Date: November 25, 1984
Location: St. Louis, MO
By: —
Newspaper: St. Louis Post-Dispatch
Page: 18D
A funeral Mass for D. Robert Werner, a pioneer in the field of business aviation, will be celebrated Monday at 10 a.m. in Our Lady of the Pillar Catholic Church, 401 South Lindbergh Boulevard. Burial will be Tuesday in Fort Atkinson, Wis.
Mr. Werner, of Frontenac, died of a heart attack Friday morning in St. John’s Mercy Medical Center. He was 68.
He was a founding partner of Remmert-Werner Inc., a company based in St. Louis that made milions of dollars and an international reputation as customizers of executive aircraft. When the company began in 1944, it restored World War II planes for sale to companies in the then-embryonic field of business aviation.
At one point the company employed 750 workers and was the exclusive distributor of the Sabreliner, plush executive jets used by companies around the world. In 1968, the company was bought out by a division of Rockwell International, and Mr. Werner retired.
In 1977, Mr. Werner joined an elite group – including Charles A. Lindbergh, Edward V. Rickenbacker and James S. McDonnell – as the recipient of the Meritorious Service Award for outstanding contributions to aviation, given by the National Business Aircraft Association. The award cited Mr. Werner’s “pioneering contributions” to business aviation.
At the time of his death, he was a board member and active with Wings of Hope Inc., a non-profit group that he had helped found in St. Louis to fly air-relief missions around the world.
Mr. Werner, a native of Fort Atkinson, came to St. Louis as a student at Parks Air College, where he graduated with a degree in aeronautical engineering. For five years before co-founding Remmert-Weerner Inc., he worked for Curtis-Wright and Lockheed aircraft companies.
Surviving are his wife, Geraldine; three daughters, Mary Anne of Baltimore, Joan Marie of Pasadena, Calif., and Sally Gay of Fort Worth, Texas; three sons, Dennis Robert Jr. of El Centro, Calif., Michael R. and Terry Alan, both of St. Louis; his mother, Elizabeth; and his brother, Donald, both of Fort Atkinson.