Vernon Stanley Mummert, cherished husband of Carol and father of Eric and Marc, passed away on April 6, 2022, surrounded by his family at HCA Lawnwood Hospital in Ft. Pierce, FL.

A native of Brutus, Michigan, born July 1938 to the late Stanley and Ruby Mummert, Vern attended Pellston High School and Western Michigan University before receiving a B.S. degree in Mechanical Engineering and an M.S.E. in Instrumentation Engineering from the University of Michigan where he became a lifelong Wolverines fan.  He went on to obtain a master’s degree in Aeronautical and Astronautical Engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

His career at Bellcomm, Inc., a subsidiary of AT&T in Washington, D.C., contracted by NASA to work on the Apollo project, included planning the trajectory for the Apollo 11 space flight of July 16 through July 24, 1969, the first crewed mission to land on the moon.  While working at Bellcomm, he earned a Juris Doctor degree from Georgetown University.

Having met at Bellcomm, Vern and Carol married in 1969 and Vern was shortly thereafter asked to transfer to Bell Laboratories in Holmdel, NJ, where he led engineering teams working in telephone network management, network planning, and international telecommunications.  He led the invention of a revolutionary traffic routing scheme that dramatically decreased network costs and positioned AT&T’s network to deliver new services.  After retiring from Bell Labs in 1995, he worked as a consultant for NCR. 

Vern, Carol, and their two sons lived in Middletown, NJ, before moving to Holmdel.  Vern was a voracious reader, history buff, and lover of Broadway plays as well as his wife’s classical music choral performances and his sons’ school musicals.  He enjoyed international travel with his wife and sons. They spent many happy years in Holmdel before relocating to Florida in 2018.

Vern is survived by Carol, his wife of 52 years; son Eric of Riverside, CA; son Marc, his wife, Nadine, and their three children of Vista, CA; brother Arnold and his wife, Allison, of Traverse City, MI; brother Dewey and his wife, Sandra, of Traverse City, MI; as well as many nieces and nephews.

A memorial Mass, to be celebrated by Rev. Msgr. Thomas V. Banick, and family gathering will be held in Vista, CA, to celebrate Vern’s life.