Warren Ringlien

Warren John Ringlien, age 74 of Northfield, MN, died October 31, 2007 at Abbott Northwestern Hospital following a 7 week battle with fungal pneumonia. He was born in Pigeon Falls, WI to Wilhelm and Julia (Lokken) Ringlien on December 2, 1932, the second of 4 children. He is survived by his wife of 50 years, Myrtle (Iverson) Ringlien; sons Jeff of Northfield, Andy (Ashley) of Charlotte, NC; grandchildren Larson and Hannah; sister Elaine (Bob) Victorine of St Anthony; brothers Kenneth (Goodie) of Pigeon Falls, Robert (Barbara) of Golden Valley; 6 nephews and nieces; and 11 great nephews and nieces. He was preceded in death by his parents.

Warren was a very active and creative person and this motivated his personal and work life. He played local team baseball as a youth, helped form a ski jumping club, and spent hours in his parent’s shop woodworking, designing and building many things and also doing some gun-smithing. After graduating from Whitehall High School he attended vocational school in Eau Claire studying drafting. He was inducted into the Army and served in the Korean Conflict in 1952. His duties included building runways and structures with the 839th Engineering Aviation Battalion at K-55 airbase (Pusan). He returned safely to study Physics at St. Olaf College on the G.I. Bill. While at St. Olaf he also wrote a Norwegian saga that traced his Ringlien-Lokken family history. Prior to his senior year at college he married Myrtle Iverson of Whitehall, WI. After graduating in 1958 he attended summer classes in Boulder, CO and obtained a teaching certificate. In May of 1959 his first son Jeff was born in Whitehall. That fall he taught one year of high school science at Greenwood, WI.

After Greenwood he was hired by a joint St. Olaf College and GT Schjeldahl project as a research associate to develop a process of cleaning copper prior to it being laminated to plastic. He also was teaching two physics labs for the college. In May of 1961 his second son Andy was born in Northfield. In 1963 he was assigned a project to develop a process for depositing a thin layer of copper on mylar covered aluminum, this process would lead to the development and building of 18 X 36 inch panels that were used to detect and record space particles and micro-meteoroids. The panels were sent into space on NASA’s three Pegasus space craft launched in 1965. In 1967 the joint St. Olaf and GT Schjeldahl project ended and he was hired full time by St. Olaf.

In 1968 he was hired by GT Schjeldahl where his work involved vacuum deposits of thin films in photo-sensitive and electro-luminescent devices (flat screen televisions). In 1971 he was hired by Mankato State Teachers College as an Instrument Maker, designing and building apparatus for the classroom and for research. After commuting for 5 years he took a similar job with Carleton College. For the last 31 years Warren worked for the Physics and Astronomy departments designing, building, and maintaining their classroom and research apparatus. He once described his work as “Everything from Observatory size to microscopic size". During the last several years at Carleton he also became involved in the Environmental Technology Sciences (ENTS) program and also was involved with their wind generator.

Warren was an active person throughout his life, he was a member of the Northfield Tennis Club, he coached and played baseball for both the Dundas Dukes and Northfield Knights in the 60’s and early 70’s, he enjoyed hunting, fishing, cooking over campfires, gardening, singing, playing the guitar and harmonica, and spending time in the family woodland in Wisconsin. He and his sons also enjoyed flying model airplanes powered by rubber bands, and had flown in local and national competitions. He had multiple backyard wind generators over the years and currently has several solar panels that charged an electric powered garden tractor he designed and built. He recently wrote and self published a biography on his great uncle who he says influenced his creativity.

A service to celebrate Warren’s life will be held on Sunday, November 11th at 2:00pm at Skinner Memorial Chapel on the Carleton campus, with visitation 1 hour prior.

Arrangements by the Bierman Funeral Home of Northfield.