also see: Kugel Recipes

The Minneapolis native had worked as a metallurgical engineer for U.S. Steel in Duluth for two years after receiving a degree in chemical engineering from the University of Minnesota in the early 1940s. He served in the Navy during World War II as a radar technician aboard a destroyer in the Pacific. After the war, he and his brother, Mark, started a company called Plastics for Industry, said his son, David of Minnetonka. Soon it evolved into Maid of Scandinavia, a specialty cookware company run by Mark, and Northland Aluminum Products, Dave's company, which manufactured Nordic Ware.

About 1950, immigrant Jewish women asked if the company could make a specialty pan that could be found only in Europe. The women tried to explain the pan, used to make a pudding called Kugel, by using a word that sounded like "bunt" and meant "a gathering of people," David Dalquist said. And the fluted, cast-aluminum design -- trademarked as a Bundt pan -- was born. When the pan was used in a winning entry in the 1966 Pillsbury Bake-Off, orders soared. In 1970, the Bundt name was licensed to Pillsbury for a line of cake mixes that fit the pan. Said his son, "My dad believed the common person could do great things if you give them a chance," and that included keeping his factory in the heart of a U.S. metropolitan area instead of moving it to a foreign country. Dalquist helped develop thermoset plastic molding technology to make products to use in microwave ovens. "He was very good at recognizing product niches, and what the consumer was looking for," said Gene Karlson, a company vice president. Dalquist became involved in environmental-quality issues and served as rear commodore for 29 years for the Great Lakes Cruising Club, the largest yachting association in the world. In addition to his son David, survivors include his wife, Dorothy Margerite Staugaard Dalquist; daughters, Linda Jeffrey of Medina; Corrine Lynch, of Eden Prairie, and Susan Brust, of Dellwood and 12 grandchildren.

Star of David Bundt Pan