Delbert E. Patton
Delbert E. Patton passed away peacefully in his sleep at his home in West Yarmouth, MA on Saturday, December 3rd. He was 85.
 
Born in Spokane, WA, Del was the son of Paul and Delberta “Bertie” Patton and older brother to Terry Patton. Paul was a ham radio operator and photographer, activities that became lifelong hobbies for Del. Bertie was an elementary school teacher and librarian, raising both sons to be lifelong learners. The family stayed in the same house in Spokane throughout Del’s childhood. Camping, fishing, and many other outdoor pursuits were popular activities.
 
Both boys gravitated to the sciences, routinely dominating science fair competitions. Del played the trombone in the high school orchestra and band, reluctantly dropping the instrument while pursuing his BS in Physics degree at the University of Washington due to the extensive lab time requirements. He was a big fan of the Washington Huskies athletic program and rooted for them throughout his life. Summers included a job with the state, fighting wildfires.
 
After graduating, Del was hired by the National Bureau of Standards in Boulder, Colorado. He started taking graduate school classes, working toward an eventual degree. He also had an amazing opportunity to participate in the International Geophysical Year program in Antarctica as an ionospheric physicist. Del was there for 15 months, based at the old Byrd Station, and moved to the new one when it opened. He had his own research projects at a location away from the base. When visibility was poor, he followed a line from the base out to his site and back so he didn’t get lost. Del stayed in touch with his family via ham radio, keeping a regular schedule with his father back in Spokane. While largely cut off from the world, the team of scientists was aware of Cold War tensions and sometimes discussed trying to restore a damaged C-130 plane in case they needed to evacuate themselves to South America. Because he spent a winter at the base, a land formation was named after him. Patton Bluff is situated between Shibuya Peak and Coleman Nunatak on the east side of Berry Glacier, in Marie Byrd Land.
 
After returning to Colorado, Del decided to move to the Boston area and pursue career opportunities on its booming Electronics Row along Route 128. He took a job at Raytheon and completed his Master’s in Electrical Engineering at Northeastern University. During this period, he was living in an apartment in Norwood, MA. As fate would have it, a woman named Martha L. Donahue was living across the hall. She caught his eye and he arranged to meet her by her mailbox and introduce himself. A courtship featuring Boston Symphony Orchestra concerts, trips to major museums, and fine dining at area restaurants ensued. Because Martha summered at her mother’s house in West Yarmouth, MA on Cape Cod, Del became a regular weekend guest during warmer months. The couple were married in 1966 in Norwood and soon bought a house in rapidly expanding Chelmsford, MA. Del picked the lot for the house to ensure it was high enough and included sufficient space for his 60’ tall radio antenna. A bedroom was dedicated to his ham radio and computer equipment, along with an ever-growing collection of ham radio cards from other operators all over the world. The yard was backed by a farm with open land, making the whole area popular with lots of wildlife. Over time, Del customized the house and yard. He designed and built a large porch addition and then a free-standing three story treehouse for the expanding family.
 
During his years at Raytheon, Del focused on several over-the-horizon backscatter radar defense projects. Because he was highly skilled as both a theoretical scientist and a practical engineer, the company often sent him abroad because he could cover the work of two people. He traveled extensively to Europe and the Pacific. In the Pacific, he was often at Kwajalein Atoll in the Marshall Islands. He also visited Australia and New Zealand. (Fun Fact: Del traveled to every continent except Africa during his life.)
 
Del and Martha took full advantage of opportunities for global travel, often on his work trips. Before having children, they visited England, France, and Italy and skied the Alps. They also traveled to Central and South America to visit Mayan and Incan sites, furthering their interest in early civilizations.
 
After completing his work at Raytheon, Del worked at a small business called ASEC that oversaw defense contracts at multiple companies. He briefly considered moving to California but took a job at MIT Lincoln Laboratory instead and had an 18-year career there. The work was top secret. During the job interview, he was only shown an older, unclassified project and asked if things like that would be interesting. While at Lincoln Laboratory, he became more and more of a computer scientist. Eventually, he was buying, configuring, assembling, and troubleshooting individual custom computer environments for a large group of scientists. At home, he built his own computer from scratch, including hand wiring the components.
 
The family had glimpses into how high priority Del’s work was. There was the early morning on a weekend when Keith found him in the kitchen in a suit headed into the office because something was wrong, and a presentation was scheduled for Monday. Del referred to the project by many euphemisms, but never told his inquisitive son what the project was. There was a sit-down meeting with both boys where the possibility (remote, but real) of them being abducted was discussed. And there was the Scouting canoe trip to backwoods Maine where he had to file a trip plan with the office in case he needed to be retrieved by helicopter.
 
Outside of work, his interests in the outdoors, nature, and cultural events continued. The family regularly went on camping and hiking trips. They towed their tent trailer on vacations throughout the Northeast United States and Eastern Canada. Countless hours were enjoyed together on museum trips. They took in concerts from Tanglewood in the Berkshires to the Esplanade in Boston to bandshells on the Cape. Del was Scoutmaster of Troop 81 in the now-defunct Greater Lowell Council for seven years. He guided hundreds of Scouts, many of whom earned Eagle Scout (including both Craig and Keith) and the yard was routinely filled with canoes, tents, and other gear pre- and post-trips. While his Westerner pride sometimes led him to poke fun at the White Mountains, dubbing them the “White Foothills,” he greatly enjoyed exploring them, particularly in the Fall when the leaves were ablaze with color. For one thing, they made great photo subjects. He took an uncountable number of shots with his ever-evolving array of cameras, documenting the family’s life and the world around him.
 
Another great love of Del’s was time spent with the family dogs. While Del had grown up with pets, there were none in his own family’s life in Chelmsford until Keith was a teenager working on Pets Merit Badge and came out of a neighbor’s house with a puppy. Long walks and bouts of playing with Netami and then Nischa were a great joy for him.
 
After Del retired in 1996, he and Martha moved to West Yarmouth. Martha had inherited the house from her mother and Del designed a substantial renovation, including the addition of a second floor. He used CAD software to turn a ranch house into a tasteful two-story Cape home that impressed the builders brought in to execute the plans.
 
Over the next 20+ years, Del and Martha traveled extensively, often using condo exchange credits from the property they had purchased decades earlier at Attitash Mountain Resort. Highlights included a Viking cruise along rivers from the Mediterranean to the North Sea and a trip to China with Keith. The trip to Alaska provided Del with a sought-after chance to travel above the Arctic Circle, pairing it with his time below the Antarctic Circle decades earlier. The pair visited Williamsburg, VA so often that a local tour coordinator asked them if they’d ever considered being docents. 
 
Del also discovered a way to contribute to his new community through the Yarmouth Senior Center. He began giving courses on a broad range of home computing topics. The classes branched into providing technical support and 1:1 tutoring in people’s homes. He occasionally brought home client laptops to repair, or to harvest for parts to use elsewhere.
 
Del was a season ticket holder at Cape Cod Symphony and a member of the Cape Cod Natural History Museum for many years. He was a reliable donor to the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute in later years.
 
He is survived by his wife of 56 years, Martha L. Patton, his sons Craig and Keith, and four grandchildren. A funeral mass will be held on January 7 at 11:00 AM at St. Pius X in South Yarmouth, with a reception to follow at Scargo Cafe in Dennis. His cremains will be interred in the Memorial Wall at Holy Trinity Church in Harwich. In lieu of flowers, the family requests that donations be made to the National Park Foundation (www.nationalparks.org),the Center for Coastal Studies (coastalstudies.org), or the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute 

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