Gilbert Oliver Pletts ’49 died on December 27, 2003, in Homosassa, Florida.
Born on December 24, 1921, in Brunswick, he prepared for college at Brunswick High School and during World War II served in the U.S. Navy Air Corps from 1943 to 1946, attaining the rank of lieutenant junior grade and being awarded the Air Medal. He entered Bowdoin in the fall of 1946 and became a member of Psi Upsilon Fraternity. Following his graduation in 1949, he did graduate work at the University of Miami in Florida, from which he received a master of science degree in clinical psychology in 1951. After three years as a researcher with the Ohio State University Personnel Research Board, he was a staff psychologist with the Washoe County Welfare Board in Reno, NV, and at the same time was principal of the Highland School for Retarded until 1958 in Reno. In 1958, he became a school psychologist with the Dade County Board of Public Instruction in Miami, FL, and in 1959 became personnel director of Ryder System, Inc., in Coconut Grove, FL, where he was vice president of personnel and training from 1965 to 1972. From that time until his retirement in 1983, he was a personnel consultant to Ryder System, Inc. Surviving are his wife, Mary Anderson Pletts, whom he married in 1945; a daughter, Susan P. Jones of Wilmington, NC; a brother, Donald C. Pletts ’49 of Largo, FL; two grandchildren; and a great-granddaughter.