Raymond Olson, former president of California Lutheran University, Dies

by Melissa Ramirez Cooper, ELCA News Service

The Rev. Raymond M. Olson, 96, second president of California
Lutheran University, Thousand Oaks, died Oct. 24.  California
Lutheran is one of 28 colleges and universities of the
Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA).

Olson served as president of the university from 1963 to 1971.
From 1952 to 1963 he was director of stewardship of the former
Evangelical Lutheran Church and The American Lutheran Church, one
of three church bodies that merged to form the ELCA in 1987.
Olson served as pastor of several congregations from 1939 to
1952.  He taught religion and speech at Waldorf College, Forest
City, Iowa, from 1936 to 1938.  Olson earned a liberal arts
degree from Waldorf in 1932, and he earned a bachelor's degree in
history from Augustana College, Sioux Falls, S.D., in 1934.
Waldorf and Augustana are colleges of the ELCA.  Olson earned a
master of divinity degree at Luther Theological Seminary (now
Luther Seminary), St. Paul, Minn., in 1943.  Luther Seminary is
one of eight seminaries of the ELCA.  Olson was born in Eagle
Grove, Iowa.

A funeral service will be held Oct. 27 at Ascension Lutheran
Church, Thousand Oaks.  The community of California Lutheran
University will honor Olson during a memorial service Nov. 17 at
the Samuelson Chapel on campus.  Olson is survived by Helen, his
wife of 69 years, three children, many grandchildren and great-
grandchildren.