Eugene Bonner Turner

Eugene Turner of Torrance, California died on February 28, 2017 at age 94. Eugene Turner was born in 1922 to Floyd Turner and Alvina Wagner Turner in Wolf Point Montana, a town that is part of the Fort Peck Indian Reservation for the Assiniboine and Sioux tribes, where he grew up and went to high school. His father was a barber and owned jukeboxes. He had one sister, Elnor Marcella Turner, who died in infancy (1914), and he was raised with Edna Kettner Mann, a cousin.

In 1944, Gene completed a BS in physics from Montana State College in Bozeman Montana (now Montana State University). After Gene completed his degree, he served two years in the US Army Signal Corps in Europe. Dean Anderson was a close friend of Gene’s during their undergraduate years and introduced him to his sister, also a student at Montana State, Shirley Anderson Turner, a home economist. Gene married Shirley and moved with her to Ypsilanti Michigan where he earned his MS degree (1950) and a PhD (1956) in physics at the University of Michigan. After completing his degree, he moved to southern California and worked at Space Technology Laboratories and Ramo Wooldridge before beginning a long career at Aerospace Corporation. He worked in the fields of plasma physics, spectroscopy, lasers, and holography, and had a top secret clearance.

As a scientist, he was especially active in the professional society, SPIE, Society for Photo-Optical and Instrumentation Engineers. He served as President from 1969-1970 and was awarded the Director’s Award. In 1981, he became a Fellow of the Society. He was important in the early growth of the Society which now has 18,500 members and publishes 10 journals.

Community service was an important part of Gene’s life. For many years he read for Recording for the Blind and Dyslexic, reading complex mathematical and technical books with equations that had to be precisely described. He served as a volunteer with the Boy Scouts and worked with a mentoring organization for youth, California Academy of Mathematics and Science. He also helped his wife Shirley in her years of work for Madrona Marsh in Torrance.

Gene had numerous hobbies. His interest in target shooting led to his service as judge at the 1984 Olympic Games in Los Angeles. He enjoyed camping and back packing. He loved reading and learning and was active in a life long learning program, Omnilore, at California State University at Dominguez Hills. He had a beautiful voice and sang in a barbershop group, the South Bay Coastliners. He and his wife Shirley were also avid bridge players. His precise scientific mind was also evident in his beautiful penmanship and his love of puns.

Gene is survived by his wife Shirley and his son Charles in Torrance, his daughter Teresa and son in law John Lucas in the US Virgin Islands, and his daughter Margaret and granddaughters Katya and Jania in Beverly Massachusetts.

Arrangements under the direction of Halverson, Stone & Myers Mortuary, Torrance, CA.