Debra Essenberg Rober

Debra Essenberg Rober (née Debra Jean Essenberg) lost her fight with metastatic cancer on Oct. 25, 2020. She was born on Mar. 8, 1950 and lived in Duarte, CA for the first 6 years of her life. A job transfer for her father brought the family to Sacramento, CA, where she attended school up to high school, at El Camino High School, graduating in 1968. She attended the University of California at Santa Cruz, graduating with a degree in physics and mathematics in 1972, then went to Stanford University and received an M.S. degree in computer engineering in 1974. She had several jobs in the budding computer industry starting as a systems programmer for Burroughs in southern California, then becoming a technical writer. Shemoved north to the bay area and worked at Tandem Computers and became a technical editor.She received several awards for this work. Tandem was acquired by Compaq, which was acquired by Hewlett-Packard. She took early retirement, then moved to Oregon to find less expensive housing. After a period, she took courses to become a medical transcriptionist and worked at this for several years at Samaritan Health Services in Albany, OR. Her job was automated and she had a second retirement, allowing more time for looking after her house and cats and other activities, such as knitting and stamp collecting. Debra had a variety of interests, including puzzles of many sorts, stamp and coin collecting, animals and wildlife, dancing (tap, folk, ballroom and ballet), arts and crafts, reading, especially science fiction and mysteries, watching old movies and a variety of performances. She volunteered for a number of organizations, and contributed knitted hats to newborns and cancer patients with the Tuesday Knitters and Loving Stitches. She enjoyed travel, especially to see new and unusual animals. Debra was predeceased by her parents Charles Martin Essenberg and Jean Russell Essenberg (née Mary Jean Russell) and is survived by her brother and sister-in-law Richard and Margaret Essenberg, her nephew Gavin Essenberg and his wife Catherine and their daughters Rachel, Lauren, Marianne and Sarah, and her niece Carla Essenberg and her husband Tim Stott. Memorial contributions may be sent to the San Diego Zoological Society or the Nature Conservancy.