Martin’s Obituary Martin Dvorin left our world in his sleep Monday, March 11, 2019. Marty came into our world January 31, 1923 in Brownsville, Brooklyn, New York, to Minnie and Irving Dvorin, and grew up in a neighborhood of four family private brick houses, pushcarts, the famous Loews’ Pitkin Theater (where one could momentarily forget the great Depression), and notorious mobsters (“Murder, Incorporated”). Marty’s younger brother, Robert, was born September 4, 1927.
Education started in P.S. 165, P.S. 183, and the Samuel J. Tilden High School until May, 1936 when the Dvorin Family moved from New York to Linden, New Jersey. Marty graduated in June, 1940, from Linden High School, where he took all college prep courses, four years of metal shop and other shops. He was Chief Photographer for the School Yearbook.
Afternoons and summers he worked in a photo shop. Dissuaded from applying to college, after graduation Marty worked in a jewelry shop, then at the General Instrument Corporation, where, through a series of moves, he became a model and toolmaker at age 19. It was at this time that Marty met the enduring sweetheart of his life and partner for 50 years, Harriette Gandel, who was attending Newark State Teachers College on a four-year competitive scholarship.
On October 31 (Hallowe’en), 1942, they were introduced by Marty’s cousin, Charlotte Dvorin, who was attending college with Harriette. World War Two arrived; Marty enlisted in the United States Navy and was sworn in on November 16, 1942, as an apprentice seaman. After Boot Camp, where Marty did stand up comedy acts, Marty attended Wentworth Institute in Boston, Mass.
, studying marine engineering, where he graduated with honors, earning a medal for being top man of fifteen thousand students. From the South Pacific Theater of Operations, the Navy sent Marty back to the U.S. Mainland, to the Engineering School at Columbia University, where he made the Dean’s List every trimester. That war over, Marty returned to active service.
Harriette and Marty were married December 22, 1945. Marty was honorably discharged in April, 1946, as a Machinists’ Mate, First Class. With two years’ engineering school “under his belt,” Marty returned to General Instrument Corp.
as a technician, and soon was promoted to Production Engineer, automatic record changers. (Remember vinyl? ) Another recession and Marty was unemployed, but worked as a photographer until returning to industry as Chief Industrial Engineer for Lavoie Labs in Morganville, New Jersey.
He completed his B.S. in May, 1958, at the New Jersey Institute of Technology, with majors in Mechanical and Management Engineering, and a minor in Fine Arts at Rutgers University. He was inducted into Tau Beta Pi, the Engineering Honor Society, the first in that college as a fully employed night school student. On that same stage, fifteen minutes before Marty, “Kid brother” Robert Dvorin received the B.S. in Chemical Engineering.
Quirk of the alphabet, and a family joke. While still an undergraduate, Marty was employed as Plant Manager, Eastern Division of Revell, Incorporated. Leaving Revell, Marty became Manager of Quality Assurance for Wilpet Tool and Manufacturing in Kearney, NJ, then changed direction to do creative product design, with interests more suited to his desires.
As Manager, New Products Development for the Glaser-Steers Division of Ametek, Marty conceived, then led the engineering team that developed a new concept in automatic record changers. This design, one of the world’s most popular, and the first cordless portable, manufactured and marketed by the General Electric Corp. , was shown at the 1964 World’s Fair in NYC and featured in Life Magazine and technical journals.
For this project, Marty was awarded the first two of several patents for his many inventions in a variety of products. In October, 1960, Bausch and Lomb, Inc., invited Marty to Rochester, NY, where he became B&L’s “skunk works,” recruiting teams of engineers to develop exciting new concepts in Opto-electromechanical systems. Projects included early fiber optics manufacturing, cameras for the CIA and instrumentation that was used to pinpoint the lunar landing sites for the NASA Apollo program.
During this time, Marty attended the Institute of Optics nights at the University of Rochester, earning the M.S. in optical engineering in May, 1966. At that time, the U.S.A. was facing a national crisis: we were losing our optical technicians to deaths and retirements. Marty and others realized as well that we also needed to launch a new generation of photonics systems technicians, with new skills, for emerging technologies and Marty was recruited to build a program at Rochester’s Monroe Community College to address this problem.
First, while finishing up a project for B&L, he taught nights as Adjunct, then joined the M.C.C. faculty in August, 1968, as a Full Professor, tenured. The M.C.C. optics/photonics program made it a point to recruit minority students, which at the time included women. After a tumultuous start, the pioneering Optical Systems Technology Program became internationally recognized as world class (“a natural re”), and many similar programs have grown up around the United States.
In 1976, Marty was elected “Dean Martin,” founding dean of the newly established Division of Engineering Technologies at M.C.C. In 1977/78 he sponsored an Israeli scientist’s sabbatical. In 1980, partially for health reasons and partially because continuity had been established, Marty took early retirement, to return to industry, and soon received a plethora of unsolicited job offers. The one which was most appealing was as Chief Scientist for Optical Sciences Group of San Rafael, California, which was expanding to a modern, enlarged facility in Petaluma.
When the new plant became operational, Marty changed direction, spending more time researching, out of necessity, Health and Longevity, on which he wrote and lectured after “rebuilding” himself as a coronary artery disease patient. Harriette and Marty also taught on-site courses in optical technology and techniques to companies in Silicon Valley. Marty’s great love, Harriette, died on September 27, 1992, of thrombotic thrombocytopenic purpura.
Although heartbroken, Marty planned to go on continuing with his active life, which included writing in several venues, researching and reading in various areas which had not been included in his previous schooling. He had a six-year happy relationship with Joyce Hunter. They ate and travelled together and Marty also took solo trips.
Joyce died of “pre-existing” illnesses, and Marty had the company of three successive companions, with whom he shared activities in which they had common interests. In the year 2000, deciding it was time to seek a new environment, Marty moved to the Marin Valley Mobile Country Club in Novato, California, living in a double wide coach, for which he designed and built additions that made living there easier, safer and more efficient. Marty has had several health “events,” and used the knowledge from his research to each time “rebuild” himself to a more functioning, active senior.
Until seriously injured in February, 2014, he could be found hiking the hills around his home, cooking his international meals in his easy to maneuver “galley,” or composing on his iMac, which was slowly learning to let him use it. He maintained an active social life, and kept in contact with his former students, his “extended family,” some of whom have build internationally recognized leading state of the art precision photonics companies. Marty leaves two daughters, Miriam Dvorin Spross, PhD (Rex A. Spross), who teaches World Music at Santa Rosa J.C., and Rebecca Dvorin Strong (Fred Strong), an artist living in Seattle, Washington.
The “apple of Marty’s eye” is granddaughter Emma Dvorin Strong, a graduate of the University of Washington, Seattle, who majored in Social Anthropology and Dance and minored in Education. She now lives in Oakland. Marty also leaves his brother, Robert Dvorin (Vicki Dvorin), of New York City.
A talented family and a cadre of skilled students are included in Marty Dvorin’s legacy. Written by Marty, Novato, California, Jan. , 2014, rev.
Feb. , 2016 Friends and family are invited to attend the Funeral Service, Thursday, March 14, 2019 at 1:00 pm at the PARENT-SORENSEN MORTUARY, 850 Keokuk St., Petaluma. Interment: B’nai Israel Cemetery, Petaluma.
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