Harlan Knudson, a prominent aerospace engineer and 60-year resident of Rancho Palos Verdes, passed away on Dec. 2, 2024, of natural causes. He was 87 and lived a full life with no regrets. He was known for his warm smile and kind heart. He is survived by his loving wife, Beverly, (married 64 years, whose partnership he cherished deeply); sons Mark, Brian and Eric; sister Eloise; and his three grandchildren Makenna, Tyler and Breegan.
The son of Ervind and Amanda (Nelson) Knudson, Harlan grew up on the family farm near Fort Totten, ND, and attended a one-room country schoolhouse up to 8th grade. Throughout his teen years he worked with his father driving tractors, milking cows and harvesting the crop. After finishing high school at Devils Lake, he attended the University of North Dakota for 4 years and obtained his Mechanical Engineering Degree in 1959. Within a few days of graduating, he finished his laundry and left for California, where he was hired by Lockheed Aircraft in Burbank. He worked on aircraft wing designs, then on some thermal control designs. During this time, he met his beautiful wife, Beverly, a dental hygenist, at a Lutheran Church social in North Hollywood and they married in the summer of 1960. For the next 3 years, Harlan performed thermal analysis on low orbit satellites while working on his Master’s Degree in Mechanical Engineering at the University of Southern California. He started a family and bought a house in Rancho Palos Verdes in 1964.
He then moved to the Space and Communications Division of Hughes Aircraft in Culver City. It was there that he was hired to perform mathematical thermal modeling analyses for a NASA program called Surveyor 1, which had just been awarded to Hughes Aircraft. This was the first lunar lander spacecraft to return detailed lunar surface pictures of the intended man landing sites for the planned Apollo program! He had the honor of monitoring all the temperature sensors on Surveyor 1 at the JPL Mission Control Center (in Pasadena) during the first night of that camera landing. Those first detailed pictures of the lunar landing site took place on June 1, 1966, where each picture was slowly created in about 20 minutes, one line at a time, with the limited capability of early computers. He then worked on several more Surveyor Lunar Lander missions before spending most of his remaining career working on the thermal design of communication satellites. Near the end of his 30 years at Hughes Aircraft, he became the Associate Manager of their satellite thermal design organization. After retiring from Hughes in 1992, he then worked as a thermal design consultant for several foreign communications satellite customers who had their satellites built in the US. He continued that work for 10 years before his final retirement.
Harlan was a devoted family man who coached soccer, volunteered at church, played tennis, was an avid reader of newspapers and biographies, enjoyed wine, classical music and traveling the globe, did crossword puzzles and loved to jog, hike and walk around the beautiful hills of Palos Verdes, often chatting up locals along the way. He really loved the peninsula! He also enjoyed regaling family and friends with funny stories about living on the farm, where he said he learned most of his life lessons. He remained loquacious, witty and observant right up til the end.
A memorial service and reception will be held Saturday January 18 from 1-4 p.m. at The Neighborhood Church, 415 Paseo Del Mar, Palos Verdes Estates. Any friends of Harlan are invited. In lieu of flowers, the family suggests memorial contributions be made to The Neighborhood Church, where Harlan and Beverly were active members.
