Douglas Fleming Hale

1943 - 2025

Portland, ME - Dr. Douglas Fleming Hale, former Professor of Mathematics and Computer Science at UT Permian Basin died September 23, 2025, Maine.

A memorial service is being planned for next summer when his family can gather to celebrate his life. It will also be streamed for the many people whose lives he touched in Odessa and throughout the world.

Doug grew up in upstate New York and Columbus, Ohio with his younger sister, Anne. He attended the Ohio State University, getting his BS, MS and PhD in Mathematics. While in Columbus he met and married his first wife, Margie LeCureaux - now Margie Rodgers Gillette. After a short stint as a lecturer in mathematics at Oklahoma State University, where his first son David was born, he became one of the founding faculty members at the University of Texas, Permian Basin in Odessa, Texas in 1973, where he taught courses in mathematics and the then-emerging field of computer science.

At UTPB he met Dr. Lois Smith Hale, with whom he had his second son, Peter, in 1979. Together they served the UTPB community for forty years. In the 1990s Doug led UTPB's pioneering distance learning program the Regional Electronic Academic Communications Highway (REACH), with the goal of bringing college and post-graduate courses to students throughout remote parts of West Texas, but finding demand for the program worldwide. In addition to developing some of the key techniques in effective distance education, Doug researched how to integrate distance education programs into traditional higher education and gain acceptance among college administrators who viewed the emerging technology as both opportunity and challenge.

Doug believed in a holistic approach to higher education and viewed his job as constantly challenging his students to think, and to learn to apply their learnings beyond the classroom. He was recognized for his dedication to his students and to scholarship when he was awarded the Minnie Stevens Piper Foundation Piper Professor award in 2007 and the University of Texas Regents Outstanding Teacher Award in 2009.

His impact on students went beyond the classroom, however. He was a strident advocate and a sought-after mentor for generations of students.

Inspired by his father's struggle with Alzheimer's disease, Doug was the chair of the board of the STAR Chapter of Alzheimer's Association, which encompasses the western two-thirds of Texas, extending from the Panhandle to the Valley. His work with the Alzheimer's Association led him to realize in his later years when the disease began to impact himself. Ever dedicated to learning and research, he volunteered for studies looking for methods to slow the disease.

In his private life Doug loved to cook and to read, generally books about history and science. After spending years of summer vacations on Bailey Island, Maine, with Lois, the two eventually purchased the historic schoolhouse on the island as their retirement home. Lois predeceased Doug in 2022.

Doug is survived by his son David and daughter-in-law Anne-Cécile of Ellicott City, Maryland, son Peter and daughter-in-law Orenda of Cape Elizabeth, Maine, and grandchildren Hannah, Sophie, Madeleine, Charlotte, Luca, Lola, and Poppy.

In lieu of flowers the family asks that you consider a contribution to the Drs. Lois and Doug Hale Endowed Scholarship at UTPB.