Halden Clair Bertholf

Halden Clair Bertholf, 86, of Winterset, died Tuesday, June 29, 2021, at Mercy One Hospital in Des Moines. Funeral services will be held 10:00 AM Saturday, July 3, 2021, at Caldwell Parrish Funeral Home Winterset Chapel. Family will greet friends one hour prior to services. Burial will be in the Clark Cemetery, Madison County. In lieu of flowers, memorials may be directed to the John Wayne Cancer Foundation (johnwayne.org). Halden Clair Bertholf was born on November 28, 1934, in Winterset, Iowa, the son of Halden and Geneva (Brown) Bertholf. Raised on their family farm during the Great Depression and World War II, he was a fan of early radio shows like “The Phantom” and broadcasts of symphony orchestras and big bands. A graduate of Winterset High School, class of 1953, he went on to study mathematics and engineering at Iowa State University (Iowa State College, as it was known then), and was recruited during his senior year to work on early computer technology for the Strategic Air Command (SAC). His early training and career was spent in upper-state New York, Boston (at M.I.T.), and Los Angeles. An early adaptor to new technologies, Halden, or “Clair” as he was called by family and friends, loved internal combustion engines, fast cars, and aircraft. Learning to fly in LA, he piloted his beloved Piper Cub across the Southwest to Iowa to visit family. He drove a black Jaguar through the twisting LA canyons, and would occasionally play sit-in gigs with the Los Angeles Philharmonic on clarinet. Halden married Virginia Lou “Ginger” Wofford on December 20, 1962. They had three children in California, and then moved to Colorado Springs, CO, where he worked on the Cheyenne Mountain Complex, again for what was then called SAC. He moved the family to Fort Worth, Texas, in 1972, where he helped to develop an experimental braking system for Semi-trucks. From the mid 1970’s until he retired he developed information systems and computer main-frames for the National Truckers’ Service, an early debit-card resource for truckers, and finally First Data Corporation. As a multi-instrumentalist, Halden played clarinet, piano, and later was the organist for the First Baptist Church of Watauga. In the summer of 2019 Clair and Ginger returned to his childhood home on the farm in Winterset with their daughter Linda. Halden Clair Bertholf is preceded in death by his parents Halden Star and Geneva (Brown) Bertholf. He is survived by his wife, Ginger; his sister Linda Jean and her husband Daryle Johnson; and by his children Joe Halden Bertholf of Fort Worth, Texas; Bret Bertholf of Denver, Colorado; and Linda Bertholf of Winterset, Iowa; and grandchildren Aaron Daniel Bertholf (married to Angel McDougald), Lazarus Antonio DiGiacomo, and Jordan Hunter Bertholf.