I'm sad to report the passing of a great advocate and friend to local history in Orange County: Don Dobmeier. Here's his obituary, as posted on DignityMemorial.com:
Donald Joseph Dobmeier
July 5, 1944 – August 2, 2024
Donald J. Dobmeier was born in [Orange's] Saint Joseph Hospital to Clifford and Isabell (Bettencourt) Dobmeier on 5 July 1944. Donald grew up in the orange groves, avocado orchards and strawberry fields of Orange County. Donald graduated from Garden Grove High School class of 1963 and was gifted one of the first 1964 Mustangs from his beloved Aunt Mary.
Donald attended Orange Coast College and Cal State University Fullerton. Donald married Sue Anne Stoecker in April 1967 at Saint Cecilia’s in Tustin. Within a few years Don and Sue with two sons returned to Don’s hometown – the strawberry capital of the world, Garden Grove. Donald and Sue planted roots in Garden Grove and raised one daughter Francisca Teresa and four sons Josef James, Paul Alexander, John Russell and Theodore David– all graduating from Don’s alma mater Garden Grove High School.
As an outdoorsman, Don climbed Mount Whitney, fed the bears in Yosemite Valley, and took the family on hiking excursions in San Bernadino’s National Forest. Donald had two small businesses and worked as ‘Don the Gardener’ by day and ‘Don the Bartender’ by night.
Don’s true passion was the historical beauty of Orange County. Don was appointed to the O.C. Historical Commission in 1974 and helped preserve O.C.’s treasures for 47 years including the Key Ranch in Placentia, Modjeska’s Arden, the old oaks in Irvine, and the Old Orange County Courthouse – Don’s home away from home.
Donald has ten grandchildren: Benjamin, Desmond, James, Tessa, Teddy, Samuel and Vince Gregory, Shelbie Sue (Christian) Korver, and Jack and Clifford. Don chose to stay in his Garden Grove home surrounded by his loving family in his final days. The same cozy home his kind hearted grandmother Francisca Bettencourt babysat him back when it all started in the 1940s.
Don passed away on Friday, August 2nd, at 80 years old. History never ends as long as we remember and cherish it.
A memorial service will be held at Saint Columban’s Catholic Church, Monday, Aug. 19, at 10am, with interment to follow at Holy Sepulcher Cemetery in Orange, followed by a reception at Moreno’s Restaurant on Chapman Ave.
While Don didn’t actively write much history himself, he was tremendously knowledgeable, was the longest-serving member of the O.C. Historical Commission, was a longtime Orange County Historical Society board member, helped save numerous endangered historic sites, served as unofficial editor for countless books and articles, and always had additional research resources to recommend whenever a historian “hit a wall.” He was the institutional memory of the Orange County historical community and was the glue that held many historical projects together.
If you'd like to know more about Don's historical work and personality, I wrote a fairly lengthy article about him on this blog in 2021, when he retired from the Commission.
I will miss Don as both a friend and a colleague.
1 comment:
A sampling of comments that were posted when I pushed this to Facebook:
Historian Pamela Gibson writes, "Don was a good friend and colleague. He had a great sense of humor and was always willing to help with a research project. Even when I left Orange County to become City Manager of Sonoma, he'd send me tidbits of Sonoma history and even a few old postcards featuring the city hall there. Thank you for letting me know he'd passed."
Garden Grove's Josh McIntosh writes, "He was one of the coolest guys in the Grove. I miss the days of carpooling with him to OCHS meetings in his old truck. He had so many interesting stories."
Former O.C. Historical Commissioner Helen Myers writes, "He was an amazing man with so much history on his brain."
Fellow OCHS board member Guy Ball writes, "Don was such a generous guy and such a long-time friend of Orange County History!"
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