George J. Butorac Obit

GEORGE J. BUTORAC passed away on Jan. 28, 2026 at age 95. He was born in Crosby, Minnesota on May 29, 1930. His parents, Gust and Rose Butorac were Austrian immigrants of Croatian ancestry. George is survived by: two sons; James of Atlanta, GA and Robert of Cairns, Australia, one daughter; Hillary Weaver of Los Angeles, CA, and two granddaughters; Chase and August Weaver. George experienced a diverse and rewarding swath of Americana. An honors graduate from the University of Minnesota, he encountered life from the Cuyuna Iron Range to Western mining camps to competitive athletics…football, basketball, baseball, tennis, golf, and rifle firing…to the U. S. Marine Corps to aerospace executive to retired author. While serving in the Corps, George won the Illinois large bore rifle championship in 1953. Upon graduation from the University of Minnesota in 1956, George spent his professional career in the Aerospace industry. He progressed from field engineering on missile launchers aboard ships through marketing and program management and on to general management. He also moved extensively. Besides Minnesota and Arizona, George has lived in Massachusetts, California, and Texas along with temporary assignments in Bath, ME; New York City, and Washington DC. One of his projects was instrumental in winning the first Malcolm Baldrige Award in 1987; it is the national award for quality excellence. As a result,he mentored the Maricopa County Health Department for one year on improving its quality performance. Upon retiring in 1992, George spent the next 10 years writing three books. The first, “Discover the Joys of Living”, distills key factors from our evolutionary heritage and our physiological makeup to derive human behaviors that lead to personal happiness. The second, “A Better Me A Better World,” derives a realistic world view and then uses servo techniques honed by our bodies over eons to develop effective ways of attacking real-world problems. The third, “Larger Than Life,” describes an array of memorable characters who strongly influenced his life and who embody much of what was good in our country during its past 90 years. George chose to be cremated with a private sendoff. He hopes the friends he has made around the country will do one of two things when they hear of his passing, have a drink or show a special kindness in his honor. He hopes they remember him as fondly as he remembers them.