Dean Lusted

On the evening of July 12, 2026 Dean Lusted of North Logan, Utah, a resident of The Gables Assisted Living, passed away at age 97. His demise was hastened by congestive heart failure and pulmonary edema. 

Dean was born in Los Angeles, California on November 19, 1928 to Reverend George Charles and Maude Browning Lusted. Yet Dean’s childhood was spent entirely in rural Iowa, steeped in art from his father and music from his mother. Dean and his older brothers, Lee and Keith, were to become accomplished musicians. From an early age, Dean played and performed on his plywood cello, often holding it over his head like an umbrella, as he walked to and from school in the rain. The three brothers performed in churches and public events around Iowa. Dean and Keith were even featured on the first ever live television broadcast in Iowa from the Iowa State Fair. The cello was a constant companion to Dean throughout his long life. 

When Dean boarded the train in 1949 for Colorado, after getting his BA in mathematics from Cornell College, his cello was by his side. To make ends meet for his advanced degree math studies at the University of Colorado, he joined Navy ROTC, becoming their marching band director. He also worked as an orderly at a Seventh Day Adventist Hospital, where he developed a fascination with medicine, resulting a change to pre-med. It was a busy time in Boulder, playing in the symphony, studies, work and courting Patricia Ann Pratt.

As part of his NROTC experience, Midshipman Dean Lusted steamed to Hawaii, “learning the ropes” on an aircraft carrier, transporting the famed Black Sheep Squadron. On arrival at Pearl Harbor, they were informed that war with Korea had begun. All the midshipman were returned to San Diego on a destroyer. While awaiting return to Boulder, Dean discovered a string quartet performing in Balboa Park. He brazenly suggested to the cellist to leave for an ice cream break, then Dean assumed the role of the cello parts for the next hour.

In 1951 Dean and Patricia returned to Iowa in his ’31 Chevy with a leaky radiator and were wed in Cedar Rapids, Iowa St Paul’s Methodist Church. Dean started Medical School at the University of Iowa in Iowa City. During this time, he drove an ambulance that also doubled as a hearse, while Patricia worked as a librarian for the University. Dean became Dr. Lusted in 1955. By this time, Patricia had given birth to their first-born, Roderick Mark (always called Mark). Beginning his career, Dr. Lusted worked the emergency room in Detroit, in the volatile big city downtown. Soon Dean became a Navy physician at Great Lakes Naval Training Station, just north of Chicago. He toyed with becoming a surgeon, but with encouragement from his father, Dean quite contentedly, hung out his “shingle” in Carthage, Illinois, for a small town private practice. He and Patricia now had three boys with the addition of Stephan Jeffrey (’57) and Gregory Dean (’59). Dr. Lusted loved his patients and general practice. No matter where he went in the future, he always delighted in treating patients. 

Being the scholar that he was, Dean and family moved to to Hartford, Connecticut to complete a residency in pathology. While working/studying at Hartford Hospital , Dr. Lusted also taught at the Yale University laboratory. Everything was as it should be. The children were starting school. “Just normal life”, as Dean recalled. Dr Lusted became board certified in both clinical and anatomical pathology. 

Then that intellectual clarion call lured Dr. Lusted to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge to study neurofilaments. These pioneering nerve studies were performed at the Schmidt lab, where he got to rub elbows with scientists from around the world. Heady days indeed for the scholar. Unfortunately, research did not pay the bills, so he and Patricia decided he needed to return to the clinical setting. 

The family moved to Norwich, Connecticut at the end of the school year in 1965. Dean worked at the Backus Hospital, sharpening his pathology acumen. Part of Dean’s character that seemed to pervade his every decision was his childhood during the Great Depression. Moving to Norwich he appeared to try to side step those emotions with the purchase of a fine house on 5 acres. His boys loved it as did many neighborhood children, who came there to play baseball or play in the woods. And yet, Dean was determined that his children would learn to work. His motto, “ Saturday morning we work”, found his boys weeding, mowing the lawn, digging a new pond in the woods, cutting firewood with a 2-man cross-cut saw…. 

University of Indiana in Indianapolis asked Dr. Lusted to come and teach and manage the Medical Technology School in Bloomington. Dean did some research in cell membranes, lipids and cholesterol. But the job was not as advertised. The next transition came as Dean accepted a teaching/clinical position at the University of Texas in Dallas. In January of 1970 Patricia and Dean brought the boys to Texas, halfway through the school year. While in Texas, vacations included teaching his sons how to sail and ski. By the end of the summer of 1972, Dean and Patricia had purchased a home in Peterborough, New Hampshire. While Mark started college and the younger brothers were working on a farm in Iowa, Dean and Pat flew to Moscow, on the second flight into Russia following Henry Kissinger’s. There, Dean presented at a conference with other physicians and scientists from the US. 

Upon returning from Russia, Dean Lusted moved to England and worked with Dr. Bangham at Cambridge University, researching phospholipid and cholesterol biophysics. Then briefly returned to New Hampshire before beginning work for the World Health Organization in ’73-’74 on the island of Cyprus in the Mediterranean Sea. He was successful in in creating a new histopathology building and modernizing their ailing laboratory. Just prior to the Cypriot War, Dean high-tailed it back to the US, where he found work teaching at the Dartmouth Medical School and and directing Laboratory Services at the VA Hospital in White River Junction Vermont. That same year Dean and Patricia were divorced.(1974) 

A second Veteran’s Administration assignment (1976) moved Dr. Lusted to Cleveland, Ohio to be Chief Pathologist and Director of Laboratory services. At the same time Dean taught at Case Western Reserve. During this period Dean took time to fly to Scotland to be licensed in Great Britain to practice medicine. Politics and corruption in medicine seemed deeply entrenched in the VA system. After battling the system locally and in Washington DC, Dean retreated to a small cabin in Blacksburg, Virginia to regroup. After a short respite in the woods of Virginia, Dean accepted a position In Oak Bluffs, Massachusetts on Martha’s Vineyard Island (1980), as the hospital pathologist. 

Martha’s Vineyard became his home for 21 years. He entered into private practice again, worked in public health, pursued music and made many friends. During his time on the Vineyard, Dean took at least four sojourns to India, seeking spiritual answers that had long puzzled him from his upbringing. While maintaining his residency on the Island, Dr. Lusted worked briefly in Carthage, Mississippi, to get a foundering hospital on its feet. Likewise during this time, Dean became the medical director at the Monroe Institute in Virginia studying human consciousness. 

By 2001 Dean said farewell to the Island, and moved to Quincey, Massachusetts. He established himself in a large aging apartment building for seniors. Not shy about confronting problems, Dean championed the cause for building safety renovations involving the press and the Mayor of Quincey. As a new adventure, Dean took up the electric bass guitar, which he played by ear, improvising bass lines. He performed with a group of retired musicians and vocalist, and accompanied local plays. All his life he had been a prolific writer, mostly journals and poetry, so Dean formed a writing club. 

Worried about finances, Dean moved into another apartment building, which was occupied by mostly Chinese people, who spoke little English. Soon he was performing with his Chinese choir and traditional Chinese musical instruments, in parks, seniors centers and a swanky hotel. Even the Mayor of Quincey came to listen. The crime in the area had Dean worried, so at age 88, he packed up his ever dwindling belongings and drove to Logan, Utah not far from his middle son, Stephan. (2016) 

The journey to Utah was not without mishaps. Not the least of which was his car dying in Laramie, Wyoming, directly in front of a used car dealer. On the road again with a 2005 Honda Accord, Dean safely made it to Logan. Since being in the Logan area, Dean met some fascinating people and he relished hearing their stories and playing music with them; and Dean fell in love again with Shirley Danahy, both a musician and an artist. Life comes full circle. 

In addition to his parents, Dr. Lusted is preceded in death by his brothers Lee and Keith, as well as his ex-wife Patricia Ann Pratt Lusted. 

He is survived by his three sons Roderick Mark (Pat) Lusted, Stephan Jeffrey (Kathy) Lusted, and Gregory Dean (Marcia) Lusted; six grandchildren: Ethan Lusted, Kevin (Christina) Lusted, Nicholas Lusted, Samuel Lusted, Thomas Lusted, and Kitsel Lusted; and two great grandchildren: Dahlia Lusted and Charter Lusted. 

Special thanks to: Spring Gardens (Pioneer Valley Lodge) of North Logan, where Dean was a longtime resident and formed many close friendships, and whose staff were unwaveringly kind. Also our deep gratitude goes out to The Gables Assisted Living and Memory Care, for such warm, diligent and professional attention to Dean in his last weeks. And lastly, we would like to express a profound thanks to the Enhabit Hospice team, for supporting Dean in his decrescendo. 

Arrangements are handled by Cache Valley Mortuary of Hyde Park, Utah. Place of interment: Keokuk, Iowa National Cemetery. An informal “Celebration of Life” will be held at Spring Gardens (Pioneer Valley Lodge) 2351 N 400 E North Logan, Utah 84341… at 10:30 AMOn August 26, 2026. In lieu of flowers, donations can be made to a charity of your choice.