Ray D. Siehndel

Obituary for Ray D. Siehndel



Ray D. Siehndel, long-time Washburn University Professor of Business Law, died July 25, 2004. He was born in Wichita on September 17, 1946 to Thurman A. and Stella Wilson Siehndel and graduated from Windom, Kansas High School in 1964. Ray received his bachelors degree in business from Fort Hays State University in 1968. He served with the U.S. Army in Vietnam where he was a member of the 25th Light Infantry Division and was honorably discharged in 1969. He received his masters degree in business from Ft. Hays State in 1971 and attended Washburn University where he was awarded his Doctor of Jurisprudence in 1974. He was a member of the Kansas Bar for thirty years and maintained a private law practice in the law office of Erle W. Francis for many years while teaching at Washburn School of Business. He also practiced law in Lyons. He served as Special Legal Counsel to the Board of County Commissioners of Shawnee County during the 1970s and early 1980s. He received a Master of Laws degree from the University of Missouri, Kansas City School of Law in 1977. Ray joined the Washburn School of Business faculty in 1973 during his senior year at Washburn Law School. He was named Full Professor in 1994 and was a widely published scholar in the areas of small business, business ethics, and international trade, especially its impact on small business in Kansas and the Midwest. He served as Director of the Small business Institute at Washburn and was a member of the Topeka-Shawnee County Metropolitan Planning Commission. From 1988 through 1990, he took a leave of absence from teaching to accept appointment by Governor Mike Hayden to serve in his Cabinet as Kansas Secretary of Human Resources. In 1991 he was the only academic appointed to the National Advisory Committee on Work-Based Learning, a 20-member advisory body to the U.S. Department of Labor that included several state governors and corporate executives. During the 1990s, Ray suffered the loss of both legs and received a kidney transplant. Relentlessly upbeat, however, at the time of his death, he was about to begin his 32nd year at Washburn where student evaluations have consistently confirmed his status as one of most popular and respected faculty in the School of Business. Ray is survived by his wife, Jalayn, of the home, a daughter, Jennifer Siehndel, Merriam, and a son, Petty Officer First Class Travis Siehndel, Annapolis, Maryland. Other survivors include his mother, Stella Siehndel, Topeka, a brother, Jay Siehndel, Scott City, two sisters, Kay Ward, Milton, Florida, and Connie Norton, Kearney, Nebraska, nieces, Lynette Smerchek and Denise Seidel of Topeka, Darla Graham and Shelley Brower, Hutchinson, and Belinda Gimpel, Pratt.



Funeral Services will be at 1:00 p.m. on Wednesday, July 28, 2004 at Penwell-Gabel Mid-Town Chapel in Topeka. Burial Services will be at Mt. Hope Cemetery in Topeka following the services. Professor Siehndel will lie in state after noon on Tuesday at the funeral home, where the family will receive friends from 7 to 8:30 p.m.



Memorial Contributions may be made to the Kidney Foundation of Kansas, 200 West 30th Street, Suite 106, Topeka, Kansas 66611 or the American Diabetes Association, Kansas Affiliate, Inc., 3210 East Douglas, Wichita, Kansas 67206-3309.On-line condolences may be made at www.penwellgabel.com