Lee Edward Fickle of Bainbridge Island and Poulsbo passed away on April 10, 2018.

Lee was born on July 16, 1926 to Floyd S. Fickle and Catherine Conlon Fickle, of Mulberry in northern Indiana.

Lee was the youngest of seven children and grew up on the 120-acre family farm.

Always interested in numbers, Lee decided in the seventh grade to become an electrical engineer. He entered Purdue University in April 1944 and received his BSEE in February 1948.

His first professional position was with the Rural Electrification Administration in Washington, D.C. There he met his wife and lifelong love Dorothy Wentworth. He always said that he was attracted to her because she read Time Magazine while standing in line at the cafeteria.

The couple wed on Sept. 23, 1950 and were together over 50 years until Dorothy passed away in March 2005.

After a short stint in the Marine Corps in 1951, the young couple moved to Cameron, Missouri, where Lee worked with a REA power generating utility. Over the space of just four years, three children were born: Kate, Floyd and Susanne. From 1957 to 1962 the family lived in Indianapolis, Indiana where Lee worked for Eli Lilly and Company as a plant engineer.

Longing for adventure, Lee and Dorothy moved their young family to Bangkok, Thailand in 1962. This began a 16-year succession of consulting engineering assignments in Bangkok, Dacca (East Pakistan, now Dhaka, Bangladesh), and Jakarta (Indonesia). Lee’s work brought power to hundreds of thousands of people for the first time. During most of his time abroad, he was employed by Black & Veatch International, where he met colleagues who became lifelong friends.

Lee and Dorothy were intensely interested in the countries and people where they lived. Lee was a “people person,” learning the local languages quickly and befriending all whom he met.

In 1978 Lee and Dorothy moved to Kansas City, the headquarters of Black & Veatch International. Lee became Senior Vice President of Marketing, traveling extensively throughout Africa, the Middle East, Asia and Australia.

After retirement, Lee and Dorothy moved to Bainbridge Island to be nearer their children, two of whom lived nearby.

Lee was a man of diverse interests, ranging from tap dancing to chocolate making to zeppelins.

Lee was a regular volunteer at the Bloedel Reserve and with the Island Volunteer Caregivers. He was a long-active member of the Oatmeal Club at the Eagle Harbor Congregational Church.

Lee loved the community he found on Bainbridge and delighted in greeting friends and acquaintances everywhere he went.

Lee is survived by two of his children, Kate Fickle (husband Jerry Carroll) of Menlo Park, California and Susanne Regan (husband Tom Regan) of Allyn, Washington; and his sister Martha Pollak of Poulsbo. His son Floyd Fickle of Seattle passed away in October 2017.

A celebration of life will be held at 11 a.m. Saturday, May 19 at The Stone Chapel Poulsbo Mortuary at Cherry Grove Memorial Park, 22272 Foss Road NE, Poulsbo.

Donations in lieu of flowers may be directed to the Bloedel Reserve (bloedelreserve.org) or Island Volunteer Caregivers (ivcbainbridge.org). An online memorial can be seen at www.poulsbomortuary.com.