Scott Melter was the kind of grandpa who would dress up in a suit and bring a bouquet of flowers for special “dates” with his granddaughters.
“They’d get all dressed up, and he’d take them to Chuck E. Cheese’s or Norman Quack’s,” said his daughter, Krystal Pearl, the mother of four of Melter’s six grandchildren. “He was always doing things like that. His grandbabies were his life.”
Melter, 60, of Wyoming, Minn., died Wednesday at M Health Fairview Bethesda Hospital in St. Paul of complications related to COVID-19. As of Friday, 22 people in Minnesota had died from coronavirus.
Melter, who was diagnosed with lung cancer in 2018 and suffered from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, fell ill March 25 while he and his wife, Treva, were driving to Minnesota from their winter house in Ridgeland, S.C., said his son, Michael Melter.
“We planned on having them come up to Minnesota because we wanted to be able to help them if, God forbid, he got sick,” said Michael Melter, who lives in Rochester. “We knew that if he got it, he was going to have a hard time with it.”
Michael Melter said he believes his father, who had spent the previous week in Cancun, Mexico, with his wife and his daughter’s family, may have contracted the coronavirus while on the flight from Atlanta to Jacksonville or while stocking up on supplies in South Carolina.
Scott Melter started coughing and experiencing shortness of breath during the drive back, Michael Melter said. “They thought he had a temperature, but they couldn’t get their hands on a thermometer,” he said.
The couple arrived in Minnesota on the afternoon of March 25 and drove right to their house in Wyoming to unpack. Scott Melter told his children that he planned on “sleeping it off,” but Pearl, who lives in Center City, insisted they go to the emergency room at M Health Fairview Lakes Medical Center in Wyoming, she said.
After being tested for COVID-19 in Wyoming, Melter was transferred to the intensive care unit at M Health Fairview Southdale Hospital in Edina. Three days later, test results showed he had COVID-19, and he was transferred to Bethesda, which last month was converted into a specialty care facility for COVID-19 patients.
“The doctors and nursing staff did everything they could for him at Bethesda,” Michael Melter said. “They were very caring, and they kept us informed of everything that was going on.”
But by Wednesday, it was clear that Scott Melter, who had part of his upper left lung removed in 2018, was not going to survive.
“His ventilators were at the highest level they could be, and his arterial blood gases, which are a measure of how well his lungs are transferring oxygen and carbon dioxide, were very far out of whack,” Michael Melter said. “It was clear that he wasn’t getting better; he was getting worse. There was really nowhere to go, and the ventilator settings could have eventually damaged his lungs or, in all likelihood, his heart would have given out, and his other organs were starting to shut down because of it.”
Michael Melter, dressed in personal protective equipment, was able to be with his father for his last few hours. His mother, Treva, is quarantined at home, he said.
Family members were able to see him and speak to him via FaceTime right before he died. “We were all able to say goodbye,” Pearl said. “It was really special. His grandbabies got to tell him that he was the best Papa in the entire world.”
Said Michael Melter: “A lot of people struggle with the idea of discontinuing support … but it’s not that you’re giving up; you’re giving them permission to end the fight.”
Scott Melter was the son of Bernard “Bernie” Melter, who served as commissioner of the Minnesota Department of Veterans Affairs from 1991 to 2001. He grew up in many different places as his father was transferred to different U.S. Marine Corps posts. From 1978 until 1984, Scott Melter served in the U.S. Army, which is where he met Treva Boatright. The two were married on May 26, 1984.
Melter, a graduate of Cannon Falls High School and Dakota County Technical College, was vice president of engineering at Comcast when he retired in November 2018. “He started climbing poles and worked his way up,” Michael Melter said.
Scott Melter loved the Minnesota Vikings, traveling, spending time with his grandchildren and camping at the Veterans Rest Camp in northern Washington County.
The highlights of each year were the Minnesota Vikings vs. Green Bay Packers games, which Melter watched with Ken Larson, the manager of the Veterans Rest Camp on Big Marine Lake in May Township, where Scott and Treva Melter spent the summers. Larson and Melter would often travel to Lambeau Field together, Larson said.
“I’m going to miss him during the Packers-Vikings games,” said Larson, a lifelong Green Bay Packers fan. “He would always make sure we were together for those games, even in South Carolina. We found a little Packers bar in Savannah, Georgia, that we would go to.”
Michael Melter said his father’s goal was to make it to every NFL stadium in the U.S. “He made it to a lot of them,” he said. “He was a season ticket holder for the Minnesota Vikings, and the stinking Vikings, I love them, but they couldn’t even win one Super Bowl before he passed.”
Michael Melter said the family’s strong faith has been sustaining them since Melter’s death. “We know that this isn’t the end,” he said. “We know God is still good in the midst of not-so-good circumstances, and that we will see how it all fits together one day.”
He praised the medical staff at Bethesda for doing their “absolute best in trying to keep us informed as much as possible. They were very kind and very thoughtful with my dad’s passing. You can tell that they are doing absolutely everything that they can for people.”
Because a large funeral isn’t possible because of social-distancing restrictions, family members plan to hold a small memorial service via Zoom later this month.
“Once this is all over, God willing, and when the quarantine is all done, we will get everyone together and celebrate his life and have a big party for him,” Michael Melter said. “He would have loved that.”
Melter is survived by his wife, Treva; two children, Krystal Pearl and Michael Melter; and six grandchildren. Mattson Funeral Home in Forest Lake is handling arrangements.
