Mr. Donald J. Rose

Professor Donald J. Rose better known as "Don" age 71, of West Jefferson, NC and Durham, NC died on Friday, June 12, 2015. Mr. Rose was born on May 25, 1944 in Orange County, CA to the late James E. and Lucile Neuman Rose. Mr. Rose worked at University of Denver, Harvard University, Vanderbilt University and Bell Labs. Don later joined Duke University serving for 31 years, including 7 years as department chair. Don became chair in 1984 of the Department of Computer Science at Duke, at that time the department's connection to the outside world was via 300 baud modems. Don brought in over $2 million for department equipment, resources used to introduce new technologies to the department that were subsequently rolled out university-wide. These included ubiquitous email over TCP/IP, modern telephone switches, powerful workstations for all faculty and graduate students and, finally, high-speed internet connectivity. During his down time he would come to West Jefferson, getting away from the academic world and into the joy of loving life.

A memorial service to celebrate and honor the life of Mr. Rose will be held on Saturday, July 11, 2015 at 11:00 am at Badger Funeral Home by Rev. Rob Lee. The family will receive friends from 10:30 am to 11:00 am on Saturday, July 11, 2015 at Badger Funeral Home.

He is survived by his daughter Tamar J. Rose-Hendricks and husband Isaac, and 4 grandchildren Jennifer Crilly (age 25), Thomas Parrish (age 22), Dakota Hendricks (age 12), and Alexander Hendricks (age 10).

The family respectfully requests no flowers please; memorials may be made to the Beaver Creek High School Memorial Scholarship Fund, c/o NC Community Foundation, 4601 Six Forks Road, Suite 524, Raleigh, NC 27609.

Words of comfort and remembrance may be viewed or sent to the family through our website at www.badgerfuneralhome.com.

Badger Funeral Home was entrusted with Mr. Rose's arrangements.