Roger Dale Hicks

1935 - 2023

Roger Dale Hicks, age 88, of Wrightwood, California passed away on Monday, December 4th, 2023.

A celebration of life service for Roger will be held on Sunday, December 17, 2023, at 2:00 PM at Wrightwood Community United Methodist Church, 1543 Barbara St., Wrightwood, CA, 92397. Refreshments and a time of sharing will follow the service.

In lieu of flowers, the family requests that donations be made to the National Multiple Sclerosis Society (https://www.nationalmssociety.org) in honor of Roger and Judy Hicks.

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Roger was an avid traveler. Throughout his life, he made trips to Hawaii, England, Alaska, the Pacific Northwest, Washington DC, Peru, and New Zealand just to name a few of his destinations. He backpacked his way through the Grand Teton National Park and the Sierra Nevada Mountains, and he even climbed Mount Whitney. But on Monday December 4, 2023, Roger made the greatest journey of his life at the age of 88 as he passed from the confines of this earth to the glorious kingdom of his Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

Roger was born into a farming family in 1935, in Moorland, Iowa. He grew up on a farm in Somers, Iowa, along with his brother Dean and his sister Judy, where he helped his dad plow, grow, and harvest the crops. He played baseball and basketball at Somers High School and graduated from there along with six other seniors. He then left the farm and got his BS in Mechanical Engineering from Iowa State College (now Iowa State University) where he was editor of the Iowa Engineer and part of the Glee Club. He joined the Air Force in 1957 as an officer with aspirations of becoming a pilot. Due to a 1mm difference between the pupils in his eyes he had to let go of his pilot dreams, and he ended up at Edwards AFB where he worked as a propulsion engineer in support of jet engines on the F-104 Starfighter and the T-38 Talon. After finishing a short career in the Air Force, he moved on to a new chapter in life as a NASA engineer in Houston, Texas.

A year after moving to Houston, Roger was married to the love of his life, Judy Coerber, in 1963. Roger and Judy quickly got to work starting their family and welcomed their daughter Cindy into the world in 1964, followed by their son, Ken, in 1966.

Early in his career with NASA, Roger was assigned to the design and development team for the Lunar Excursion Module in support of the Apollo Project. His work on the LM-5 lunar module was pivotal in getting the astronauts of the historic Apollo 11 Mission safely “down” to the surface of the moon and back “up” to the Command and Service Modules for their return trip home to earth. At the conclusion of the Apollo program, Roger worked on the NASA Skylab (the United States’ first space station) and LACIE projects before moving to Lancaster, California in 1975, where he worked for the remainder of his career as a project engineer and ultimately the resident manager for the Space Shuttle program at Plant 42 in Palmdale.

The Space Shuttle program took Roger and Judy to Lompoc, California for a few years when Vandenberg AFB was being spooled up for shuttle launches, but they returned to the high desert after the Vandenberg launch activities were abandoned. After leaving Lompoc, Roger and Judy made their new home in the mountain community of Wrightwood, California. Commuting from Wrightwood to Palmdale each day, Roger finished his career with NASA in 1990, just prior to final checkout and delivery of the fifth and final space shuttle, Enterprise.

Roger’s retirement from NASA came a bit earlier than expected so he could provide more extensive care to Judy due to her battle with multiple sclerosis. As he continued to look for ways to ease her journey through this debilitating disease, he stumbled across Feldenkrais, a unique approach to healing accomplished by improving neural connections between the brain and the rest of the body. Roger began to study Feldenkrais techniques and soon became a certified Feldenkrais practitioner, eventually using his new passion to bring healing to his wife, family, friends, and friends-to-be.

Roger was a man of great intellect, even at the end of his life. Yet he was also a man of great faith. He put his trust in the Lord Jesus Christ many years ago, and he never let go. He was able to apply his scientific mind to better appreciate the infinite and loving Creator of the universe. His faith was expressed daily by how he lived his life. He was a man of incredible generosity and selflessness who lived his life as an act of service that made a difference in the lives of all of those who were fortunate enough to know him. And he was blessed beyond measure over the last 35 years by his amazing church family at Wrightwood Community United Methodist Church.

Music was always a significant part of Roger’s life. Whether he was singing in the Iowa State Glee Club or the church choir, singing solos at church, participating in Messiah sing-alongs, attending musicals, or immersing himself in the classic works of Bach and Beethoven, Roger found peace and joy when he was in the midst of the beautiful harmonies, emotions and complexities of music. In his later years, he developed a passion for opera and spent many hours attending, watching, and listening to both classical and contemporary operas.

Outside of music, Roger took pleasure in numerous other things as well. He enjoyed skiing, backpacking, hiking, golfing, gardening, cooking, bird watching, reading, learning and problem-solving. But far above any of these was his love for family. He jumped at every opportunity to be with them, talk with them, travel with them, and support them. He was an amazing husband, father, grandfather, son, and brother. He will be sorely missed by his family and friends.

Roger was preceded in death by his wife, Judy, in 2010. He is survived by his brother Dean Hicks of Knoxville, IA; his sister Judy Wood of Fort Dodge, IA; his daughter Cindy Hicks and her wife Leah Griffin of Long Beach, CA; his son Ken Hicks and his wife Susie, and their children Kaylee Fraats (and her husband Daniel), Bethany Hicks, and Jeremy Hicks, all of Lompoc, CA.