Bruce A. Pass

“December 7, 1925 - May 5, 2017”

Bruce Allen Pass, “An Extraordinary Gentleman”, was born in Chicago, Illinois on December 7, 1925 to Douglas and Olga (Rothschild) Pass. After Olga’s unexpected death when Bruce was just 4 years old, his father moved his extended family to Los Angeles in 1929 at the beginning of the Great Depression. Bruce, his elder sibling Audrey and their cousin Blanche were all raised for a time by their Kosher Jewish grandparents as his father’s job had him traveling all over the U.S. When Bruce was 12 and Audrey 13, Douglas married his second wife, their beloved step-mother, Lorraine, and settled the family in Oakland.

Bruce graduated from Oakland High in 1944 where he served as President of the ROTC. Immediately after graduating, Bruce joined the Army Air Corps and served in the Air Force during WWII as a tail gunner on a B24 Liberator in the Pacific Theater. Bruce was very proud of his service to our Country and loved to share stories of his wartime experiences.

After the war, Bruce attended The University of California at Berkeley (Cal) graduating with a Business Degree. During his years at Cal, he served as President of the Blue & Gold, the school’s yearbook, of which he had many fond memories. While at Cal, Bruce met his first wife, the former Elaine Davis, whom he married in 1949 and settled with in San Francisco.

Bruce and Elaine’s first child, son Stephen Charles, was born in 1950 in San Francisco. Soon after Steve’s birth, Bruce began his 35-year career with New York Life Insurance Company (NYLIC) in their San Francisco Group Sales office as a “Group Man”. Group Insurance was a brand new business in 1951 and Bruce was just the 9th “Group Man” hired by NYLIC.

Back in those days, insurance companies relocated their sales people every few years and Bruce was no exception. In 1952 Bruce was transferred to Oregon and his small family settled in Portland where their second child, daughter Alanna Lorraine, was born in 1953. Not too many years after that the family was happy to be transferred to Glendale, California where their youngest child, Jeffrey Douglas was born in 1959.

The now family of 5 had 10 very happy years living in Southern California. Bruce was a very involved and loving father to his children. He was a participant in the annual Verdugo Woodlands Elementary School Fathers’ Follies which is now in its 69th year and is the longest running annual school fundraiser in the U.S. Bruce loved being a member of the Fathers’ Follies where he enjoyed singing in the chorus and dancing the CanCan in drag!

Every summer, Bruce loved taking his family camping, piling everyone into the red & white ‘56 Chevy Wagon with a tenttrailer in tow! A favorite destination was Yosemite National Park. He and other fathers would make air mattress courses out of rocks in the river for the campground kids to enjoy. He would go on hikes, bike rides, mule rides and watch the nightly fire-fall from El Capitan with his kids. Bruce also took them fishing on the Merced River, a hobby he continued to pursue through his 70s.

In 1966, Bruce was transferred back to the San Francisco Bay Area where he would spend time in the San Jose, San Francisco and San Mateo Sales Offices as a Group Sales Manager before retiring at the age of 60 in 1985. Bruce loved working for New York Life and remained in close contact with many of his colleagues, enjoying get-togethers with several of them over the past 32 years.

It was at New York Life where Bruce would meet his second and current wife, Penny Whiteford Pass. They enjoyed a lengthy courtship of 13 years before getting married in Lake Tahoe in 1997. Bruce and Penny enjoyed many of the same things that Life had to offer including sports, traveling and entertaining family and friends. You could often find them, and any number of friends, drinking “corktails” and eating “snappitizers” while glued to their TV set cheering on the 49er’s, Shark’s, Giant’s, A’s and of course, the Cal Bear’s football team. Alas, Bruce never did get to see his beloved Bear’s win the Tournament of Roses.

Bruce came from a very small family, but when he married Penny, he gained a mother-in-law, 5 sistersin-law, their spouses, 10 nieces and nephews, their spouses and 14 great-nieces and great-nephews! He absolutely loved spending time with Penny’s family and they loved him immeasurabley in return. And the children knew that whenever Uncle Bruce came to visit, he would have a pocketful of $1 bills to play the dollar game with them.

Bruce and Penny were fortunate to have been able to travel all over the world during their 33 years of happiness together. Bruce’s favorite trip was to Kenya and Tanzania where, on safari, they were able to observe nature at its wildest. The last international trip they took was to Cuba last summer, a destination on Bruce’s bucket list!

Bruce and Penny made their home in Cupertino where, together, they became Child Advocates through the Court Appointed Special Advocates program (CASA) for 3 children in 1998. Twins Melissa and Alejandro were 5 at the time, while their younger brother, Ramon was 4. They expected to be the children’s Advocates for approximately 11 months, but it ended up being 14 years instead! The “children” are now young adults and each has a child of their own. They have all remained very close to Penny and Brucie, who loved them unconditionally for nearly 20 years now, and are considered members of their family.

For many years, Bruce served on the Board of Directors for New York Life’s Charitable Organization for Children. He also served as President of the Cupertino Waterfall Condominium Association for 20+ years. During his retirement, Bruce enjoyed playing doubles tennis and golf as well as fishing. He and Penny spent a lot of time with family in California and in Penny’s hometown of Traverse City, MI. Bruce had a very close and loving relationship with his grandchildren, Isabella (Shuggie), Gareth and Nathan, and spent as much time with them over the years as possible.

Bruce was diagnosed with Parkinson’s Disease in 2003 and, at the time, was the eldest Kaiser Permanente patient approved for the Deep Brain Stimulation Surgery (DBS) at age 86. The DBS allowed him to live a more fulfilling life with less Parkinson’s medications and side effects, so he and Penny were very thankful to Kaiser for approving the surgery. Ultimately though, it was complications from Parkinson’s that would be the cause of Bruce’s death. Bruce was ready to move on to his next journey and was very thankful for the happy and fulfilling life he led that was full of love, laughter and many adventures along the way.

Bruce’s survivors include his beloved wife Penny, first wife Elaine (Bill Skotnica) Pass, sister Audrey Austin, children Steve (Gladys Cornell) Pass, Alanna (Raymond Woltz) Pass and Jeff Pass, Grandchildren Gareth (Felicia) Vernam, Isabella Koselak and Nathan Cornell, Motherin-law Patricia Whiteford, Sisters-in-law and Brothersin-law Sarah Roberts Davis (Tom Bradner), Mary (Joe) Pickard, Pamela LaPlante, Jean (Dave) Chavalia, Angela (Wyman) Friske and Shelly (Bernd) Seeger, CASA children Alejandro and Ramon Lopez and Melissa Morales, Nephew, Alan Austin and numerous nieces, nephews, cousins and friends and his loyal companions of the past 11 years, Higgins and Dolly.

All who knew him will surely miss the dashing, witty, kind, caring, giving, happy, brilliant, handsome and Extraordinary Gentleman that was Bruce, Brucie, Brucer, Brucie.com, UB and Schmatzel.

Bruce’s family invites you to join them for a Celebration of Bruce’s Brilliant Life open house at their Elk Grove home on Sunday, May 21 from Noon - 7:00pm.

If family and friends so desire, contributions are appreciated in Bruce’s memory to: CASA or the VFW.