Lasting Memories

Jean Van Rensselaer Chandler Trotter
July 22, 1918-Nov. 26, 2015
Menlo Park,CA and Sun City West,AZ, California

Jean Van Rensselaer Chandler Trotter of Menlo Park, California, and Sun City West, Arizona, died peacefully on November 26, with her daughter by her side.

Mrs. Trotter, 97, was a World War II veteran, researcher, local volunteer, poet and artist.

She grew up in Norwalk, Connecticut, and attended Wellesley College, class of 1941. Upon graduation, she joined the Navy’s first class of WAVES and was assigned to the Chief of Naval Operations Office in Washington, D.C., where she spent the war years in an elite group as a code breaker and analyst.

As Lieutenant Trotter, she met fellow naval intelligence officer and electronics expert George C. Trotter and was married in the National Cathedral. They were married for 54 years before his death in 1999.

After the war Mrs. Trotter began her life-long career as a researcher and analyst at Harvard University while her husband finished his studies there.

Later she moved with her husband to Los Altos Hills, California, where they raised their two children, and her husband set up the computer lab for IRMA, the first industrial computer.

For many years Mrs. Trotter was an active volunteer in many local schools and charities in the Bay Area.

On her husband’s retirement, she moved to Arizona, returning more recently to Menlo Park to stay with her daughter. Mrs. Trotter was also an accomplished poet, water color artist, pianist, and avid reader.

The daughter of Elizabeth W. Chandler and Henry A.E. Chandler of Norwalk, Connecticut, Mrs. Trotter was predeceased by two sisters, Mary C. Duncan of East Boothbay, Maine, and Frances C. Morris of Crozet, Virginia. She is survived by her son, Douglas C. Trotter of Albuquerque, New Mexico, her daughter, Caroline C. Trotter of Menlo Park, California, and nieces and nephews Rita Morris Reynolds, Sylvia Morris Young, John C. Duncan, and William C. Duncan.

Services will be held in Washington, D.C., where she will be buried in Arlington National Cemetery with her husband. Private services will also be held in Menlo Park and Sun City West. The family asks in lieu of flowers donations be made to Wounded Warriors or Castilleja School in Palo Alto, California.