Dr. Timothy G. Woodcock
December 3, 1954
October 24, 2022
Memorial Services for Dr. Timothy G. Woodcock, 67, of Salado, will be held at 2:00 pm on Saturday, November 19, 2022, at St. Joseph’s Episcopal Church in Salado, Texas. Dr. Woodcock honorably donated his body to science and will be cremated then returned to the family in the spring. A Celebration of Life for family and friends will be held in the spring.
Timothy Woodcock died on Monday, October 24, 2022, at his home.
Dr. Timothy G. Woodcock was born in upstate New York on December 3, 1954, to Gordon Hawley Woodcock and Joyce Ann Van Buren Woodcock. Timothy’s family of seven moved to Ft Lauderdale, FL in 1966. From an early age, Timothy loved to take things apart and, usually, put them back together. His first science kit sparked his interest in building radios and later computers. Rumor has it that he even invented the internet (disclaimer: rumor started by his mom). He was active in Boy Scouts and mischief with friends. Timothy was never one to follow the crowd; a one-of-a-kind as evidenced by the top hat he wore in high school. After graduating from Northeast High School in 1973, he joined the Air Force as a radio repairman. Starting in 1975, he attended Florida Atlantic University where he earned a BA in physics, MS in mathematics, and a PhD in computer science. While working on his higher education, he started his career in computers and started his family with Betsy in 1980 and William in 1984. He worked at IBM as an advisory engineer from 1979 to 1998 and a software engineer at Sony-Ericsson from 1998 to 2003. In 2003 Timothy started his second career as an assistant professor at Alfred State College in western New York. From 2009 to 2019 Timothy (Dr. Woodcock) taught at Texas A&M Central Texas in Killeen where he was loved by faculty and students alike. In August 2020 Timothy was diagnosed with Lewy Body Dementia, though the first signs showed up two years earlier. This awful disease rapidly took away his ability to teach, to participate in the activities he loved, and ultimately took his life.
Timothy met his wife Dawn in 1993. Dawn was a Girl Scouts coleader with two children of her own, Rachel and Matt. Timothy’s daughter Betsy was in Dawn’s troop and was best friends with Rachel. They soon fell in love and became a blended family of six. The family moved to North Carolina in 1995 when IBM relocated Timothy’s job there. In 2003 Timothy and Dawn moved to western NY and in 2009 moved to Salado, Texas. After twenty years together, Timothy worked up the courage to ask for Dawn’s hand in marriage. They married in May 2014.
Timothy was best known for his sense of humor and for helping others. Timothy had many passions including corny puns, cooking, traveling, camping, fishing, libertarians, and taking his beloved Pinzgauer (a 6-wheel Swiss army truck) on offroad adventures. He loved hats, cats, anything with wheels, and Shiner beer. Above all, he loved his family. He enjoyed helping young people through his teaching, mentoring, and many years as a Boy Scouts leader. He was easy to love and will be sorely missed.
He is preceded in death by his parents. Survivors include his wife, Dawn Erickson Woodcock; two sons, William Woodcock, Matt Erickson; two daughters, Betsy Woodcock, Rachel Sweatte, along with his brother Jon, and sisters Candace, Kimberly, and Connie; and nine grandchildren.
Arrangements are in the care of Young’s Daughters Funeral Home and Bereavement Center.