Calvin George Lotz a resident of Los Banos, passed away on April 30, 2022 at his home in Los Banos, CA. Calvin was born in St. Paul, Minnesota on March 27, 1946 to Arnold H. and Maxine Lotz. He was raised in Erie, Colorado and graduated from Erie High School in 1964. Calvin joined the Air Force after graduation and he served two tours in Vietnam.
After his service he started working for Western Telephone in Los Gatos, CA. Later to be General Telephone and then Verizon Communications.
Calvin met his wife, Kim Finch at a Sambos restaurant during a San Jose Street Racers Club meeting and married her on February 19, 1972. They lived in San Jose for a bit. They had two children, Theodore Thomas and Laura Lee. They moved to South Lake Tahoe for a few years, I can't remember how many years, but long enough to buy 4-wheel drive vehicles so we could navigate the winter roads. He even took a really big scraper blade and cut it down and mounted it on the front of our little CJ5 jeep to keep the road clear of snow. The (what we called) flat landers would come up to ski and get stuck in the snow and he would get calls to come pull them out and clean up their rental drive and street so they could get back to the slopes or the casinos. While working for AT&T in South Lake the company devested and we moved to Los Banos in 1981. Not my first choice, but it worked out for us like we never thought it would. He went back to work for General Telephone and commuted to Los Gatos every day. He could almost make that trip in his sleep after a while.
After he retired, he started really working on his shop. (Originally it was half of the garage that was next to our house). He built up his shop a little at a time to become quite impressive, with lathes, drill presses, glass bead machine, tools up the ass (if you needed it, he had it). There has to be at least six welders in there (all Miller). He loved to fabricate things, anything. If it was broken and no replacement part was available, he could almost always make it out of a chunk of steel. He spent all day in that shop except from 12 noon to 2 o'clock. That was his "reading time" which translated to reading a paragraph to taking a nap. He would take time out of his shop to scrape corrals or fix the shit the goats broke that I just didn't have the skill for. He was our "Mr. Fix It". He could fix anything. He had so much knowledge in that head of his. He taught so many that were interested in welding, wiring, fabricating or just general knowledge and if he didn't know he would read up on it and have an answer for you. You knew if he liked you and you really knew if he didn't. He didn't pull any punches on how he felt. He loved to talk. He'd keep you here for hours and talk about anything. Calvin built just about everything on our place from corrals for my critters to shelters for them. He made sure there were enough outlets for power and all the water lines for all the water troughs. He loved his backhoe attachment for the Kubota tractor. I suppose I could go on forever about him. He will be truly missed by me, Laura and J.C. and all the people that called him their friend. I love you, Dear. See you on the flip side.
Calvin is preceded in death by his parents Arnold H. Lotz and Maxine Young, stepfather Evert Young and his brother Arnold C. Lotz.
He is survived by his spouse Kim Lotz, his daughter Laura Lotz, grandson Jeremiah C. Weik and his BFF Butch Kittle (known to all as his brother)
A Visitation will be held on Monday, May 16, 2022 from 10 am to 11 am at Whitehurst Funeral Chapel in Los Banos followed by the Funeral Service at 11 am. Burial at the Los Banos Cemetery District.

To plant a beautiful memorial tree in memory of Calvin Lotz, please visit our Tribute Store