Gary Allen Culbert, Ph.D.

Gary Allen Culbert, Ph.D. passed away on April 23, 2024 at the age of 80. Gary was born on January 5, 1944 in Eau Claire, Wisconsin to Vincent and Doris Culbert of Omaha Street. Gary graduated from Eau Claire Memorial High School in 1962, and received his Bachelor of Arts in English from St. Olaf College in Northfield, Minnesota in 1966. Gary attended the University of Chicago where he received his Masters of Arts in English in 1967. On June 17, 1967, Gary married his high school sweetheart Sandra Culbert (née Severson), daughter of LeRoy and Jeanette Severson of the Shawtown area of Eau Claire. In 1974, Gary received his doctorate in English Literature from the University of Wisconsin - Madison.

Gary was hired as an Associate Professor of English at the University of Washington in 1972. Gary and Sandy moved to Seattle where they bought a home, and established their new lives. Gary taught at the UW for 9 years where there was often a waiting list for his classes. At the end of his time at the UW, he found a new position as an English teacher at Eastside Catholic High School in Bellevue, Washington. Over his 29 years of teaching at Eastside, Gary became a legendary and beloved teacher, guiding and mentoring his students through their time in high school, and ushering them into adulthood where college and real life awaited them.

As their teacher, Dr. Culbert, affectionately known as “Doc” to his students, kept expectations high of his students, believing they were capable of great things, requiring them to write a daily journal entry, a habit many students still report doing to this day. He also required them to memorize the first eighteen lines of the prologue to Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales, another habit that many students can still recite to this day. Through the school year, Doc would randomly draw a number and whichever student had that number would then have to stand and recite it to the whole class. No pressure! At his retirement party, dozens of students stood and surprised Doc with a spontaneous recitation. And yet again, at his memorial in June, nearly 200 former students and colleagues recited the prologue along with an audio recording of Doc reciting it. Not a dry eye in the chapel.

It is no secret that Doc inspired hundreds of students, that as a teacher he impacted more than we can count, and as a human who cared deeply about his passion and passing it along to the youth he was blessed to teach, the ripple effect now moves on through generations. Many of his former students have gone on to become English majors, teachers, professors, doctors, lawyers, writers, producers, actors. That is only a small sample. From being the mentor his students needed, to being the one who brought out the best in them, to advising and traveling with the JSA group, announcing all the basketball and football games for his entire career, Doc made Eastside his world. His students were his “kids”. He was more than just a teacher.

In addition to being a UW professor and a high school teacher, Gary lectured through the 1980s and into the 2000s at the Women’s University Club, brought in by his dear friend Virginia Dearborn, one of his first and oldest students at the UW. He delighted the older women in the establishment with his wit, charm, knowledge, and his command of his expertise in literature from Emily Dickinson to Shakespeare and everything in between. Recently, his daughter has been digitizing old cassette tapes of these lectures for all to enjoy in perpetuity - his voice carrying on indefinitely for those who want to learn and re-learn from him. In his last couple of years, Gary was able to listen to his own lectures from his younger years and even impressed himself at the quality of his teaching. It was a gift to him as well to know just how much his legacy would live on. (See the end of the obituary for a link to the playlist.)

Gary had an enduring love of collecting antique books. His book and general knowledge was immeasurably expansive. He was an expert on American author Hamlin Garland, as well as W.D. Howells. His knack for random interjection of facts and trivia knew no end. His grasp of history and its players was deep. Even his hobby of following obituaries and his love of cemeteries was impressive. You could ask him anything and he would know the answer, close to always. It goes without saying that reading was the main reason for this vast vault of knowledge. Reading was a true love - he could easily surpass 100 books a year, often writing them down in an ongoing tally. For his casual reading, he favored a good spy novel, a detective mystery, and a good biography. He had a passion for movies, and even acted in a few plays himself (Princess Bride, Fantasticks, Man of La Mancha). He was passionate about buttered popcorn, green olives, a good diner, a Leinie’s, cheese curds, and lefse. He also was passionate about genealogy - he spent decades refining the family genealogy, even researching in the old stavkirker of Norway for some of the family ancestry. Ultimately, he could trace back to the year 1250 in Ireland, from where the name Culbert originates. It was an endless quest for more history, more detail. He leaves a wealth of genealogy information for his descendants to build upon.

During summer school breaks from teaching, Gary would pack up his car with books and DVDs, and drive to his rustic family cabin in Chetek, Wisconsin - his very own Walden Pond - where he would recharge and reset for several weeks. Sitting on the dock and reading, fishing, taking the boat out, rocking in the chair by the fireplace, observing the wildlife tenants of the land, cranking the hand pump for well water - the simplicity and slowing down it required was the perfect antidote to all of life’s stresses and trials. He loved having a meal at a classic diner in town, making conversation with the proprietors and locals alike (they came to know him and look forward to his visits), with the occasional trip to Turtle Lake Casino with the gum money he collected from his students throughout the year rounding things off. He tended to the cabin from the time his father passed onward. He brought and taught his family and visitors how to take care of it, and appreciate its history. The cabin was in his blood, as was Wisconsin even when he no longer lived there.

Having lost his thirty-seven year-old mother to a brain tumor when he was the tender age of twelve, a life-changing event, Gary knew the value of family. Gary cared deeply about his family, from his extended family with Sandy, to his own children and grandchildren. He was a loving husband, brother, father and grandfather. He was an excellent listener who always had the best advice, and knew how to use humor when it was most needed. Seeing him laugh to tears was a real treat. Monty Python could do it, Mad Libs, and Ole and Lena jokes, too. He loved a game of cards, cribbage, gin rummy, and was the consistent winner of Trivial Pursuit (a surprise to no one). Most recently, his favorite card game was Uno Flip, never tiring of it. Besides the games themselves, it was the time with family that meant the most.

What Doc taught all of us, students and family alike, was to never cease learning, to stay curious, to crack open a book now and then (the more often the better), that literature has real and applicable value in our fast-paced lives, that it can teach us things no matter how old it is, that the value of the arts lies in it making life worth living. He encouraged us to strive to be our best selves, to always believe we can do more than we think we can, that we can always do better. He taught us to ask questions, to seek the deeper meaning, the next level of inquiry and thought. He taught us that words are not just words, they are magic, they are what connect us all. How we use them, how we consume them make us who we are - creative, expressive, insightful.

One more thing he taught us: that you never know when you will need to bust out some of Chaucer’s Middle English, if nothing else than to impress people, not the least of whom, yourselves. Gary even left his own life with a poetic ending: he passed away on the birth and death date of Shakespeare himself! He would have had a good chuckle.

Gary is survived by his wife of 57 years, Sandy, his sister Janice Jarnigan, his half-sister Crisor Babe, his son John Culbert, his daughter Emily Culbert Clapper and son-in-law Nicholas Clapper, his wonderful grandchildren Soleya Rea and Kaden Clapper, and his sweet and brilliant great-grandchild Fernadae Rea. He also leaves behind loving sisters-in-law, cousins, nieces and nephews, and devoted lifelong friends in Seattle and in Wisconsin. He was preceded in death by his parents Vincent and Doris, his sisters Dianne Albers and Susan Culbert, and many other beloved relatives. He will be greatly missed by all, but he will live on in all of us.

Thank you for your enduring support. In lieu of flowers, there is a GoFundMe to help with funeral and memorial expenses set up by his former students. If so inspired, you may donate here:

https://www.gofundme.com/f/honoring-dr-culberts-legacy-in-education?attribution_id=sl:f94fa91e-e399-4cdb-978b-cfbbf01749dd&utm_campaign=p_cp+share-sheet&utm_medium=copy_link_all&utm_source=customer

Here is the link to the playlist of digitized lectures from Gary's years speaking at the Women's University Club:

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLrwAEAOOUqKhN9NHRF8rW0JN29YAWrk2m

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'Tis good - the looking back on Grief -

To re-endure a Day -

We thought the Mighty Funeral -

Of All Conceived Joy -

To recollect how Busy Grass

Did meddle - one by one -

Till all the Grief with Summer - waved

And none could see the stone.

And though the Woe you have Today

Be larger - As the Sea

Exceeds its Unremembered Drop -

They're Water - equally -

~ Emily Dickinson