Larry
Dan Maupin
Grand Island resident Larry Dan Maupin, 67, died on December 15, 2009, after a long battle with pancreatic cancer. Services will be at 11:00 a.m. on Saturday, December 19, at Trinity United Methodist Church. The Reverend Jay Vetter will officiate.
All Faiths Funeral Home of Grand Island is serving the family.
Survivors include his wife, Judy (Bartzatt) Maupin; daughter, Cindy Maupin of Grand Island; daughter and son-in-law, Lisa Maupin and Robert Goldberg of Lincoln; brother and sister-in-law, Kenneth Maupin and AnneMarie Lewis of Spokane, Washington; and brother-in-law, James Bartzatt of Lincoln. He is also survived by his grandsons, Noah and Leo Goldberg of Lincoln, and many cousins, nieces and nephews.
Larry was born on February 11, 1942, in Kansas City, Kansas, to Dan W. and Ruth C. Maupin. He grew up in Lincoln and was graduated from Lincoln Northeast High School in 1960, where he met Judy Bartzatt, his high school sweetheart. They were married on September 1, 1963, and were married for 46 years. He received a bachelor's degree in music education from Nebraska Wesleyan University in 1965, and a master's degree in music from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln in 1969.
In 1965, Larry and Judy moved to Grand Island, where Larry was employed by the Grand Island public school system. For the next 38 years, he taught instrumental music in the elementary schools and directed the Senior High Orchestra.
Larry joined the Hastings Symphony Orchestra as concertmaster in 1965, a post he held until 2002. Subsequently, he held the position of principal second violin until this year. He was also first violinist of the Hastings Symphony String Quartet. He was a charter member of the Lincoln Youth Symphony, and a member of the Lincoln Symphony Orchestra from 1959 through 1970.
In 1972, Larry founded the Nebraska Tri-City Youth Symphony, made up of the best young musicians in the area. The orchestra performed widely in Nebraska, Illinois, Missouri, and Minnesota for 25 years before he stepped down in 1997.
Larry served as the president of the Grand Island Education Association from 1970-71 and as the chair of Orchestra Affairs for the Nebraska Music Educators Association from 1970-71 and again from 1988-89. He was the co-founder of the Grand Island Area Arts Council (known as CARP - Community Arts Resource Personnel) in 1974. Also in that year, he received the Hall County Jaycees Outstanding Young Educator Award. Larry was a member of the Hastings Symphony Hall of Fame, the Nebraska Music Educators Hall of Fame, and was named Nebraska ASTA String Teacher of the Year.
In 2001, he received the Moonshell Arts and Humanities Council's Education Award, an award that was re-named the Larry Maupin Education Award. In October of this year, Larry was awarded the first-ever Legendary Educator Award by the Grand Island Education Foundation.
A 45-year member of Trinity United Methodist Church, Larry served on numerous church boards, and was a 30-year member of the church choir. He was also instrumental in establishing a Public Radio Network for Nebraska, serving as the local chairman of fundraising and raised nearly $70,000 in the Grand Island/Hastings area.
Larry retired from Grand Island Public Schools in 2003 and continued a long-standing avocation of driving a motor coach for Arrow Stage Lines. Over the course of more than 30 years, he drove buses to 48 states and 6 Canadian provinces, over 750,000 miles. He was also a member of the Great Plains chapter of the National Railroad Historical Society.
Among Larry's favorite things was his 1970 French Citroën automobile, which he and Judy acquired in France while attending their daughter Lisa's wedding in 2001. The only one of its kind in Nebraska, you could frequently see his Citroën cruising around Grand Island, its driver sporting a maroon beret.
Mr. Maupin will be cremated; there will be no
visitation. In
lieu of flowers, memorials can be sent to Trinity United Methodist
Church Building Fund or the Larry and Judy Maupin Orchestra
Endowmentwithin the Grand Island Education Foundation (
123 South Webb Road, P.O. Box 4904, Grand Island, NE 68802).