Professor Myers

MADISON-Glen Everett Myers, age 85, of Madison, Professor Emeritus of Mechanical Engineering at the University of Wisconsin, passed away peacefully on December 2, 2019 at UW Hospital with his devoted wife, Susan, and daughter, Christine, by his side. A dedicated father, husband, teacher, and textbook author & publisher, Glen was a genuinely good person who will certainly be missed.

Glen was born March 6, 1934 in Hollywood, California to the late Henry G. and Kathryn E. (Gorden) Myers. He was a 1952 graduate of Valley Stream High School on Long Island, NY, a 1956 graduate of the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, and received his M.S. and Ph.D. from Stanford University in 1957 & 1962 respectively. After a bi-coastal childhood in CA and NY, Glen was content to settle in Madison once he began working at the university in 1962.

Glen married his wife of 56 years, Susan M. Ralph, on August 4, 1963 in Seattle, WA. Together they had three children, whose various activities kept them busy. Glen thoroughly enjoyed attending swim meets, functioning as the Head Timer for the Badger Dolphins for many years. Additionally, he designed and made the record boards at Hill Farm Swim Club and created computer files to merge and print them.

Though Glen had industrial experience with North American Aviation, Convair, Douglas Aircraft, and at DuPont's Savannah River Plant, his passion was teaching the next generation of engineers. He was a longtime member of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers and the American Society for Engineering Education. Glen received a number of department, college and campus-wide teaching awards during his 40-year career. Due to his lengthy service coordinating departmental scholarships, Glen's family has decided to establish one in his name to support future Mechanical Engineering students at the UW.

His thermodynamics notes for undergraduates were published in 1989 as a textbook, Engineering Thermodynamics. His graduate text, Analytical Methods in Conduction Heat Transfer, evolved from notes written to help off-campus graduate students who could not attend regular classes. This book, published in 1971, was the first heat-transfer text to present the finite-element analysis of conduction problems. After his retirement in 2002, Glen still regularly went into his office to work on his solution manuals. He self-published new editions of both of his textbooks as a project to keep his mind active.

Glen had season tickets to UW Football games for over 50 years, taking one of his children or Susan with him each week. He enjoyed attending bowl games, especially the Rose Bowl so he could visit his hometown. Some of his other favorite pastimes included attending the Madison Symphony Orchestra and Gilbert & Sullivan operettas, biking, gardening, playing basketball, walking, and woodworking. Glen was also a member of Covenant Presbyterian Church, the University League, and UW Sports Medicine.

In recent decades Glen and Susan did a considerable amount of genealogy research on their family, with the aid of various computer resources that Glen particularly appreciated. Some of their travels to England, Ireland, and Scotland connected them to their ancestral history, while their final trip was to Paris & Amsterdam in 2016 as participants on a college travel course led by their daughter and two of her colleagues.

Glen is survived by his wife Susan and their children, Timothy A. Myers of Moorhead, MN, Christine D. Myers of Monmouth, IL, and grandson Ethan C. Myers also of Moorhead. Glen's extended family includes a nephew, niece, grandnephew, and numerous cousins. Glen was preceded in death by his young son, Gregory, his parents, and his sister Patricia Nyerges.

The family extends a special thank you to the nurses and respiratory therapists of the Neuroscience ICU at UW Hospital for the wonderful care and support.

Private burial arrangements have been made at Forest Hill Cemetery in Madison, where Glen will be laid to rest with his son, Greg.