John Dustrude

John Dustrude was born in the small town of Hartland, Wisconsin in January of 1930. The youngest of 3 kids, he had an older brother Robert and and older sister Shirley. He lived in Hartland all the way through primary and secondary school until he went to college at the University of Wisconsin where he met the love of his life and future wife, Louise who was originally from Racine, Wisconsin.

They were soon married and graduated from university, and after his 2 years in the Army in Korea, they went for a trip to Europe for an extended honeymoon of about six months.

Upon their return to the USA, he got a job with the US Forest Service which moved him around from place to place about every 2 years. The first of these jobs was in the Denver, Colorado where they had their 2 boys, Eric and Tim. Not long after they moved to Juneau, Alaska, then San Bernardino, California and finally San Francisco, California. It was there that he decided he was tired of moving around so much and that he didn’t want the next promotion to a “desk job”, and also, a beautiful little island
community they had just discovered was beckoning.

So he retired from the Forest Service and moved the young family to Friday Harbor, Washington in February of 1971. Both John and Louise took whatever jobs they could in the beginning just to make ends meet and quickly grew to love their new community and ended up calling it home from then on.

Being boat owners became a way of life and they spent many years with many different boats, both sail and power (and canoes and rowboats) exploring the islands. And along with boats, he found a love for motorcycles and toured the northern United States with a tent and camp stove.

Bicycles also became a favorite way of getting around for him and in later years this transitioned to his big red E-Bike which he rode all over the island. When Louise decided she was done biking herself due to balance issues, they discovered recumbent three wheelers or “doodlebugs” as they called them. These gave both of them great joy all the way to the end.

John was preceded in death by Louise in November of 2024 after 72 years of marriage. Both Eric and Tim came to the island many times to be with him after Louise was gone.

After almost a year of John of living at Village at the Harbor, John passed away on June 28, 2026 at 96 years of age. He is survived by his son Eric and his wife Jan, their 2 daughters Kate (& her husband Tom) and Alyssa, and his son Tim and his wife Shannon, and their 3 kids, Tyler, Cody and Courtney.

John’s family would like to thank all the wonderful people at Village at the Harbor and Hospice Northwest.

And ask that in lieu of flowers, we would prefer that you do something nice for your neighbor in John’s honor.