Obituary of Gerald W. Healy

Gerald William Healy died on June 19, 2016, in Cambridge, Minnesota, at the age of 88. He had suffered from Parkinson’s disease for the past three years. He was a leap year baby, born February 29, 1928, in River Falls, Wisconsin, the youngest of Glen and Martha Healy’s five children. Jer attended the University of Wisconsin at River Falls for two years before transferring to Sioux Falls College, where he met Mildred Jucht. They were married on August 17, 1950. Jer taught high school English in Sinai and Alcester, South Dakota, before taking a job in the English Department at Bethel College, in St. Paul, Minnesota, where he also coached basketball. He earned an M.A. from the University of South Dakota and a Ph.D. from the University of Minnesota. After retiring from Bethel in 1986, he and Millie established a retreat center, Lindisfarne, near Pine City, Minnesota. After their second retirement in 1999, they sold that property and moved to Cambridge, Minnesota. Jer had a long association with Trout Lake Camp, serving on the permanent staff during several summers in the 1950s and at retreats for many years thereafter. He was a frequent guest speaker at churches throughout the upper Midwest. Jer loved poetry, basketball, golf, the Mills Brothers, traditional hymns, oyster stew, and pie. He hated long sermons, grammatical errors, table games, and ice hockey. Jer was preceded in death by his four siblings: Marsha Gleiter, Jack Healy, June Easton, and Jim Healy. He is survived by his wife, Millie; sons David (Nancy), Paul (Marlys), and Will (Julie), and daughter, Elizabeth; grandchildren Ben (Atsuko), Matt (Joanna), Nina (Red), Sam (Aubrey), Nelia (Neil), Juliet (Rich), and Jenny; and nine great-grandchildren: Kellen, Caleb, Lily, Ian, Grace, Nathan, Adam, Kenta, and Kyler. The family is grateful to the staff at GracePointe West, where Jer lived for the past two years.