David A. McCutchan

David McCutchan was born February 14, 1932 and passed peacefully on November 11th, 2024 at 92.
He was born in Dearborn, Michigan to Arthur McCutchan and Wynne Larmour Gillespie. Arthur was an engineer and Wynne was a schoolteacher and they instilled a healthy love for science, math and respect for education.
David attended Edison Elementary School in Detroit and after his family moved to Louisville, Kentucky. He attended the Louisville Male High School 1946-1950. He attended University of Colorado for Mechanical Engineering. There he joined the Sigma Phi Epsilon Fraternity. Among his summer jobs was an adventure at Yellowstone National Park. After his graduation in 1954, a classmate told him of an opportunity to get a research assistantship in the AEC's Ames Laboratory at Iowa State College and get a master's degree in Nuclear Engineering.
At Iowa State, by good fortune he took his meals with the Sig Ep fraternity chapter there and was set up on a blind date with Virginia Hurlbert, a Chicago girl whose sorority house was across the street. They fell in love and were married in Evanston, IL on January 14th, 1956.
At Ginny's urging, he then ventured to North Carolina State for a PhD in nuclear engineering. There he held assistantships and Ginny worked at the college in the Human Resources department until 1960. Dave's PhD earned him an exciting job opportunity in Pittsburgh, PA at Astro (The Astronuclear Laboratory). The laboratory won a contract from a DOE/NASA office to design a Nuclear Rocket for Vehicle Application. A high spot was a 15-month assignment with other Westinghouse engineers to work at the Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory near Santa Fe, NM. The Los Alamos Laboratory had developed the initial design of the reactor and tested it at Los Alamos and near Las Vegas. Dave and Ginny loved the Hispanic and Indian culture and they created a family with their daughter Susan, who was born at Los Alamos on December 19, 1961.
Later David held jobs at the Advanced Systems Technology Division and in a reliability engineering group in the Nuclear Technology Division of Westinghouse. He always said he had great managers, interesting work and fascinating business trips to Saudi Arabia, Japan and France. He took advantage of an early retirement incentive in 1990.
Anyone that knew Dave knows he was always learning and loved working, so in 1992 he joined Responics, Inc. medical equipment supplier in Murrysville PA and worked there in a reliability group until retiring again in 1997.
Never idle, Dave began volunteering at the Carnegie Museum of Natural History extracting bone fragments from matrix material and then later in the Mullosk Department. He thoroughly loved interacting with intelligent curators and scientists.
He independently wrote a comprehensive textbook with his Dear friend Al Mowery with the hopes that it could be published for free use by engineering students. He also compiled information for a "pretensioner" being a lover of words and collected thousands of idioms that amused him.
He leaves behind his wife of nearly 59 years, Virginia. His daughter Susan and her husband Greg Shogan and his beloved granddaughter Alyssa, of whom he was in awe of her intelligence and willingness to debate all things from nuclear power to politics.
David's quirky personality did not make him universally likeable but anyone that truly knew him understood he had the heart and soul of a Christian. He literally counted his blessing each and every day from the serendipity of meeting lifelong friends to the beauty of Western Pennsylvania and the absolute joys of owning loving pets.
The majority of this obituary was written by David himself several years ago and the last line that he wrote is especially impactful.
The end of this abundantly blessed life occurred after a brief illness.
The world has a hole in it for those that loved him.
A memorial service will be held Friday, November 15th at 1:00 pm at the Murrysville Redstone Highlands Chapel. Arrangements were entrusted to Jobe Funeral Home & Crematory, Inc 445 Beatty Rd. Monroeville, (412)-856-4747. Any donations in Dave's honor may be made to the Sierra Club foundation. It is a four star charity, whose mission is to educate and empower people to protect and improve the natural and human environment.
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