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Tze Leung Lai
June 28, 1945 - May 21, 2023
Stanford, California

Tze Leung Lai (June 28, 1945–May 21, 2023), professor of statistics at Columbia University and Ray Lyman Wilbur Professor at Stanford University, passed away peacefully in his sleep on 21 May 2023. Lai lived a remarkable life, investing in his academic career, his students, and his family; he was proud of his accomplishments in each of those areas. Growing up in postwar Hong Kong, Lai learned at an early age the value of hard work: having skipped kindergarten, he was the youngest child in his classes and had to study harder to match his older peers, many of whom would repeat a class year to ensure good grades. He attended the University of Hong Kong, where he initially pursued economics before switching to mathematics. Graduating in 1967, Lai initially considered a career in civil service, but the local anti-government riots protesting British colonial rule that year made him reconsider. He instead decided to pursue higher education, ending up at Columbia University in 1968 in the statistics program, where he lived through the September 1968 student protests that shut down the campus. In May 1970, Lai was preparing to take his oral qualifying exam when President...

 

Jacob Pierce
March 1, 1983 - May 19, 2023
Palo Alto, California

Jacob Rodgers Pierce, age 40, passed away unexpectedly on Friday, May 19, 2023. Jacob was born on March 1, 1983 in Redwood City to Carolyn and Steve Pierce. He was raised in Palo Alto alongside his three brothers: Nate, Zane, and Ezra. A remarkably bright and creative person, Jacob was homeschooled until the age of 14 after which he attended the King’s Academy in Sunnyvale for high school. He graduated from the University of California at Santa Barbara, with a B.A. in Sociology and began his career working in Corporate Development at Stanford University. He spent most of his adult life in Palo Alto, aside from a brief sojourn in London, during which he co-founded a successful technology start-up. In the last several years preceding his death, he materialized his longtime dream of becoming a vintner, leveraging locally grown grapes he cultivated himself. A true polymath, Jacob was the person that friends and family would turn to first for advice on any number of subjects, whether that be baking bread, investing in the stock market, or writing an app. He was in turn a gourmet chef, horticulturist, chess instructor, archer, painter, and lover of all things beautiful. He wa...

 

Joan Hancock
Oct. 30, 1931 - May 14, 2023
Palo Alto, California

Joan Hancock passed away peacefully at home in Palo Alto, on Mother’s Day, May 14, 2023. The oldest child of Margaret (Meg) and Roger Egeberg, she and her three siblings were raised in Cleveland, OH and Los Angeles. After graduating from U.C. Berkeley in 1953, she lived in Grand Mere, Quebec before settling back into the San Francisco Bay Area where she taught Elementary School in Daly City and Pinole. In the late 1950’s she moved to Sherman Oaks Apartments in Palo Alto, where she met her future husband Bill Hancock, a Cardiologist at Stanford, after hearing his piano playing in the apartment building. Bill and Joan eventually settled into a house on Tennyson, where they lived together for over 50 years. Joan will be remembered by her prolific artistic output, spanning seven decades. Her portraits and landscapes, which depicted both the fantastic and the real, were filled with playfulness and joy. She saw beauty and form everywhere, which was evident even walking through her house. She showed her work at galleries across the Bay Area and opened her own Blue Skies Studio in the 1980s. She painted numerous murals in houses and businesses across the peninsula, including bo...

 

Marylyn Jo Morrell
Nov. 22, 1932 - May 14, 2023
Atherton, CA

Marylyn Morrell, a dedicated advocate for women's empowerment, a beloved wife and mother, loyal friend, and a lifelong learner, passed away on May 14, 2023, at the age of 90. She spent her final months surrounded by her children and grandchildren and, as was her wish, in her beloved home. Born on November 22, 1932, in La Grange, Illinois to Mabel and Ralph Eck. Marylyn displayed a thirst for knowledge from the very beginning. She excelled at Lyons High School and Kalamazoo College, where she met her husband James (Jim) Morrell during her freshman orientation. She was 17 years old. They were married within 2 years. College was interrupted when she joined him during his military service at Fort Knox, Kentucky for 2 years, where she worked as a typist and assistant to the General. When Jim's service requirement was over, they moved back to Kalamazoo, and Jim took a job at Saga Corporation and Marylyn returned to complete college, carrying her first child on stage to receive her diploma. While Jim continued to advance at Saga, Marylyn went on to receive her master’s degree in psychology at Western Michigan University, where she stayed to teach. Jim's work transfer to Saga headqua...

 

Theodore Clarence Carlstrom
May 1, 1933 - May 12, 2023
Palo Alto, CA

Longtime Palo Alto resident Theodore Clarence Carlstrom passed away in the early hours of Friday, May 12 after a sudden and short illness. Throughout his hospitalization, Ted was surrounded by his immediate family who recall his extraordinary devotion to them, as well as a life marked by intellectual curiosity, an ongoing love of history, extensive volunteering, and a deep appreciation of the natural environment. Ted was born on May 1, 1933 in Round Rock, Texas to the Reverend Clarence Elmer Carlstrom, a Lutheran minister, and Elsie Margaret Younggren Carlstrom, a classically-trained vocalist. Both of Ted's parents were the children of Swedish immigrants. In 1936, Ted's parents moved the family back to California where Ted's two older brothers, Gerard Marcus and John Phillip had been born. Settling at first in Oakland, the family relocated to Palo Alto in 1937 where Clarence was the pastor at First Lutheran Church in Palo Alto. Ted had many fond memories of exploring a still semi-rural Palo Alto along with attending Addison Elementary and Jordan Junior High School (now Greene Middle School). He later graduated from Antioch High School in 1951 where his father Clarence h...

 

Robert Campbell McGibben Jr
Feb. 28, 1937 - May 7, 2023
Carmel, California

ROBERT CAMPBELL MCGIBBEN, JR 1937-2023 Bob was a 3rd generation San Franciscan, born at Children’s Hospital on February 28,1937. His youth was spent in Menlo Park under the loving eye of his grandfather, who instilled in Bob a sense of confidence, a zest for life and a quick wit. In the mid-fifties Bob was drafted into the army. While stationed in Georgia, Bob had the enviable opportunity of serving twice as a marshal at the Masters Golf Tournament at Augusta. He was also introduced to local jazz bands and developed a lifelong passion for music. After his military service he spent time in Reno as a disc jockey, playing jazz and accumulating a vast collection of vinyl records, which he later donated to Stanford University. Bob graduated from The New York Institute of Finance in 1961. He then began his successful career, launching Robert McGibben, Inc. at the Pacific Stock Exchange. Bob was active in his community, serving on the Menlo Park Fire Department Board of Directors, and later serving as a volunteer guide at the Monterey Bay Aquarium and as a marshal at the Poppy Hills Golf Course. Bob was a lifelong sports fan, a master of crossword puzzles, a...

 

Elizabeth Jeanne Doyle
Oct. 17, 1924 - May 6, 2023
Los Gatos, California

Elizabeth Jeanne Doyle ("Betsy" to her friends and family) died with family at her bedside on May 6, 2023, from complications of a December 2020 stroke. She was 98. Betsy was born in Salt Lake City on October 17, 1924, to parents Lyle Maxon Barker, a mining engineer from Iowa, and Isabel O'Neill, who started out teaching grade school in a one-room schoolhouse in Wisconsin. Betsy's family moved to Arizona when she was still a toddler, where they lived in a succession of copper mining towns. The first was Clarkdale, home to the United Verde Copper Company where her father rose to superintendent of the smelting operation. Betsy loved the Arizona desert and had many tales of family adventures in the Verde Valley and neighboring Jerome, Sedona and Oak Creek Canyon. Those days in the desert inspired her love for startling sunsets, the night sky, her eye for color and design, and her life-long fascination with the moon, the weather, and wildlife. The family's next stop was in Ajo, another small desert town where her father was manager of the town and the copper mine. There, Betsy attended Ajo High School, graduating as one of three co-valedictorians in 1942. She had grown into a real ...

 

Dorothea Emily Collins
March 12, 1933 - April 25, 2023
Santa Rosa, CA

Dorothea passed away on April 25, 2023, after a short illness. Born in 1933 in Boston, Massachusetts, Dorothea and her mom, Dorothy, moved to the home of her Grandparents after the passing of her father when she was three. Her grandparents treated her like she was their own child. She grew up in a house filled with loving aunts and uncles and is fondly remembered by her cousins as “Bunny”, which was given to her as a small child. Since Bunny was the oldest, she did a lot of babysitting for her cousins. They all remember her reading them stories. Most of all they remember her singing voice. Broadway music was her favorite and throughout the years she performed in several local musicals, once singing at the Boston Pops. In 1954, Dorothea graduate from Regis College in Weston, MA. Upon graduation she became a teacher, a career that would last her over 35 years. In 1960 Dorothea married Robert “Bob” James Collins, also of Boston and bought a small house in Westwood, MA. Within a year, their first son, Robert Joseph was born, followed 17 months later by the birth of the second son, Daniel John. The new parents had little time to settle in when Bob’s company...

 

Charles Reese Probst
March 8, 1989 - April 19, 2023
Los Altos, California

Charles O. Probst, previously named Reese J. Probst, died at home by accident on April 19, 2023. Born March 8, 1989 in Mountain View, Reese grew up in Palo Alto. He attended Gunn High School, where he competed on the wrestling team, served as president of the Gay-Straight Alliance, and received the Faculty Award for Outstanding Male Student when he graduated in 2007. Reese graduated with honors from San Francisco State University in 2011. At SF State he discovered his deep connection to Christianity and felt called to the medical profession. After working as a nursing assistant at Stanford Hospital, he enrolled in the University of San Francisco graduate nursing program, but was forced to drop out by chronic illness. Later, illness in remission, he became a pharmacy technician, working at Walgreens pharmacies in Palo Alto and Mountain View. He faced his hardships with grace and courage. His friends knew him as a sweet bear of a man who was always there to listen. He’d lived in Los Altos with his family since 2014, but he never lost his love for San Francisco and its gay and transgender communities. In 2022 he changed his name to Charles, after his grandfather. Charles (Reese) is ...

 

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