Birth date: Mar 5, 1944 Death date: Oct 18, 2023
Mr Elliot "Kip" Dodge, age 79, passed away on October 18, 2023 in Dallas, Texas. Kip was drawn to artistic pursuits from a young age. Growing up in the Midwest and spending summers at the family cottage in Michigan, Kip taught him Read Obituary
It was a pleasure to meet him at his graddaughters wedding. Godspeed Kip.
I met Kip in Tananarive (Madagascar). He came to see his brother who was a teacher at the American Culturel Center. I was 19 and Kip 29. He was a gorgious man ! He came later in Paris where I lived. And the life decided to separate us. I am so sad for him, for his family. He was so talentuous and He was to young to death. All my best wishes to his family.
Géraldine
We lost a wonderful friend and colleague! Kip was a gifted artist and true renaissance man, gifted in multiple disciplines and industries.
I will always remember him as a ‘go to guy’ to manage a demanding customer and focus on the goal. Few realize the many successful US satellites that benefited from Kip’s meticulous attention technical detail and pending launch schedule!
We will all remember him with warmth!
I met Kip when he was assigned to be the Program Manager for the $1 billion dollar FERMI satellite and I was assigned to be the Principal Engineer. We knew that FERMI was going to be a challenging project as we were implementing several new technologies which had never been flown. Before building the actual satellite, it is standard practice to build a smaller version of all systems, called a coupon, using the intended technology and subjecting that to the actual mission environment. As such, we designed the coupon with all the new technology using our best ideas for materials and manufacturing processes and started the test. Within just a week, we had massive catastrophic failures like we had never seen. I thought for sure I was going to be fired. I met with Kip, he calmed me down, and he called a meeting with our team. We went over every failure but had no clue what had happened and we were contractually obligated to inform our customer, General Dynamics, who in turn informed their customer NASA. Within a few days we had a dozen General Dynamics and NASA engineers at our facility. It was agreed that representatives from both those companies would set up permanent offices at our facility to monitor our progress in figuring out what had happened. Kip took the lead in coordinating this effort. Within two months, we had build another test coupon based on our knowledge obtained through Kip's leadership. The coupon tested successfully and became the model from which nearly all spacecraft after that were built to. The FERMI satellite was supposed to last 5 years. It has been working flawlessly for 14 years. A couple of years after launch, Kip and I along with two other engineers from our company were awarded NASA's prestigious Public Service Achievement Award usually given to NASA engineers with a lifetime of accomplishments. The year we received it, however, NASA made an exception and gave us the award even though we were not direct NASA employees at the time (Kip had worked for NASA in the past but was not a NASA employee at this time). The award was given to us by the president of NASA at a fancy meeting in Washington DC. It was Kip's dedication, perseverance, and ability to motivate people that made that happen. This is just one of many projects Kip completed successfully. He was a great man. I am lucky to have known him.
Kip was married to my cousin. I never met Kip in person, but he was my ‘go to’ person keeping in touch with Jeanette. My condolences to Kip’s children and grandchildren and family. He was a man with great skill and talent. May he be remembered for all he contributed to industry, and enriched the lives of all who knew him. Susie.
So sorry to hear of Kip’s passing. My sincere condolences to all of his family. I had the privilege of working with Kip at Lockheed Martin Librascope in Glendale California about 20 years ago. He made quite an impression on me (20 years his junior) and was a wonderful person to know and to call my friend. I kept in touch with him through Facebook over the years. He was a wonderful soul. He will be missed dearly by many.
Troy Barry
