Donald Perkins Gatley

He graduated from Vanderbilt with a Mechanical Engineering degree as an ROTC student, and then served for 4 years in the Navy before working for Trane Air Conditioning in the Northeast before settling in Atlanta.

He worked as a consulting engineer specializing in HVAC. He developed a strong interest in psychrometrics (the study of vapor and thermodynamics), because of its applicability to air conditioning. Not finding a sufficient all in one reference for the field, he wrote a book, Understanding Psychrometrics, published by ASHRAE. He joked that after all the time he put in on the book, he was down to about $1 an hour for his efforts.

He had been a sea scout as a boy and developed a love for sailing. With a friend he bought an old wooden sloop and sailed it at Lake Lanier, eventually buying a small property at the Lake (with no phone) that was a remedy to the workweek.

He and Jane had a love of travel and spent many vacations on bicycle trips in Europe.

He enjoyed tennis, and in later years the times spent on the clay courts at Bitsy Grant were one of the things he looked forward to the most.

He had an active social life, organized by Jane, with many friends who went all the way back to Vanderbilt. Their crowd threw and attended many dinner parties.

He is survived by his spouse, Jane Gatley, and son, Eric Gatley.