Thor Wenzel was taken by the angels on May 1, 2025, after a struggle with pneumonia.  He leaves behind his wife, Tamara, children Kevin, Keith, Seth, Serin, and Jarod, plus grandchildren Carter, Logan, Kate, and Jasmine.

Thor was the image and temperament of his mother, Donna McKea, daughter of Donald Duncan McKea, son of John Wallace McKea.  He strongly associated with the long line of shipbuilders and mathematicians who came to England with William the Conqueror, Duke of Normandy. As shipbuilders, they called themselves Quay, and after the invasion, they were awarded a manor in the north, at a harbor in Scotland, where they continued ship-building.  As the years passed, and the family expanded both in size and location, they changed their name to English and Scottish versions. The records show Kee, Kea, Key, McKee and McKea.  In the 1500s, Thor's ancestors had a fleet of merchant ships out of London, controlled by two brothers, one them now Mayor of London.  The Mayor's son rid himself of the competing inheritor, his cousin, using ill-gotten authority to impress him into the Royal Navy.  Learning of the plot, the young man sailed at first tide on his father's ship bound for Charleston.  Upon arriving, he was a wanted man by the British military, so again, the name changed.  He went into lumber, and used his shipbuilding skills to build his own fortune.  The Kees, Keas, and Keys still populate Charleston, Virginia, Maryland, and more.  The families had many notable figures, the most famous being Francis Scott Key.  Years pass, and once again, wealth brings rifts, so another young man sets out to seek his fortune at Sutter's Mill—but not to pan for gold.  His lumber helped build Sacramento and San Francisco, and he accumulated his own fortune.  In the rift, he changed his name back to McKea.  Records of the McKea lumbering family are found at the Plumas County Museum.

Thor studied Pure Math at Reed in Portland, writing his thesis on the Reimann zeta function of the Prime Number Theorem, specifically the Dirichlet Series.   After graduation, he was drafted to Vietnam, where he was a cryptologist.  He then entered banking as a programmer, where he became attracted to systems architecture.  He helped develop many of the changes that came to banking during this era, such as the first ATM. He learned the interfaces of the Demand System for Fed-Member Bank processing, and through many bank mergers, became a M&A programming specialist.  His last employer was the global financial behemoth InterContinental Exchange.

Thor was a quiet man of strong convictions.  When words were needed, he sought the best. But with his Heavenly Father, he knew  that few words are necessary.  At the end, he conveyed to his family Psalm 139: "Thou knowest my down-sitting and mine uprising; thou understandeth my thought afar off.  Thou compassest my path and my lying down, and art acquainted with all my ways, for there is not a word in my tongue, but, lo, O LORD, thou knowest it altogether. … Whither shall I go from Thy spirit? Whither shall I flee from Thy presence? …."When I awake, I am still with thee."

A graveside service will be held on Saturday, May 17, 2025 at 4:00 PM at Maple Leaf Cemetery.  Pastor Reed Benson will officiate.