Wallace "Wally" Budsberg

Wallace Lowell Budsberg, “Wally” to his friends and relatives, was born May 9, 1933 to parents Leona and Sandy Budsberg in Moorhead, MN. After a brief stop in Los Angeles, CA, at the tail end of the 1930s, the family settled in Olympia, WA where they subsequently planted lifelong roots. After graduating from Olympia High School, it was by perfect happenstance that Wally would meet the love of his life Doris May cook; the pair married on a bright sunny June day in 1952. The pair had four children: Cindy, Tom, Jim and Dan, and subsequently became adoring grandparents to ten beloved grandchildren: Sara, Tera, Brandy, Matthew, Jessica, Grace, Disa, Timothy, Rachel, and Olivia. They spent 44 long years together, Doris tragically succumbing to cancer in 1996.

An eye witness to history, Wally worked as a telecommunication engineer for various incarnations of the telephone company in Washington State for over four decades, where he saw firsthand multiple mergers and the breakup of AT&T in 1982. After retiring, he subsequently was called as an expert witness by the Thurston County government to testify on a variety of telecommunication issues.

In his spare time, Wally was a lifelong member of Gyro and was a passionate women’s fast pitch softball coach who led his teams to a number of hard-fought championships. He was also a zealous woodworker, honing his skills over the decades crafting everything from kitchen cutting boards, to expertly-manufactured lounge chairs, to imaginatively designed tables of varying sizes, all from the comfort of his own personal studio. For his grandchildren, Wally also conceived and installed a massive playground cleverly dubbed “Wally World,” which included amongst other amenities a pair of giant swings, a massive fort with slide and a full half-court basketball court.

Wally died on Saturday, Feb. 23, 2019 at the age of 85. He is survived by all four of his children, all ten of his grandchildren, and a loving bushel of great-grandchildren, all of whom will remember him fondly.