Obituary of David Francis Lohman

David F. Lohman, known to many as Professor but to those who loved him most as Papa, died Wednesday, March 5, 2025, held in the light and love of his three girls, Beth, Michelle, and Nina, and his wife, Sherry.

Dave was born January 14, 1949 in Butte, Montana to William and H. Marian Lohman. The third of what would become a family of eight children, the care he received from and offered to his siblings formed the foundation of his life. He followed Bill and Marian’s lead, he watched out for Dan, he cared gently for Cathy and Betsy, and he rooted for Jim and Ed. A hard and diligent worker from a young age, he graduated from Great Falls Central Catholic High School in 1967.

Like most of the important things that happened in his life, it was more chance than choice that a recruiter from the U.S. Coast Guard Academy visited Dave’s landlocked high school in Montana extolling the virtues of the Eagle – a 295-foot, three-masted barque used by the Coast Guard to train cadets in the ways of the sea. Always one to balance ambition with responsibility, Dave saw in the recruit’s offer an opportunity for adventure paired with a college education, so with the promise of sailing the high seas in the company of young men with sound bodies, stout hearts, and alert minds, he headed to New London for training.

At the Academy, he forged friendships with fellow cadets while discovering a love of sailing – an activity prized for its perfect balance of precision and freedom. Now an adult with independence and agency, it was also the place where he recognized his abhorrence for the exercise of irrational authority. Working to convince a fellow second-year cadet to stay, he was surprised to discover the arguments made by his peer were stronger than his own, and so, swayed, they both left.

On the advice of a priest at Stonehill College, Dave moved to South Bend, Indiana and enrolled in Notre Dame intending to study theology and psychology. Given room to explore, Dave’s intellectual curiosity alighted into new realms as he overloaded his course schedule each semester with classes beyond his major to include everything from engineering to chemistry, philosophy to poetry, Greek, law, and nuclear physics to metaphysics. Soon academic rigor replaced an adolescent interest in the priesthood and Dave graduated from Notre Dame with a BA in psychology in 1972.

With a beard and a bachelor’s degree, he returned to Great Falls, Montana, where he began working at the State School for the Deaf and Blind. Beyond teaching, Dave was tasked with administering ability tests to current and prospective students. The learning curve was steep, but Dave was up for the challenge. He learned American Sign Language to administer nonverbal tests, an experience that opened his eyes to the field of educational and psychological testing.

Testing wasn’t the only thing that caught his attention. A calm, quiet, and independent young woman who was patient with the children she worked with at the school also caught his eye. After just a few short months of dating, wearing a blue tux with his signature wide smile, Dave married Sherry Gildersleeve on July 14, 1973.

Spurred once again by his insatiable intellectual curiosity, Dave applied to graduate programs directed by those whose books he had read, which was how he ended up working with Lee Cronbach and his primary mentor, the brilliant gentle-man Richard Snow at Stanford University in Palo Alto, California. Through research and countless hours in the library, Dave focused on visual-spatial abilities while working to understand the intricacies of cognitive processing. Following the lead of Dr. Snow, Dave never lost sight of the person behind the data; he recognized the influence motivation, personality, culture, and temperament play in individual differences in learning.

Dave and Sherry welcomed their first two daughters into the warm California sun, Beth in 1975, then Michelle in 1978. Motivated by their arrival, Dave completed his PhD in Educational Psychology in 1979. He remained at Stanford as a Lecturer and Research Associate until the couple’s third California girl, Nina, was born in 1981, at which point, after a brief stint teaching at the University of British Columbia, he accepted a faculty position at the University of Iowa in the department of Educational Psychology. A Midwesterner once again, he served as chair of the Division of Psychological & Quantitative Foundations in the College of Education from 1993 to 1997. During his time at Iowa, he received numerous awards, including a Fulbright Fellowship, the Iowa Regents Award for Faculty Excellence, and the Distinguished Scholar Award from the National Association of Gifted Children.

Another unexpected but momentous opportunity came his way when, in 1998, Dave was asked to assume R.L. Thorndike’s position alongside Betty Hagen as co-author of the Cognitive Abilities Test. Dave accepted the challenge where he worked with Betty until her death, at which point he served as the senior editor of CogAT until his retirement in 2013.

Though his accomplishments were vast and varied, the greatest source of pride in Dave’s life came from his deep and strong relationships with his daughters and his wife. Dave was a present, generous man who cared for his family in countless ways big and small. He showed his love through building furniture, prioritizing education, saying yes to adventures, repairing broken items, baking pies, sharing poetry, going on long bike rides, playing songs on the guitar, kayaking on Lake Macbride, and giving generously. As his family grew, so did his capacity to love. First with sons-in-law then with the addition of eight grandchildren who knew him as Papa. There was always a grandkid on his shoulders, on his knee, holding his hand, in his arms, or held in his embrace.

Dave is survived by his wife Sherry Lohman, their daughters and their families: Beth, Jon, Jeremiah, and Sierra Pruessner; Michelle, Jay, Lohman, Avery, Jameson, and Finley Provorse; Nina Lohman, Adel and Ezra Cilek. He is survived by his siblings Dan (Flora) Lohman, Betsy (Ben) Forbes, and James (Laura) Lohman. He was preceded in death by his parents and his siblings Bill, Marian, Cathy, and Ed.

A gathering time for family and friends to remember David will be held from 1 to 4pm Saturday, April 19^th. at Terry Trueblood in Iowa City. In lieu of flowers, donations can be made to the David Lohman Scholarship Fund at the Community Foundation of Johnson County.