Dr. Theodore “Ted” Folkerth

Ted was born at home in Darke County, Ohio in 1937 to L.D. and Lenore Folkerth, who raised him on the family farm. Ted was the middle child of three; he had an older sister, Nancy, and a younger, Rhoda. He often recalled fond memories of working alongside his grandfather William Carpenter, with whom he developed a respect and love of husbandry.

Ted attended a rural high school, graduating in a class of eleven. After earning a bachelor’s degree in Chemistry from Earlham College (1959), Ted continued his studies, earning a master’s degree in Biochemistry at Indiana University (1962) and then receiving his medical degree from Indiana University’s School of Medicine (1965). It was during his time at Indiana University that he met and married Lenora Lee Wallace, with whom he would have three children.

After medical school, Ted joined the Navy and continued his medical education. The family moved to southern California, where Ted specialized in surgery at the Naval Medical Center in San Diego. He completed three tours in Vietnam as a surgeon, at times attached to the US Marines, with which he developed a lasting sense of camaraderie. The family then moved up to the Bay Area, where Ted studied cardiac surgery at the Stanford VA Hospital. The family then moved back down to southern California, to the city of Del Mar, while Ted continued his commitments to the Navy. In 1975 he travelled to Children’s Hospital in Boston Massachusetts to do a six-month residency in pediatric cardiac surgery, becoming one of a handful of people worldwide who could do this surgery at the time.

After an honorable discharge in 1977 at the rank of Commander, Ted entered private practice at Good Samaritan Hospital in San Jose, CA. A few years later Ted moved to Santa Rosa, where he created Santa Rosa Memorial Hospital’s heart program, offering care to patients and their families who had previously had to seek treatment out of county.

Feeling the pull of southern California life, Ted then relocated back to Del Mar, California to open a private practice at Tri-City Medical Center, where he would eventually serve as Chief of Staff with the constant support of his wife and registered heart nurse, Jean. Ted concluded his 58-year career at UC San Diego as an adjunct professor, assisting newly licensed surgeons. Over the course of his long career in cardio-thoracic surgery he operated on many thousands of patients, in many cases literally saving their lives. He was especially renowned for his bedside manner, one of the best in the business. He never forgot where he came from.

Ted was a natural and fiercely competitive athlete. He enjoyed recounting the tale of the high school pitcher who threw a fastball high and inside, sending a young Ted into the dirt. Ted sent the pitcher’s next pitch over the fence. He was an excellent tennis player and golfer, and enjoyed playing with friends, as well as with his children. He tried to instill his competitive spirit in his kids by offering to sign over his car to them if they could beat him. They never did, but they sure kept trying. He thought homemade ice cream tasted better when it was cranked by hand.

He loved music, especially opera and symphonic works, and often had season tickets to the local opera or symphony orchestra. Even more than he loved music, he loved to laugh and to joke around with friends and family. He was an excellent teller of jokes, the punchlines of which would sometimes be woven through family conversation decades later, long after the actual joke itself was forgotten. He was an avid reader, especially of histories and biographies. He earned a private pilot’s license in the mid-1970s, and flew all over California, as well as to Montana, Arizona, and Baja California. Later in life, Ted enjoyed breeding thoroughbred race horses and making classical guitars in his home woodshop. As a luthier he made over 50 guitars. He built a life of love and devotion to those around him.

Ted is survived, and greatly missed, by his three children Wesley, Elizabeth and Geoffrey, his wife, Jean and his two stepchildren, Jaime and Kevin, along with eight grandchildren, Alex, Finnley, Lee, Eleanor, Magnus, Regan, Jaxon, and Ryder, and two great-grandchildren, Hudson, and Theo.

A funeral service with honors for Ted will be held Friday, May 3, 2024 from 10:15 AM to 10:45 AM at Miramar National Cemetery, 5795 Nobel Dr, San Diego, CA 92122.