Harrison Doyle Bushman, age 85, passed away Feb. 16 in Tacoma, where he had moved in September with his cherished wife of 65 years, Gloria Siegalkoff Bushman.
For the past 30 years, they had resided on their beloved Whidbey Island where they were members at Useless Bay Golf Club, making many friends and enjoying golf. They had moved recently to be nearer to family.
Doyle was born in Chico, Calif. and grew up in nearby Lodi. As a boy, he picked cotton and worked in local vineyards. In high school, he was a record setting freestyle swimmer for the Lodi Flames. He met Gloria in school and proposed to her in one of Lodi’s vineyards as she sat perched on a grape box. They then eloped to Reno in April 1942.
He enlisted in the Marine Corps in 1943 and served in some of the most difficult battles of the South Pacific Theater, emerging in 1945 as a tech sergeant. He then took his wife and two daughters, Sharon and Claudia, to Fairbanks, Alaska in 1949 to begin a career in electronics engineering with the Civil Aeronautics Administration (later FAA).
Moving from Fairbanks to the Tlingit Indian village of Yakutat, and three years later to Anchorage, then a town of 15,000, he held progressively responsible positions in FAA, retiring in 1978 as Sector Manager of the Alaska Region Air Traffic Control Center. His work often took him to chilly and remote areas of the state in all kinds of weather. He was dedicated to his family and spent the summer weekends fishing and camping with them.
Doyle set a wonderful example for his children and colleagues with his integrity, hard work, intelligence, respect and love for his friends and family. He loved to recite and write doggerel, and friends celebrating events frequently called on his poetic talents. He had a wonderful incisive sense of humor and a quick wit. And he was a talented caricaturist and tinkerer.
Doyle leaves behind his wife Gloria, daughters Sharon Manning of Anchorage and Claudia Ellsworth of Tacoma, and their husbands, Bob Manning and Lewis (Lynn) Ellsworth; four grandchildren and four great-grandsons; two sisters, Eileen Rabusin and Jeanne Paoletti, both of Lodi.
A memorial service will be held at Langley United Methodist Church at 2 p.m. Friday, Feb. 22. The family suggests that any remembrances be made to the American Cancer Society or the Multicare Health Foundation.
