On Thursday, April 9th, I received this email from my good friend and colleague, Bob Wardwell:
To my extended family - my life has been enhanced by the close relationships with all of you. I can’t tell you how much I have enjoyed it! My journey through life has come to a close. My airplane had the wheels come down yesterday. This is the end of the trip. I have loved all of you!
Love to all, Bob
It took me a few moments for the meaning of his email to sink in - and then it hit me - classic Wardwell composing an email to be sent out to his "extended family" on the day after his death.
Bob and His Partner
It was pleasant serendipity that I met Bob while I was working at CU-Colorado Springs. Bob was part of a small research group at Penrose Hospital and Cancer Center working on building a computer model of breast cancer growth and treatment. A physician, a physicist and mathematician, a computer scientist, a cell/molecular biologist, and Bob the engineer who herded these cats. After leaving Colorado Springs, I kept in contact with Bob over the years, and was continually amazed at the depth and breadth of his knowledge. And we could even agree to disagree on some subjects!!
Surrounded by his family at home, where he wanted to be, Robert Hayes Wardwell passed from his children's love to God's love on April 8, 2026.
Bob was born to Gladys and Robert Wardwell, Sr., on November 18, 1930, in Colorado Springs, then a town of thirty thousand people with a trolley system. He attended Steele Elementary School, North Junior High, and Colorado Springs High School (now Palmer), graduating in 1949. While enrolled in the Colorado School of Mines, Bob enlisted in the United States Navy and left Colorado to fight in the Korean War as a flight navigator. After the war he finished his engineering degree at San Jose State.
Bob began his career working at Hewlett Packard in 1953 and retired from there in 1997. He holds nineteen patents for probing technologies and microchip design. After his beloved wife Naeda was diagnosed with cancer in 1983, he helped found Oncometrics, a trailblazing group of engineers and physicians who worked together to model tumor cells and prepare treatment plans. In retirement he continued to run his own business, NEWTek engineering, which supported his patent work, microchip and probing technologies.
Bob was preceded in death by Naeda in 2011, and his daughter Gail in 2019. He is survived by his children—Charlotte (John), Steven (Nadine), Ryan (Marianna), Erin (Ethan), Allison (Michael), and Meredith (Shane)—and two exchange students who became family, Johan Lof, Dimitry Pluschev and thirteen granchildren - Dana, Keelin, Lauren, George, Sidney, Robert, Jacinto, Ella, Deegan, Cullen, William, Wyatt and Colette.
Bob met Naeda in 1964 in Palo Alto CA. They were married for forty-seven years. He was a beloved husband, father and friend. He was an active community member who belonged to the Elks, the Range Riders, and First Presbyterian Church. A voracious reader with a love history, physics, mathematics and current events, Bob played a game of pool and finished Theo of Golden shortly before he passed.
We are brokenhearted by his passing but delight that he is reunited with our beloved mother and sister.
Bob loved life, loved learning, loved his friends, and most of all loved his favmily
5 comments:
Bob inspired me to write my last email that hopefully will go out one day after I check out - just like Bob
You know that some wiseguy is going to say, "Can't wait to see what your final email has to say!"
Yes, Anon, and I think that I know who that wise guy is :-) Rest assured that my final analogy won't be an airplane, but rather basketball!
Thank you so much for lovely last note of my uncle Bob.
I am his sister’s (Trudy Wardwell) daughter Cathryn Cordova Garbers. My mother passed back in 2011 shortly before Bob’s wife Naeda.
I was on occasion calling Bob and he did come to visit me in Rosita. I had numerous pictures of our family in our extra cabin. He wanted to take some, but Steve stopped him.
I heard that he was doing quite well. I know he would go play pool with his buddies on Thursday evenings.
I will always remember him for his intelligence.
Again, thank you for the lovely memorial.
Cathryn Cordova Garbers
Thank you for sending this out!!! Bob was one cool individual that was not only smart, but very talented and loved by all who met him!!!!
Greg Budwine
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