Dean Gallea

Ancestors

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Biography

Dean's mother and father divorced shortly after birth. He was raised in River Rouge, MI, by his mother, who was a Public Health nurse. He went to Mrs. Thornton's nursery school followed by Kindergarten at Ann Visger School. Then he attended grades 1-4 at Our Lady of Lourdes Parish Catholic School in River Rouge. He studied piano there, and played in several school concerts.

Until his teens, Dean spent the summers in Coderre, SK, with his mother's family, Grandmama and Grandpapa (at whose home Dean and his mother stayed), three uncles and aunts, and many cousins. Inspired by jack-of-all-trades uncle Lionel "L.P." Coderre, Dean developed a strong interest in electronics. At eight, Dean successfully constructed his first electronic "kit", an Eico volt-ohmmeter, which still worked 60 years later (as of 2019). He also would scavenge discarded radios from the local TV shop and build stereo speakers, which he installed for neighbors.

Dean attended grades 5-8 at the Hall of the Divine Child (a pseudo-military boarding school run by the IHM Sisters, since closed and operating as a nursing home), in Monroe, MI, on the advice of Sister Theotilde at O.L.L. While he was there, his mother met stepfather Don White who had two sons (Bruce and Roy) at the same school. They married and moved to Holt, MI, near the East Lansing main campus of Michigan State U., where Don was a Professor of Forestry.

Dean attended Msgr. John A. Gabriel high school (later merged into Lansing Catholic), run by the Christian Brothers, boarding with the Larkin family on Jerome St. in Lansing, a short walk from the state capitol building. The summer after junior year, he tried working on a custodial crew cleaning out graduate dorms on campus, but did not make the cut after a few weeks. The next summer, he worked as a technician/installer for the M.S.U. Instructional Media Center, which became a regular summer job through college.

Dean attended Oakland University starting fall 1969 (where 2nd cousin Michael Goci also attended), majoring in Engineering. He lived in Pryale House, a co-ed dorm, where he made many long-term friends. He worked in the Campus print shop, then in the A.V. department, where he designed and built recording and film projection automation equipment. Also worked on the fabrication of power components and control circuitry for the school's electric vehicle project.

The summer of 1971, Dean traveled extensively throughout the Western U.S. on a tour of the National Park system. He graduated 1973, but did not receive his diploma until fall 1973 due to an unfinished term project.

In the summer of 1972, Dean worked for Thom Hartmann at his shop called "The Electronics joint" in East Lansing, MI. (Thom later became a renowned political TV commentator and blogger.) Summer and winter of 1973-4, Dean worked as technician/installer at Shertronics TV shop in Oxford, living in Lake Orion and Rochester.

In 1973, Dean sent a letter to the editor of Consumer Reports magazine, critical of aspects of their testing of televisions, and included a copy of newly-printed resume as credentials. Consumer Reports called and requested to fly him to NY for an interview, after which he was offered and accepted a position as Assistant Engineer in the Electronics Department, in June, 1974.

After a brief stay in a boarding house, he lived in Yonkers in a six-story building at 811 Bronx River Road, which had a prestigious Bronxville address. In 1977, he moved to a beautiful apartment adjoining a house at the top of Prickly Pear Hill in Croton-on-Hudson, NY. There were sweeping views of the Hudson, and an Audubon Sanctuary out the back door. He took up cross-country skiing, woodworking, and began studying Tai-Chi Chuan which he continued to do intermittently from that time on.

In 1978, he bought a property in Hawthorne, NY, as a rental investment. There were two houses on a single property, separated by a flagstone patio. He moved there in 1981, and served the dual role of landlord and homeowner, remodeling his house with new plumbing and wiring and a completely hand-built oak, cedar and ceramic tile kitchen. He traveled to Australia and to England on a hiking expedition with the English Ramblers. He also went to the British Virgin Islands on a working vacation mapping trails for the Appalachian Mountain Club.

In 1989, he began to spend time with a prior acquaintance, June Brazil, who had two children from a previous marriage. After Dean moved into June's 1875-vintage Victorian house overlooking the Hudson in Tarrytown, they decided to marry in 1990. Dean's wife passed away from complications secondary to Multiple Myeloma in 1999.

Dean worked for Consumer Reports for over 42 years until his retirement in Feb, 2017. He has continued to live in the Tarrytown house, as of 2018. Both before and after retirement, Dean was active in many organizations and volunteer groups in and around Tarrytown, including serving as co-chair of the village Environmental Advisory Council, as a local Democratic District Leader, for Riverkeeper and Scenic Hudson, on a Sustainable Westchester working group, and on several committees and Boards of Directors.

Dean discovered a half-brother, Robert Weber (adopted), through the 23andMe DNA ancestry service in 2017, and another half-brother, Mike Landers, through Ancestry.com. Dean, Bob, and Mike met for the first time in Minnesota in June 2018. Dean visited his half-brother Bob, who lives in Hawaii, in January 2019. In late 2019, Dean discovered a third half-brother, Paul Reader, who lives in Minnesota.

Sources

• First-hand information. Entered by Dean Gallea at registration.