J. Paul Dittrich passed away in Tucson, AZ on November 27, 2025, at the age of 91, surrounded by his family.

Paul was born in Fort Scott, KS, on October 20, 1934, to a German father and an Irish mother. The family moved around the Midwest for several years, eventually settling down in Duluth, MN in 1941. Paul spent summers working on his uncle’s dairy farm in New Ulm, MN, a place that gave him great solace and tremendous satisfaction. He loved rising with the sun, working outside all day, and fixing things with his hands. So began a lifelong love of tinkering and building.

He graduated from Marquette University in 1956 and from Marquette Medical School in 1959. During a short stint in South Dakota for a general surgery internship, Paul overcame his boredom with the endless prairies by learning to fly single-engine airplanes, a passion he would continue late into his 80s.  

Long enamored with the poetry of Robert Service and its vivid descriptions of the Yukon, Paul finally realized his childhood dream of moving to Alaska in 1961 when he joined the Public Health Service and was stationed in Dillingham. He loved to explore the wilderness of southwestern Alaska in his first airplane, discovering the best fishing and hunting spots throughout Bristol Bay. His deployment lasted only 18 months, but he knew immediately that Alaska would become his forever home. 

Following in his father’s footsteps, Paul began an orthopedic surgery residency in Minneapolis in 1963. While in the Twin Cities, he went on a blind date with Marjorie from Kenosha, WI. They fell madly in love and married two years later. 

In 1966, with Marjorie seven-months pregnant, the couple packed their belongings into a brand-new Dodge station wagon and set off for what would become a lifelong adventure in Alaska—one that would include the births of their five children over the next six-and-half years. 

Shortly after arriving in Alaska, Paul opened his medical practice at Providence Hospital, becoming only the fifth orthopedic surgeon in Anchorage. He spent the next 36 years mending the community’s broken bones.

On most summer weekends of the 1970s and ‘80s, Paul could be found up at Red Shirt Lake with his family working on the cabin he built by hand, designing intricate plumbing systems, adding new docks and a wood-fired sauna, and fixing finicky boat motors. There was nothing that Paul’s ingenuity and trusty “Come-Along” tool couldn’t fix. He topped off most days on a slalom waterski, zipping around the lake with a cigar in his mouth and beer tucked into his life-belt. 

Paul demonstrated every day how to embrace life fully, with gratitude, and always at the edge of your comfort zone. When confronted with challenges, Paul had a keen sense of knowing when to persevere, when to be patient, and when to let go. After Marjorie was diagnosed with ovarian cancer in 1993, Paul, without hesitation, became an even better version of himself, showering her with love and meticulous attentiveness until her death nine years later. 

Paul found love a second time, marrying Beth Horton in 2003. For 22 years, they split their time between Anchorage and Tucson, where Paul woke before dawn to take his daily three-mile walk, play 18 holes of golf, and whip up his famous sourdough bread or waffles. In 2020, Paul shot his one and only hole-in-one. (And yes, he would want us to include that!) 

Rarely in a bad mood, relentlessly optimistic, and a consummate storyteller, Paul always made sure there was room at the table for the many friends and stray kids in the neighborhood who needed a soft place to land. Paul was never bored and never boring. With his dry wit and perfect timing, he could hold court with any audience, especially his family, making us laugh harder than we could cry, all the way to the end. 

Paul left this world true to the way he lived his life: with clarity, integrity, deep faith, and boundless love and appreciation for his family.  

He will be greatly missed by his entire family, including his wife, Beth; his children, John Dittrich of Anchorage, AK, Bill Dittrich of Boise, ID, Mary Dittrich Orth of Seattle, WA, Jamie Dittrich of Anchorage, AK, and Annie Dittrich Kornmann of Seattle, WA; his children-in-law, Andrea, Mary, Steve, and Melanie; his beloved grandchildren, Olivia, Muriel, Charlie, Sam, Jack, Josh, Matt, Maggie, Paul, Daniel, Joey, Lottie, and Alex; and his step-children, Terry and Hal. 

Paul will be laid to rest beside Marjorie in Anchorage in a private family service. To continue Paul’s legacy, the family suggests donating to Catholic Social Services - Alaska, an organization he greatly admired and supported.