Lawrence Donald Schubert

Known to family and friends by his middle name, Don was a devoted husband to Zita, his beloved wife of 64 years. They raised seven children, and had three grandkids.

A Chicago native, Don called Torrance home for 52 years. After serving in World War II and attending community college on the G.I. Bill, Don worked his entire career for Northrop Aircraft.

He was hired in July 1948 as a draftsman in the aircraft division, designing cable assemblies, wiring diagrams and such. He worked his way up to planner, and later transferred to the company's missile division, Nortronics, as an engineer.

Through various assignments over the decades, he returned to Northrop’s aircraft division, where he promoted to manager of integrated logistics support.

“Dad, what do you do at work?” A frequent question, considering his convoluted, murky job title.

His standard reply: “I shuffle papers.”

But to all who knew him, Don was an engineer through and through. In high school, he belonged to the Slide Rule Club. As a young man, he studied electronics by tinkering with a Heathkit. His children teased him about the incongruous title of a favorite book: “The Saga of the Vacuum Tube.”

That engineer’s mind, that planner’s approach to problem-solving, was a valuable skill in supporting a nine-person family on one salary. Trouble-shoot, devise substitutions and work-arounds, make do with what you have.

Family vacations? Build a large wooden box, fasten it to the roof of your 1968 Plymouth station wagon, and carefully distribute the load -- tent, Coleman stove and lanterns, sleeping bags and pillowcases-as-lightweight-suitcases -- and camp across the country. Don’t run the air conditioning even when driving through the desert during July -- the engine could overheat! THAT’S how you go over the river and through the woods to grandmother’s house (in New Jersey).

His kids brown-bagged it to school, so he, too, tucked a peanut butter or baloney sandwich into his briefcase, filled a Thermos of coffee, and ate lunch at his desk. It was one of many ways that he and Zita mastered the art of stretching the family budget.

Don was a product of his youth. Born four years before the Wall Street crash, he grew up during the austerity of the Great Depression -- trying times that instilled in him resourcefulness, ingenuity, and a determination to sock away money for a rainy day.

His financial prudence provided a home in safe suburbia, food on the table, (used) cars in the driveway, braces and retainers for seven children, clothes from Sears and J.C. Penney, and music lessons.

His hedge against life’s potholes and curveballs, when you have little margin for error, reverted to his engineering roots: “Measure twice, cut once.”

And learn how to do things yourself. You’ll save thousands of dollars over your lifetime, he counseled, if you don’t have to hire somebody. Auto maintenance and repairs? Plumbing problems? Broken appliances? Don Schubert, household handyman, fixed them all.

Cardboard boxes, once containing a washing machine or refrigerator, were flattened and slid under a jacked-up car, so Don could crawl under to install new brakes or change the oil without staining the driveway.

He taught his children the “proper” way to wash a car, with spot-free, no-streak windows. For weekend yard work, Don paid his young helpers a nickel for every bag of weeds they pulled. An oft-repeated phrase to his large brood: “Many hands make light work.”

Some men escape the workaday grind by retreating to their den, office or gym; Don’s haven was his garage. All sizes of screws, nuts, bolts and nails filled baby food jars, a vast array of tools lined its neatly organized shelves.

He puttered at his workbench, taking apart mechanical devices to see how they worked. He meticulously restored vintage radios and adding machines, and carried a torch for his stubbornly unreliable Italian beauty -- a 1960 Lancia Flaminia Pininfarina coupe, a black two-door with red upholstery.

Meanwhile, at Northrop, younger co-workers with college diplomas began eclipsing him, so Don decided to finish his education. He enrolled in extension courses through the University of Redlands, and earned his bachelor of science degree in December 1979. Age 54, a college graduate at last!

Don was born June 26, 1925 in Chicago, the second child of Albert and Katherine Schubert. He was halfway through high school when the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor. Two days before his 18th birthday, Don graduated from Morgan Park High School, Class of 1943.

World War II was raging, so he volunteered for induction into the Army rather than waiting to be drafted. He completed basic training at Fort McClellan, Alabama in February 1944. His unit then set sail from New Jersey to Europe. Don never forgot the date his troop ship landed in Belfast, Northern Ireland: 4-4-44.

As part of the Army’s 1st Infantry Division, Don served in Germany, France, Belgium, Czechoslovakia, England and Ireland. Discharged from the Army in December 1945, he was awarded a Purple Heart, Bronze Star and several other medals.

For more than 50 years, Don’s Army dog tag hung on his key chain. He often told his children, who grew up during the turbulent Vietnam War era: “Peace begins at home.”

Don’s family had moved from Illinois to California during the war, so in 1946, he enrolled at Los Angeles City College. A month after his June 1948 graduation, he landed a job at Northrop Aircraft.

In 1950, Don met Zita Ginocchio at church, beginning a courtship that led to their wedding on October 27, 1951. The newlyweds bought their first home in Westchester, and in February 1964, the still-growing Schubert family moved to Torrance.

During his 38-year career in the aerospace industry, Don primarily worked at Northrop’s Hawthorne plant and LAX-vicinity offices. He also had temporary assignments in Newbury Park and Cocoa Beach, Florida. After a farewell luncheon on Friday, January 31, 1986, Don hung up his suits and ties, and put away his wing tip shoes.

For most of his 30-year, five-day retirement, Don pursued hobbies that work and fatherhood had relegated to the back burner. He scoured garage sales and swap meets for antique radios, their cabinets wooden or Bakelite, their styles Art Deco to Space Age; he bought a lathe and took machining classes; he learned computers; he became a backyard gardener, growing tomatoes, apricots and other crops, often tapping his engineering skills to thwart the neighborhood squirrels who gobbled them.

He and Zita traveled to Europe and all over the U.S., visiting family and friends. He reconnected with long-ago Army buddies by joining the Society of the 1st Infantry Division, and attending annual “Big Red One” reunions -- in San Jose, Chicago, Virginia, Louisville, or wherever the old soldiers were gathered that summer.

“When you’re retired, every day is Saturday. Except for Sunday, when we go to church,” he often joked.

His “golden years” also gave Don a new title: Grandpa. He delighted in creating math puzzles, logic quizzes and Venn diagrams for his young grandkids to solve.

He fashioned white PVC pipes, metal lids from orange juice cans and assorted parts from his garage into deliberately low-tech toys, to spark their imaginations. He found an outlet for his silly side, turning an unused closet into a “hotline” so the little ones could “call” the Torrance Police Department in the event of a vampire or mummy sighting.

Along with his wife Zita, Don leaves behind sons Larry of Los Angeles; Mark of Lomita; Joseph (wife Teri) of Placentia; John of Torrance; Edward (wife Shelley) of Vacaville; Michael of Vallejo; daughter Mary Bender (husband Kurt) of Fontana; grandsons Miles Schubert, 19, of Vacaville and Tim Schubert, 24, of Placentia, and granddaughter Anna Schubert, 27, (husband Aaron Doyle), of Los Angeles.

He was preceded in death by his father (1981) and mother (1992); his younger sister Eileen Hession (1990); and his younger brother Al Schubert (2007). Older sister Lorraine Hession, 92, of Solvang, survives him, as do dozens of nieces and nephews.

A memorial Mass will be held at Nativity Catholic Church, 1447 Engracia Avenue, Torrance. Arrangements are still pending.