Cincinnati Enquirer

November 20, 2011

A few credit hours short of earning a college degree in 1944, Harvey C. Sunderman left the University of Kentucky to enlist in the military and fight for his country in World War II. "He said the college boys, as the drill instructors called them, were steered to certain things, and he was steered to become a pilot," said one of his two sons, Alan Sunderman of Delhi Township. The 24-year-old had no flying experience, but was trained by the Army Air Corps to pilot the B-24 Liberator, a heavy bomber. Between April and August of 1945, he flew several dozen missions in the South Pacific, his son said. "He said it was incredibly scary, but ... he was never injured and he returned from every one of them."

Mr. Sunderman, who had Parkinson's disease, died of pneumonia Nov. 1 at Twin Towers senior living community in College Hill, where he had lived for eight years. The retired University of Cincinnati geology professor and longtime resident of Groesbeck was 91. After the war, Mr. Sunderman returned to UK and completed his bachelor's degree in geology in 1946. Later that year, he married Margaret Dorsey. She died in 1975. Mr. Sunderman's second wife, Rosemary Powell Hall, died in 2006. Alan Sunderman isn't sure why his father chose to major in geology, given that music might have seemed the obvious choice. "He was not much of a student in high school, but he was an unbelievable trombone player," the son said. "It was his trombone playing that got him into the University of Kentucky on a music scholarship." Geology, though, became his career choice. He remained at UK and earned a master's degree in 1947; four years later, he received a doctorate from the University of Wisconsin. He was hired as a geology professor by UC in 1952.

"He loved doing field work," his son said. "He loved doing geological mapping." But in 1955, at age 35, Mr. Sunderman fell and injured a knee. After several surgeries, he could bend it only 15 degrees. His days doing fieldwork were over, and he walked with a limp the rest of his life. He turned his attention to optical mineralogy, and devised a method of grinding minerals into tiny spheres and using refracted light and polarizing microscopes to study them.

His teaching career was sandwiched around stints as assistant dean and associate dean at UC's McMicken College of Arts and Sciences. He retired from UC in 1985, but he continued to apply his scientific knowledge while enjoying a favorite hobby - fishing. In addition to his son Alan, survivors include a son, Mark Sunderman of Athens, Ohio; one grandson; and three stepgrandchildren.