Professor Rolfe C. Erickson, PhD

November 18, 1936 – April 11, 2023

Obituary

Rolfe Erickson died on Tuesday, April 11, 2023 while a resident at Sunrise Home of Petaluma in Petaluma, California. He had been a resident there for the past several years, after moving out of his home in Cotati, California. He was 86 years old at the time of his death.

Rolfe was a lifelong resident of the North Bay area of California, settling there after graduate school. In addition to Cotati, Rolfe lived in Rohnert Park, both just south of Santa Rosa. He retired in 2005 from the faculty at Sonoma State University after 39 years.

Rolfe is survived by his brother Kirby and his wife Katie, and their six children, and a step-daughter, Jody Cox. He also has seven grand nieces and nephews.

Early years.

Rolfe was born in Superior, Wisconsin, and attended public schools through high school there. He was active in the Central Methodist Church, which included Boy Scouts and Explorer Scouts, and Youth Fellowship. He was also blessed with the family’s cabin on Lake Amnicon south of Superior where he spent many summers.

While in high school, Rolfe was a serious student and he developed a number of friends who followed their academic interest together. They were regulars at the Superior Public Library. (They were “nerds” before that word became popular.) During the winter months, he was an avid curler, playing on teams from the high school.

College

After high school, Rolfe attended Superior State University for two years, where he was active in theater and developed his interest in geology. He followed that with a three year stint at Michigan Tech, in Houghton, Michigan, graduating in May, 1959. (Michigan Tech became Michigan Technological University later.)

To attend graduate school Rolfe enrolled at the University of Arizona, in Tucson, Arizona the following year (after three years of snow and cold on the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, a move to the warm desert of AZ seemed pretty nice.) Rolfe become integrated in the University’s graduate school where he was a teaching assistant, and worked at the University to help with his tuition, and he was on scholarship for some of the time.

Rolfe completed both his Master’s and Doctoral Degrees in Geology at Arizona, and he developed a keen interest in the mountains of Arizona as well as the desert as a part of his graduate school studies. In fact, his doctoral dissertation was focused on an analysis of the rock make up of a mountain range east of Tucson. This interest became more evident once he became a professor in California.

Career

While attending a professional conference during his last year at Arizona, he met a professor from the school in California where he eventually became a faculty member. This fellow was looking for staff to expand the school’s major in geology, and he and Rolfe hit it off right away. He eventually interviewed and was hired at Sonoma State University, a school in the California State University System (CSU).

He loved the university setting and the department he joined. Over the years, his department’s enrollment grew, and he had many graduates that went on to careers in the field of geology. He became famous for his field trips with his students. He did several every year, some of which were to Death Valley. He loved to show off his photo albums from his field trips. He had several stints as department chair, which rotated among the faculty in the department, but he valued his teaching role more, and of course, his field trips and research.

Rolfe's submissions to the Sonoma State University, Scholar Works website are shown below.

Giant Intrusive Volcanic Breccia Complex in the Dos Cabezas Mountains, Arizona, Erickson, Rolfe (2017), The Dos Cabezas mountains are a medium-sized range outcropping in southeastern Arizona near the town of Willcox. They are dominantly a Precambrian complex composed of 10 granitoid plutons and 3 multi-km² terranes of Pinal ...

Petrology of a Franciscan Olistostrome with a Massive Sandstone Matrix: The King Ridge Road Melange at Cazadero, California , Erickson, Rolfe (The Geological Society of America - Special Paper, 2011), The King Ridge Road melange is a unit of the Franciscan Complex, cropping out in an area of at least SO km2 around the town of Cazadero, coastal California. This unit is an olistostrome with a massive, unfoliated sandstone ...

Producing an Accurate Crystal Drawing in Any Orientation from a Stereogram , Erickson, Rolfe (Journal of Geoscience Education, 1998), A wholly general method is presented to produce accurate drawings of any crystal in any orientation from a stereogram of the crystal. A standard stereogram is prepared with all faces plotted, and the desired viewpoint ...

How to Make an Accurate Three-Dimensional Model of Any Crystal from Its Stereogram , Erickson, Rolfe; Barthelmy, Lance Gerald (Journal of Geoscience Education, 2000), To make an accurate three-dimensional model of any crystal, plot partial stereograms of one face from each form on the crystal and all the faces with which it shares edges. Rotate each partial stereogram until the chosen ...

Petrology and Geochemistry of the Dos Cabezas Mountains, Cochise County, Arizona, Erickson, Rolfe (Department of Geology, University of Arizona, 1969), The Dos Cabezas Mountains lie in the northeastern-most part of Arizona, in Cochise county. They are a medium-sized range of some 150 square miles area, and are almost wholly surrounded by unconsolidated basin-fill material. ...

Family

Rolfe was married twice, his first to Trudy in Rohnert Park, where she was a teacher in an elementary school. They settled in a home in the hills outside of town, a beautiful setting. The marriage, however, didn’t last; and they had no children.

His second marriage was to Laura, who worked in the wine industry as a wine chemist. With the marriage came a young girl who became Rolfe’s step-daughter, Jody. Unfortunately, after a number of years together, Rolfe and his wife also separated and divorced. Rolfe, however, stayed close to Jody. He ended up walking her down the aisle when she got married.

Retirement

After more than 39 years on the faculty at Sonoma State University, Rolfe retired. He had many friends and former colleagues in the area, and he decided to continue to live in the North Bay area. He also added some travel to his itinerary with trips to Mexico, Iceland, Norway, and other spots. He also decided to work on his interest in blue grass music, playing a banjo and making all the regional blue grass fairs and concerts.

Rolfe joined the family back in Wisconsin for the Christmas – New Year’s holiday almost every year. It was a highlight for him, and for all the kids, grandkids, and extended family who loved him and he as well enjoyed his time with us. This also included Katie’s parents, Bill and Evelyn, who often joined Rolfe and the rest of the family in the holiday activities.

4/19/2023 - Kirby Erickson                                                                                                                                                                                                                      

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