John Bruce Margitan

John Margitan passed away peacefully, in the house that he built, on October 21, 2026, after a long fight with Parkinson’s Disease. John was born to Steve and Emma Margitan in a two-room tar paper shack in Springstead, WI on March 25, 1940, the fourth of five children. He attended AVW elementary school before graduating as part of the first class of Lakeland Union High School in 1958. He attended Michigan Technical College, graduating with a B.S. in civil engineering. He served as an Officer in the United States Marine Corps at Camp Lejeune, North Carolina from 1962 to 1965. After leaving the Marine Corps, John used his experience as a civil engineer to oversee building projects in Maryland, Wisconsin, Indiana, and California. John and his family settled back in Minocqua in 1971, where he opened his surveying company, Voyageur Land Surveys. In 1975, John began teaching a land surveying technician program at Nicolet College, where he also worked as an admissions officer after receiving a master’s degree from Cardinal Stritch University. He taught at Nicolet College until he retired in 2002. He was a founding member of the Wisconsin Society of Land Surveyors (WSLS), where he also served as a past president and director. In 2017, John received the WSLS Lifetime Achievement Award for the significant contributions he made to higher education of surveying in the State of Wisconsin. John married his sweetheart Bonnie in 1961, and they spent a wonderful 65 years together. Throughout his life John remained an avid outdoorsman. He enjoyed hunting and fishing at the cabin he and his son built on the Turtle Flambeau Flowage, where he spent many happy hours exploring the woods with his dogs. He took many canoe trips, both in rivers of the Northwoods, the Boundary Waters, and down the Blood Vein River of Canada where he and Bonnie spent 3 weeks camping. John is survived by his wife Bonnie, two children, Steve (Sonja) and Kirsten (Miguel Aparicio) and three grandchildren, John Aguirre, Marie Aguirre, and LaCrosse Margitan. John will be missed by his family and friends and will be remembered for his dry wit, surveying legacy and outdoor expertise.