Harold Bonnell Frost

12/03/1923 – 01/11/2021

Harold Bonnell Frost (age 97) died January 11, 2021, in Loveland, Colorado. Bonnell, as he was known to family and friends, is survived by his wife of 74 years, Betty Lu Weinsheim Frost; brother Jack Frost (Bobbye); Children Teresa (Joe) Graedon; James Frost (Carol Pratt); Andrea Frost (Steven Shrum); and Karro Frost (Jack Cadwell); grandchildren David (Amy Barefoot) and Alena Graedon; Dana Frost (Tanvir Anjum) and Amanda Cadwell-Frost (Nils Johnson); Atticus and Michael Frost; and great-grandson Simon Graedon. 

He was born in Ft. Washakie, Wyoming, on Dec. 3, 1923. His father, Harold Bonnell Frost, was working as a bus driver in Yellowstone Park in the summertime. His mother was Jeannette Butcher Frost. 

The family moved to Lovell, Wyoming. His father, a mechanic, died of meningitis when Bonnell was 11 years old. Nonetheless, he excelled in school and went to the University of Wyoming after graduating from Lovell High School. After Pearl Harbor, he was recruited by the Navy for training in radar–a new technology in WWII. He served on the destroyer USS Cushing. The year before the end of the war, he was made chief radar officer. He was discharged from the Navy after the war’s end in January 1946. 

He attended the University of Nebraska, where he earned his undergraduate degree in engineering. During that time, he met Betty Lu Weinsheim and they married on Dec. 22, 1946. In 1948, he proceeded to MIT for graduate work in electrical engineering, where he earned his doctorate in 1953. His dissertation work on vacuum tubes and his good record at MIT earned him a place at Bell Telephone Laboratories, where he spent his career until taking early retirement in 1984. During that time, he worked at Murray Hill, Reading, and Boulder laboratories.

He was an avid bicycle rider and enjoyed long rides through Boulder after retirement. He collected rocks and fossils and always loved reading scientific literature. He conveyed his delight in camping and hiking to his children and often delighted his wife with his nature photography, especially of flowers. 

Bonnell served on the Board of Education for Watchung Hills Regional High School in New Jersey in the early 1960s. He was active in the Episcopal churches he and his wife Betty attended in their various home towns: Metuchen and Millington, NJ, Wyomissing, PA, Longmont, CO, and Loveland, CO. He and Betty helped found the church of St. Mary Magdalene in Boulder. 

Bonnell was known as a man of outstanding integrity and intelligence. He believed in education at every level. Bonnell was a kind, gentle and frugal person who was renowned for repairing things that needed fixing.

The family thanks Halcyon Hospice and Good Samaritan Loveland Village for their tender care. In lieu of flowers, memorial contributions may be made to Sigma Xi, the World Wildlife Fund or the college or university of your choice.