Frederick Joseph Kruger

Frederick Joseph Kruger was born Dec. 3, 1926, in his parents' apartment in the Inwood section of upper New York City and passed away June 1, 2017 at his home in Fallbrook, Calif.

His father, Frederick John Kruger, was a welder and ironworker and his mother, Ruth Kruger, was from Kingston, Jamaica. Fred had an older brother, James, and an older sister, Amelia.

Growing up in New York during the Depression, Fred attended Holy Cross Episcopal Church and was active in numerous sports. He was one of the last surviving founding members of the Whippets Baseball team, a youth team that remains a prominent powerhouse in New York youth baseball. His interest in baseball continued through his entire life.

Fred attended Manhattan High School of Aviation Trades specializing in aviation and Stewart Technical School majoring in Aeronautical & Mechanical Drafting & Design. With World War II going on, Fred enlisted in the U.S. Army and despite his educational background was trained and assigned to the horse cavalry.

In the spring of 1945, he was deployed to the 1st Calvary Division then on Okinawa and remained with the Division as part of the occupation forces in Japan when the war concluded. He remained proud of the fact that as a writer for Stars and Stripes he was the first U.S. serviceman to ride the emperor of Japan's ceremonial white horses.

Following his discharge from the Army, Fred settled in Los Angeles, Calif., and was employed by North American Aviation at the Los Angeles Airport plant working on the F86 fighter. He met and married Dorothy Marie Morrow and they lived in Hawthorne, Calif .; Long Beach, Calif .; Los Alamitos, Calif .; Nyack, N.Y .; Santa Ana, Calif .; Boston, Mass .; Granada Hills, Calif. and Vista, Calif.

Fred's career with North American included work on the B45 Tornado bomber and the F100 Super Sabre fighter. He was one of the Deputy Program Managers on the B70 Valkerie Bomber program in the early 1960s prior to transferring to the Autonetics Division of North American where he worked on life support systems for the Apollo space program. Fred concluded his professional career with ITT as the Program Manager of the Government of Sweden S3D radar program.

Fred and Dorothy raised two children, John and Ruth. During his retirement, Fred was active in golf and traveling throughout the world having visited over 50 countries. Fred was preceded in death by his wife Dorothy in 1990 and he is currently survived by Peggy Scott Seay; his son John and wife Vickie, his daughter, Ruth Delfs, and numerous grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

Shelter service at Riverside National Cemetery will be on Thursday, June 22 at 11 a.m.