Kevin Wiley

Kevin Wiley passed away unexpectedly on July 4th, 2025. Kevin was born in The Dalles, Oregon to Gilbert and Jeanne Wiley. He spent his time hanging out with friends, reading, and listening to all types of music. Kevin enjoyed working on cars and owned a few classics, including a 1928 Ford Model A which he almost drove through the US Bank window when the brakes failed.

After high school, Kevin attended a number of Oregon colleges, but through an exchange program with the U of O, he graduated from Rutgers University in New Jersey with a BA degree in Spanish. After graduation, he returned to Portland where he worked in various administrative and customer service roles. While working for HP, Kevin decided to return to college where he earned a BS in Electrical Engineering from the University of Portland.

Kevin worked as an Electrical Engineer until retirement for a number of small hightech firms in the Portland metro area including Support Technologies, E-Machines, Instromedix, Pixelworks, Williams Controls, AAE, Crimson Trace, and Timbercon. After retirement, he continued to work on some small circuit board projects and was taking classes to learn how to weld.

Of all the holidays, Halloween was Kevin’s favorite. For years, he made elaborate decorations combining Halloween masks, motion detectors and videos of monster movies from the 1950’s. He loved the claymation, bad costumes and corny dialog.

When he wasn’t designing a new decoration, you could find Kevin playing his guitar. He dutifully practiced 45 minutes a day for decades. Kevin loved a wide variety of music, from classical to jazz to finger style and surf guitar. If you ever recommended an artist or song to him, he’d say “I’ll check it out”—and actually would!

Kevin will be remembered for his wry sense of humor, his math lessons on the kitchen whiteboard, playing ‘Uno’ and dancing on Christmas Eve, his ability to remember the “The Simpsons” dialog by heart—a gift (or curse) he shared with his daughters—and for family trips to Disneyland, where Kevin only wanted to ride the slow rides so he could admire the art and the animatronics (and, of course, the Disneyland Railroad.)

Kevin is survived by his wife, Barbara; daughters, Michelle and Laura; sisters, Cecelia and Cynthia; nieces, Alanna, Samantha, and Finley; and nephews, Sam and Andy.

Contributions in Kevin’s memory may be made to Oregon Public Broadcasting or your local public radio station.