Dick was born June 26, 1932, in Detroit, Michigan, to Arthur G. and Stella (Beseler) Hulstrand. Following several years of acute illness he passed away of respiratory failure June 20, 2012. Private burial will be at Roselawn Memorial Park in Denton.
Dick earned his B.S. and M.S. degrees in petroleum geology from the University of Michigan where he was a member of Sigma Alpha Epsilon fraternity. He began his professional career in Morgan City, Louisiana, working off-shore in the Gulf of Mexico for Magnolia Petroleum Company which later merged into Mobil Oil. On June 30, 1956, he married Arley Elaine Berwald at the Presidio of San Francisco. She survives him, along with children Peter (Randena), Tanya (Rick) Prindle, Sara (Steve) Blackman, Ann Victoria, Stuart; grandchildren Siena and Emeric Hulstrand; and sister Nan Carlson.
Before his transfer to the Mobil office in Wichita, Kansas, he served six months in the U.S. Army’s critical skills program. In 1961, he began his international career in the deserts and mountains of southern Iran on loan assignment, followed by transfers to Teheran; Port Harcourt, Nigeria (from where the family evacuated during the Biafran War); Paris, France; Fernando Po, Equitorial Guinea; Lagos, Nigeria; back to Teheran; finally to Dallas in 1975. At this time the family moved to Denton, accompanied by their two Kenyan dogs and two cats, one French and one Nigerian.
After Dick’s retirement from Mobil in 1986 he worked briefly in the Far East, followed by 11 years in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates. He enjoyed working with many different nationalities and learning about their cultures. In addition, he took every opportunity he could to visit foreign countries. Dick loved the outdoors, hiking, scuba diving, sailing, tennis, photography, collecting fossils, and tackling construction projects, evidenced by a 1950s cottage at Lake Texoma that he restored. He climbed to the tops of the Great Pyramid in Egypt and Mount Kilimanjaro in Africa. He traveled to six of the seven continents, with poor health precluding him from reaching Australia. He traveled to Canada and throughout the U. S., but his favorite trips were in Texas where he enjoyed exploring historical locations. Dick was an honorable, kind, intelligent, and adventuresome man. He will be greatly missed by his family and friends. In lieu of flowers please send memorials to the Denton Animal Shelter Foundation, PO Box 486, Denton, Texas 76202.
