Bernard W. Braun

Bernard Willard Braun “Bernie”
How do you sum up 90 years in a few short paragraphs? Bernie was born May 6, 1936 in Minneapolis to his parents, Dorothea “Dora” and Benjamin “Ben” Braun.

Bernie grew up in South Minneapolis on 52nd and 10th during World War II and the postwar era afterward, “terrorizing” the neighborhood with his neighborhood friends, unintentionally breaking a few car and house windows playing baseball in the street, riding bikes and climbing trees. Bernie once broke both wrists at the same time falling from a neighborhood tree he and his friends had climbed. Bernie even made news in the Minneapolis Star newspaper one day after being involved in an accident with a car while riding his Cushman scooter.

Bernie also enjoyed watching TV – it was the era of B-movie Westerns, Gene Autry, the Lone Ranger and Howdie Doody. Like many, Bernie had a paper route and participated in Boy Scouts. He also enjoyed model and real trains and had an O27, Marx model train layout in his upstairs bedroom. Bernie attended school in the Minneapolis Public School System and graduated from Minneapolis Vocational High School (the Volts) in 1953 where he studied cabinet making and drafting. Bernie was an exceptional cabinet maker and made some beautiful furniture during his studies but decided he preferred cabinet making as a hobby rather than a career and chose drafting instead.

Bernie worked a variety of jobs out of high school, including stocking shelves at Osgood’s Super Valu store on 56th and Chicago, a shoe salesman in the women’s shoe department (for one day) at a store in downtown Minneapolis and as a summer job, he often helped one of his high school teachers roofing houses in South Minneapolis. Bernie hired on as a draftsman at the McQuay Perfex Company in Northeast Minneapolis on Broadway Ave in November 1957. Bernie worked at McQuay for an astounding 68 years, right up until his hospitalization Feb 8, 2026 after a fall at home and saw a lot of changes at McQuay including a move from the Broadway Ave location to a new headquarters in Plymouth, MN, and corporate name changes from McQuay Perfex to Snyder General to Mc Quay International and finally Daikin Applied. When he started, drafting was done by hand on giant drafting tables, later transitioning to computer aided drafting and finally working from his home on a laptop. His focus was commercial HVAC systems, and he became expert at the products’ design and construction, so much so that even the design engineers and customers would consult him on engineering questions, even though he technically wasn’t an engineer. He worked closely with the factories in Faribault and Owatonna and often traveled to Visalia, CA and Huntsville, AL to trouble shoot quality issues with the factories there. Bernie never retired and right up to the day he passed, was looking forward to returning to work.

Bernie enlisted in the US Army Reserve after graduating from high school and served as a Reservist for nine and a half years in the 5th Army, 307th Division Heavy Automotive Group where he attained the rank of Staff Sergeant. Bernie had a lot of great stories of training at Camp McCoy in Wisconsin and other locations in Kansas, Colorado and Utah over the years and the characters he encountered during his time in service, one story being the sign posted at a grade crossing with the Milwaukee Road railroad tracks and the road going to the firing range at Camp McCoy which read, “caution, trains pass in excess of 100mph” and how at least one military truck had been hit by a train there. He usually served as company clerk at summer camp which allowed him to draw a vehicle from the motor pool, the Dodge M-37 ¾ ton truck being his vehicle of choice.

Around this same time, Bernie met Shirley Zaske of Bertha, MN. Bernie and Shirley were married June 4, 1960 in Hewitt, MN and were married 58 years until Shirley’s passing in October 2018, calling Richfield, MN their home with their children, Jeffrey and Susan.

Outside of work, Bernie enjoyed many hobbies, perhaps the most unique, playing the accordion. Bernie enjoyed a variety of music, polka, blue grass, country western and gospel hymns to name a few. Bernie was an avid model railroader in HO scale and built a large model railroad layout in the basement of both Richfield homes he lived in over the years. He enjoyed building railroad kits, structures and scratch built many detailed structures for his model railroad, including a little hamburger shack, appropriately named “Bernie’s”. Bernie also enjoyed building model car and aircraft kits. In 1978, he began an adventure in railroad restoration and preservation of full-size railroad equipment which would last the rest of his life as a volunteer at the Minnesota Transportation Museum and later Gopher State Railway Museum. At MTM, he served as vice president of the MTM Railroad Division from 1983 to 1986 during which time he helped arrange and operate many mainline excursions with restored steam locomotive Northern Pacific 328. He was also heavily involved in MTM’s acquisition of the former Great Northern Railway Jackson Street Roundhouse property in St Paul, MN and its development into what today is the Jackson Street Roundhouse Museum. Bernie was also a streetcar operator at the Como Harriet Streetcar Line in Minneapolis, MN from 1978 until the mid-2000s.

In 1990, Bernie was a founding member of the Gopher State Railway Museum in New Prague, MN and served many years as its president and the past five years as a director-at-large. Besides trains, Bernie spent time working on his 1943 Dodge ¾ ton command car project. He attended many different vintage military vehicle shows and events over the years with his son, Jeff. Bernie was also an active member at the Scott-Carver Threshers in Jordan, MN from the mid-1990s until the mid-2000s. Outside of hobbies, Bernie was a lifelong member of Oakland Avenue United Methodist church navigating many changes including, merging with Asbury United Methodist in the early 2000s and another merge with Epworth Church in February 2026. Bernie had many roles at the church including helping with Sunday school, serving as a trustee and as an usher. Besides his faith journey, Bernie was active in the Boy Scouts of America as an assistant scoutmaster, then scoutmaster of Troop 443 in Richfield for many years. Bernie enjoyed camping and the outdoors and spent two weeks in 1980 backpacking in New Mexico at the Philmont Scout Reservation as well as many summers camping for two weeks each year at Many Point Scout Camp. Bernie also served nearly three decades as a Viking Council BSA District Commissioner. Bernie was inducted into the Boy Scouts Order of the Arrow where he received its highest honor as a Vigil member. Scouting also led Bernie to spend almost three decades as a volunteer usher at Minnesota Gopher Football games, from 1976 until the early 2000s.

Bernie suffered a cardiac arrest in the ambulance on the way to the ER Feb 8th and was revived. He slowly recovered in the hospital and was able to transfer to transitional care at the Masonic Home on March 16th where he worked hard twice daily on PT and OT. Bernie looked forward to getting back to work. It wasn’t to be and Thursday April 23rd, Bernie suffered another severe heart attack in the ambulance on the way to Southdale ER for some routine observation. The ambulance crew said Bernie spent most of the trip talking with them (probably about trains), when his heart stopped and they couldn’t revive him. His family was blessed to have had the extra few months to spend with him, supporting his recovery.

Bernie loved his wife, Shirley of 58 years; his children, Jeff and Susan and his extended family through marriage including son-in-law, Ron Goedken; brothers and sisters-in-law; his wife’s parents and many nieces and nephews. Bernie had a positive impact on all whose lives he touched. Bernie led by example through a quiet strength and had a way of finding other’s strengths and encouraging them to grow and lead as well. The Masonic Home staff summed up Bernie’s quiet strength perfectly saying he never gave up hope of recovering, never lost the sparkle in his eyes never lost his smile, was always enthusiastic and ready to get to work on his PT and OT. He was kind to all of them, his hope inspired them to say, “they all needed to be more like Bernie, they needed more Bernie’s, be like Bernie.”

Bernie is survived by his son, Jeffrey Braun; daughter, Susan Goedken; son-in-law, Ron Goedken; sisters-in-law, Fayette Kovar, LaVonne Drayna and Jeannette Zaske; cousins, Dale and Janet Tornell as well as many nieces and nephews. Bernie was preceded in death by his wife, Shirley Braun; parents, Dorothea and Benjamin Braun; mother and father-in-law, Alice and Clifford Zaske, and many aunts, uncles, cousins, nieces, nephews and brothers and sisters-in-law.