Damon R. Runyan ’61

Damon died July 7, 2011, in Lakewood, Colo., after a brief battle with gall bladder cancer. 

Damon came to Princeton from Lakewood High School and majored in geological engineering. At Princeton, he was in Army ROTC, took his meals at Cloister, and roomed with Bob Wilkinson and Ed Zschau.

In the year following graduation, he enrolled at UC Berkeley and married his high-school sweetheart, Lorene Tyler. After earning a master’s degree in engineering in 1963, Damon served in the Army in Hawaii for three years before beginning a four-decade career in geological engineering that took him to Hawaii (19 years), Iran (three years), and New Jersey (two years) before returning home to Colorado.

Damon’s true loves were his family and the outdoors. He was able to combine both in the Rocky Mountains with Lorene and his son, Andrew, and daughter, Ondine, and their families, including five grandchildren, living close by. Eleven years ago, Damon and Lorene purchased a cabin in Estes Park, Colo., where the whole family could be together, laugh at Damon’s dry humor, and enjoy inspiring mountain vistas.

The class extends deepest sympathy to Lorene and all of Damon’s loving family.