God knew what he was doing when he planted us here. Now, in my greatest challenge, it is comforting knowing that Rutledge is close by and being looked after with the utmost care. The hospice nurse told me that maybe a week or two, then he will truly find the peace and happiness he so richly deserves.
WHAT FOLLOWS IS A SMALL SHARING OF HIS PRIVATE THOUGHTS......
TO: SYBIL - for thirty years of a comfortable, loving marriage,
MY NIECES AND NEPHEWS - for giving me the love of children.
JACK - (his best forever friend) for being the thread that held all my lives together.
JUDY - who gave me renewed joy and happiness and encouraged me to write my story.
Book preface
In everyones life, there occurs such cataclysmic events that alter ones life seems completely different. In face, it is so different that it should be considered a separate life, with only threads to the previous life to make it congruous to the present.
These events can be pleasant or devastating, such as a marriage or death, but they are, nonetheless, totally altering of ones life.
Inbetween the extreems, there exists a proliferation of smaller, albeit significant event that change ones life inexorably. These include divorice, loss of love, forced change of career, moving to a different geography or away from friends or family, letting ones children go (empty nest syndrome}, survival of a catastrophy, or survival of a murder or accident scene.There are many other situations that create the phenomenon of a different life.
It is reality, it is a different – and new life.
This is not a new concept – from books like "how to survive the loss of a love
' to the concepts of Alcaholics Annonimous, it is emphasized that this is your life – now – and, while it is influenced by the past, it is not determined by the past. This instant is about now, and that is all that exists.
The book is about one life – I almost said one insignificant life – but I caught myself. This book is about a very significant life – mine!
It includes pain, sorrow, murder, loss of a love, loss of a child, and most of all, a realization of the reality that I have had several lives within my life, with only a small thread to join them together.
It was a dark and stormy night
I always liked the way that Snoopy – from Schultz's Peanuts – had his opening for his novel.
But I had gone to sleep with great anticipation from a forecast of frigig temperatures and SNOW!
I awoke to the familiar sound od a my dad shaking the grate to remove the "klinkers" from the coal furnace. Then the scrape, scrape of the shovel putting fresh coal into the burner. I knew that in twenty minutes or so we would begin to feel the heat permeate the house.
With only my eyes above the blankets, my excitements was so great that I braved the frosty room to jump out of bed and raise the shade – and there were there! In as much splendor as I could imaginve. Ice castles on the window pane! The crystal, sparkling ice forms covered most of the window pane! I stared at them for a long while – incredulous at the beauty, and imagining fantasies and forms in the patterns. But I had to reach my main goal. I first put a finger to the ice magic – and melted a small spot. But I had to see out. I put my palm to the window, and erased an area that I could see through. Yes! There was snow! My dreams had come true! Not several inches, but just a few. Just enough so that the car traffic on the side roads would leave a packed, perfect, ice hockey surface. My heart pounded to the after-school hockey game we would have! Boot hockey. I would gladly give up my boots for the goal posts – the buckels would catch each other and trip me up anyway!
Back in my room, I could smell the heat coming now, and so I flew to the bathroom where, as always, my dad had finished his shower and was ready to shave. He had this old straw hat that he put just so on his head to put a wave in his hair, and was spreading the lather on his face and chin for the shave. Im sure it was Burma-shave, as I had read the signs along the road for years now. I was about as happy as anyone could be as I took my perch on the toilet to watch the long, smooth strokes of the razor, waiting for the dab of Burma-shave on my chin – and the soft stroke to remove my "peach fuzz".
He had to go, and I dances back to the frigid room to dive under the covers and wait for the call. The bed wa already very cold, and so I would kick my feet in a peddling motion to warm up a spot. Soon the call came from Mom – "get up – breakfast in five minutes".
God, I loved winter!