[Episcopal Diocese of Ohio] The Rt. Rev. David C. Bowman, ninth bishop of Western New York and assisting bishop of Ohio, died on July 10 in Cleveland, Ohio, at age 82, shortly following a stroke.

Born on November 15, 1932 in Oil City, Pennsylvania, Bishop Bowman was raised in Canton, Ohio, where he attended Canton Lincoln High school, and graduated from Ohio University in 1955. After serving three years in the U.S. Army, he attended the Virginia Theological Seminary, where he earned a Masters of Divinity in 1960. He was ordained to the diaconate in June and to the priesthood in December of that year.

From 1960 to 1963 he served as Assistant Rector at the Church of the Epiphany in Euclid, Ohio, where he met his wife, Nancy. He was then vicar of St. Andrew’s in North Grafton, Massachusetts, from 1963 to 1966; rector of St. Andrew’s Church in Canfield, Ohio, from 1967 to 1973; rector of St. James’ Church, Painesville, Ohio, from 1973 to 1980; and rector of Trinity Church in Toledo, Ohio, from 1980 to 1986, from where he was elected fishop of Western New York.

Upon his retirement in 1999, the Bowmans moved to Shaker Heights, Ohio, where he served for a year as interim dean of Trinity Cathedral, followed by a year as interim bishop of Central New York, while that diocese moved through the process to elect a new bishop. In 2003 he served a year as assisting bishop of Ohio, after which was the interim Dean and President of Seabury Western Seminary in Evanston, Illinois. For the last ten years he has served actively as one of the assisting bishops of the Diocese of Ohio.

Bishop Bowman spent summers in Rangeley, Maine, at the family’s lakeside camp, where he loved to sail, play tennis, and play the banjo and string bass.

He is survived by his wife, Nancy Lou Betts Bowman, whom he married in 1962, and their three children, Ann of Cleveland, Ohio, William (Georgine) of Cincinnati, Ohio, and Sarah Bowman Workman (Jason) of Cleveland, Ohio, as well as two granddaughters, Abigail Bowman and Lucy Workman, and his brother, Richard of Boulder, Colorado.

Burial service and reception were held July 18 Trinity Cathedral in Cleveland.