Daniel James Beckman passed away on the morning of July 21, 2021, at the age of 60. Dan was born on August 20, 1960, in Lima, Ohio, to Karla and James Beckman. In 1969, the Beckman family moved from Ohio to Southern California; living in Imperial Beach and finally Chula Vista.
After graduating from Chula Vista High School, Dan attended DeVry University in Phoenix, Arizona, graduating with a Bachelor of Science degree in Electrical Engineering Technology. Upon graduation Dan began his career in hardware engineering at Linkabit. In 1982, Dan met Lynn Wescott, who also worked at Linkabit and they were married in 1984.
Dan decided to further his education and attended the University of California at San Diego (UCSD), graduating in 1989 with a Bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering. He subsequently worked at SAIT and I-Bus.
In 1995, Dan and Lynn expanded their family when they adopted their twins, Cassandra and Kyle.
Dan then moved to Sun Microsystems, which was later acquired by Oracle. Dan’s career at Sun and Oracle lasted 19 years before he was laid off in 2017. During his time there, Dan was awarded two patents. In December 2010 he was awarded a patent for “Method and Apparatus for Detecting Degradation in an Integrated Circuit.” In May 2013 he was awarded a patent for “Real-Time Optimization of TX FIR Filter for High-Speed Data Communications.”
Dan was always known as the guy you could depend on. At work his forte was in debugging and he could find and solve hardware problems that no one else could. At home he was delightfully goofy, always ready with a twist of words and able to fix any and everything.
Aside from work, Dan enjoyed camping with his family and travelling. Dan was fascinated by the weather and had his own weather station, ultimately becoming part of the National Weather Service Citizen Weather Observer Program. This allowed him to pursue both his love of weather information and of data. He really enjoyed crunching all the data he received from his weather station and uploading it so others could benefit from it as well.
Dan thoroughly enjoyed volunteering at the San Diego Automotive Museum. He initially began as a volunteer in the restoration department, and then switched to being a docent at the museum in Balboa Park.
Unfortunately, Dan’s layoff in 2017 was particularly difficult for him and his mental health suffered. It took him two long years to find a new job at Cubic. While his family knew he was suffering, they didn’t realize the severity, so his death by his own hands was quite a shock. The family urges everyone to reach out and help those you think are having trouble, and for those in pain, please seek help before you make a tragic decision.
Dan is preceded in death by his mother, Karla. Dan is survived by his wife Lynn Wescott Beckman; his children Cassandra Lynn Beckman and Kyle James Beckman; his grandchildren Tyler Daniel Beckman, Steven Brock Beckman, and Landyn James Beckman; father, James Arthur Beckman; sister Donna Vignapiano (Louie); and niece Emily Vignapiano.
A funeral service will be held for Dan at 1 p.m. on Saturday, August 14, 2021, at St. Rose of Lima Catholic Church, 278 Alvarado St., Chula Vista. A reception will be held in The Little Lodge at Glen Abbey Memorial Park immediately following the service.
Donations in Dan’s memory can be made to the San Diego Automotive Museum https://engage.sdautomuseum.org/donate
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