Frank Albert Heilman was born on Oct. 8, 1915, in Canton, Ohio, the son of the Rev. J. Frank Heilman, D.D. and Kathleen Williford Heilman. He was the fourth child of that family.
He is survived by his wife of 69 years, Carlyne M. Heilman; their only son, F. Allan (Kathleen), of Belleair, Fla.; three grandchildren, Mark A. (Ann), of Carmel, Ind., John W. (Jillian), of Valrico, Fla., and Michael J. (Laura), of Princeton, N.J.; five great-grandchildren; and several nephews and nieces.
He was a graduate of Gettysburg High School in Gettysburg, Pa., and entered Duke University as a freshman in September 1933 to study mechanical engineering. He left Duke in November 1935, having run out of money.
In July 1936, he got a job in construction at the Carbide and Carbon Chemicals Corporation (CCC) in South Charleston, W.V. He was transferred to the field engineers as an engineering aide (rodman). This work included factory construction (steel and concrete) and considerable survey work in the hills and towns of West Virginia. In December 1938, he became Works Progress Administration (WPA) county supervisor of roads and grounds of schools in Avery County, N.C.
In 1940, Frank went to Tampa, Fla., to work in the Tampa Shipyards. This did not turn out, so he got a job in Hartford, Conn., with the British Purchasing Commission as a machine gun inspector. When Franklin Delano Roosevelt developed lend-lease and the U.S. replaced the British Purchasing Commission as the armorer of Great Britain, Frank got his old job back at CCC in South Charleston, W.V.
In December 1942, he was selected by his Avery County draft board to serve in the Army and entered active service on Dec. 5, 1942, at Fort Bragg, N.C. He was sent to the field artillery of the 92nd Infantry Division at Camp Phillips, Kansas.
In April 1943, he was transferred to the Army Specialized Training Program to study engineering at the University of Kentucky in Lexington. On Dec. 23, 1943, still at UK, he married Carlyne Morrison, his fiancée of many years, who was working as a medical records librarian at the Biltmore Hospital in Asheville, N.C. She went back to North Carolina, and he went back to studies.
He was assigned to the Signal Corp at Camp Shelby, Miss., and was later sent to the Philippines in 1944. After the Japanese surrender was signed on Sept. 2, 1945, Communist guerilla activity by the Hukbalihop rebels increased. Truck convoys were regularly attacked until they were armed with machine guns.
In December 1945, the day after detecting a nerve gas release, he was promoted to tech. sergeant. He was discharged from the 214th Signal Depot Company on Feb. 23, 1946, at Ft. Bragg, N.C. He completed his bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering at the University of Kentucky in 1947 under the G.I. Bill.
After the war, he worked for Texaco at their research labs in Beacon, N.Y. The winter of 1948 did not agree with the family, so Frank got a position as a development engineer for Union Carbide at the Gaseous Diffusion Plant (K-25) in Oak Ridge, where he worked until he retired on May 2, 1978.
He was a member of Grace Evangelical Lutheran Church in Oak Ridge. He and his wife enjoyed sailing on Melton Hill Lake and travel in their series of three camper-vans. They made many Florida trips, western trips, and one trip to Alaska. They were active in a local camping club. Frank was a member of the Cranberry Lodge in North Carolina. He was a member of the Oak Ridge Sportsman Association and participated in marksmanship.
He had resided with his wife as a resident of Emeritus at Oak Ridge since November 2009.
Services will be by Rev. Dr. Stephen G. Damos, pastor at Grace Evangelical Lutheran Church at 131 W. Gettysburg Avenue in Oak Ridge, with a visitation at 10 a.m. and a memorial service at 11 a.m. on Monday, Jan. 21.
In lieu of flowers, contributions may be made to the Grace Church Memorial Fund.
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