William Richard Nienhaus

Santa Clara, CA —William (Bill) R. Nienhaus, 79 passed away peacefully on Friday Oct. 21, 2016, after a long battle with Alzheimer’s. He leaves behind his wife of 56 years, Sharon (Lammlein) Nienhaus; his daughter, Laura Zarrinnaal; his son Daniel Nienhaus; five grandchildren, and a big extended family.

Born and raised in St. Louis, MO, Bill attended St. Louis University earning a Bachelors of Electrical Engineering and Masters degree in Mathematics. Bill was with McDonald Douglas for 17 years working on the Mercury Capsule for NASA and an early voice synthesizer for hospital patients. His job took him out to California where he worked for Apple Computer on the team that wrote code for the early Apple computers to ‘talk’ to each other, called Schoolbus which later became Appletalk. He also worked for Gavilan, which developed the first laptop computer. Other companies included Fairchild, 3Com, and Olivetti which took him to Ivrea, Italy often. After a long career in high tech, he bought a locksmith shop, Romy’s Lock & Key, where Dan came to work with him and now continues it.

His grandchildren, Nick, Tyler, and Amber Nienhaus and Kiyon and Josh Zarrinnaal were the light of his life.

Bill loved dogs and is survived by his dog, McGregor and his grand dogs, Cody and Millie.

Bill and Sharon met at Our Lady of Sorrows church and were later married there.

A Funeral Mass will be held in Bill's memory at Our Lady of Sorrows at 11:00 am on Saturday, December 10, 2016.