Dennis Lietz
- Email Address: Email Me
- Website: St. Gregory's Episcopal Church
Biography
I am a farm boy from Minnesota, the lake endowed state and home of the mythical Lake Woebegone. I attended an agricultural college forty miles from home all the while vowing that I would ultimately get as far from the farm as I possibly could. In order to assure this, I pursued a subject that I loved, chemistry, ultimately earning a BS degree in Chemistry and an MS degree in Organic Chemistry from South Dakota State University. While there I met a female chemistry student and ultimately married her. We have five wonderful children who have given us six grandchildren. After graduation, I landed a job in Cleveland with the Colton Chemical branch of Air Products, a manufacturer of emulsion polymers and there learned to do this seemingly exotic form of science. I spent my entire career in research doing emulsion polymerization although not always with the same company. It seems that after four years in Cleveland, Air Products decided to close the laboratories there and move them to New Jersey. That was too close to New York City to please a country boy so I changed jobs and moved to the Chicago area where I worked for a small laboratory doing research for several paint companies, all doing emulsion polymerization. I have also worked briefly for the adhesive industry. Both the paint and adhesive industries use emulsion polymers. I closed out my career working for Stepan Chemical in Northfield, IL, a manufacturer of surface active agents, substances used in emulsion polymerization. In 1991, I was finally convinced by a parish couple to attend a Cursillo weekend, something that I did primarily to keep others from hounding me to go. It was while on this weekend that the call came from God to serve Him as a deacon in the church. I was ordained in 1996 and have served in this capacity at St. Gregory's since.
Interests
My interests include reading, almost anything that I can get my hands on from novels to biographies to tomes on the boundary between science and religion. I got started reading by collecting comic books and still love the funny pages of the newspaper. But perhaps the second most appealing parts of the newspaper for me are the editorial and op-ed pages. I also rarely miss doing the crossword puzzle and have become a fan of Sudoku. I love travel and movies. Hobbies include photography and genealogy. This latter hobby has led to my meeting relatives that I did not know I had, some as close by as Kankakee and some as far away as the state of Washington. I feed birds and chase squirrels. I gave up ice fishing when I learned that shacks were not allowed on the ice in Illinois. I like to cook, especially casseroles and other one-pot dishes. To me the kitchen is just another laboratory but one where it is not necessary to keep a notebook. Unfortunately, I like my own cooking a little too much and it seems to go to waist. I like eating out, too and that is even worse.
