Douglas Pardoe Wilson

August 5, 1949 – March 11, 2019

The first child of Ted and Betty Wilson, Douglas was born in Vancouver and died in Victoria at age 69. He is survived by his loving partner Gudrun and her daughter Lindsey of Sooke, his only child Clara of Vancouver, his father Ted and brother Alan (Laurie) of Gabriola Island, as well as niece Marika of Nanaimo and cousins in BC, Ontario and Washington.

Doug grew up in North Vancouver where he was an omnivorous reader and outstanding student with a penchant for math and science, and he attended Simon Fraser University from its opening in the 1960s through most of the 70s. Something of a polymath, Doug took a wide-ranging undergraduate degree and then a Masters Degree, and subsequently went on to work for the aerospace firm McDonald Dettwiler in space-based imaging and satellite surveillance as a software engineer and analyst.

From his early years, Doug had a brilliant and wide-ranging mind which took him into various realms, including a love of music, particularly pipe organ music. Not content to be just a listener, he took on a massively complex volunteer project in his 20s of trying to rescue the huge pipe organ at the Holy Rosary Cathedral in Vancouver which had fallen into disrepair. Over his latter years he worked to elaborate on his social theories and genealogy projects, tracing the family tree well back beyond the Norman conquest.

He was a profuse writer producing numerous unpublished works of fiction and non-fiction, and dozens of websites exploring solutions to social issues. In 1999 a British organization honoured him with its award for the best social innovation of the year for his application of mathematics to social problems.

Doug could be persuasive and inspiring, or argumentative and contrary, and he had a wicked sense of humour. In a manic phase he could declaim prodigiously on almost any subject and as the audience you would get glimpses of his vast technical knowledge. His sudden loss is hard to accept and he will be missed.