Terry Ryan Schumacher Obituary

Terry Ryan Schumacher attended Abraham Lincoln High School in San Jose, CA. View the obituary, post a memory, or share a photo about Terry Ryan Schumacher.

Graduation Year	Class of 1977
Date of Passing	Jul 30, 2020
About	My Baby Brother, Terry I was always proud to brag that Terry was a physicist who worked on the Lockheed Orion Project. But Terry was much more than that. He was a camper, hunter, shooter, hiker and nature lover as he went camping several times a year and every year took my daughter with him. He had so much gear, his garage rafters were overflowing. He loved to travel across the country and world regularly. He accumulated so many frequent flyer miles and still has over 200,000 miles. He was the Drum Major in at Lincoln High and competed in the Santa Clara Vanguard Drum & Bugle Corp, a precision drill team, for 2 years where they placed first and second out of 40+ teams. He loved gambling and the Lottery. Each year he reported a hefty win to the IRS and had 6 boxes of scratched Lotto tickets if he ever needed evidence of his losses. As a wine connoisseur, he judged at several wineries. He took my daughter wine-tasting and taught her the nuances of and instilled a love for wine. He bought all types and kinds of wine, as proved by his assortment of over 750 bottles. As an avid coin collector, he accumulated nearly $30,000 worth of coins. He also loved music and owned 6 stereos to play his 3000+ CDs. He was funny, but his humor was sometimes too cerebral for me. He was sharp and had a quick wit. One time I asked him what he was doing in a picture and he responded by squatting down, showing me exactly what he was doing in the picture. He taught me how to drive a stick shift and after almost 50 years I still can. Unless you wanted a 3-hour dissertation on the theory of relativity and every other scientific phenomenon, you couldn’t ask him to explain how a simple light switch worked. Even though we stayed in close contact through our adult years, we were separated by living across the country, yet the similarities between us were uncanny. We loved a great deal, why buy 1, when you can buy 4 or 10 at such a good price? We collected magnets from places we would travel to, a myriad of key chains, expired driver’s licenses, hotel key cards, tax returns and bills long after they were useful. We both constantly bought little gadgets, trinkets and collectibles from the catalogues, and on several occasions the same item. We kept our grades. tests, transcripts and papers from our educational endeavors. We had the same sense of humor and made each other laugh with memes I always sent him. Every year for his birthday, I would remind him he was not getting better, he was getting older. I always told him he was my favorite baby brother, to which his retort was, I am your only baby brother. He was a life-long learner owning hundreds of self-help, science, language, physics, optics, science, German, scientific theory and the entire Dune and Harry Potter series. We lost Terry suddenly and unexpectedly just one day after his 61st birthday. Even though he always talked about having me do his Will & Trust, he never got around to it. As the administrator of his estate, it has been difficult and sorrowful clearing out his home and all his life-long belongings. Terry always donated to so many good causes. It was an honor to donate his clothes, bedding, toiletries and food to a homeless encampment, who were grateful for the abundance of his gift. We shared a childhood, so many memories only we could talk about. We never fought; we always had each other’s back. As kids we hitchhiked and were unafraid of who picked us up, fed us and drove us home, unheard of in today’s world. Terry was well regarded in his industry and I received countless condolences from friends and colleagues. I find myself having a question about a memory and wanting to call Terry to ask him about it, then being jarred back to reality that I cannot. I will miss Terry, my only baby brother.