John F. McCarthy, Jr.

Life-long Princeton resident and lawyer, Jack McCarthy, Jr. died on June 22, 2012 at his home after a long illness. He was 90.

John F. McCarthy, Jr. was born on October 17, 1921 on Charlton Street in Princeton, the second child of John F. McCarthy and Rose (Devine) McCarthy. His father worked as a trolley car conductor and butcher while attending the old New Jersey law school in Newark at night. Mr. McCarthy Sr. practiced law in Princeton from 1927 until 1954 when he died of a heart attack at the Mercer County Court house. Rose McCarthy died in 1973. Jack’s sister Mary McHugh, who taught for many years at St. Paul’s School, died in 2006.

Mr. McCarthy was educated at St. Paul’s School, Princeton High School (1937), the Hun School (1939) and Princeton University (1943). He graduated from Princeton High School at 15, having skipped two grades in grammar school. At the Hun School he played baseball and basketball. At Princeton University he captained the undefeated 1942 baseball team, played varsity basketball, served as an officer of Tower Club and graduated with honors. An all-ECAC (precursor to the Ivy League) first baseman, he hit a home run over the right field fence at Cornell — a feat matched previously only by Lou Gehrig. His colleague classmates voted him “best sense of humor” and “best natured.”

In 1943 he was commissioned as a second lieutenant in the 87th Field Artillery. Landing with the First Army on the Normandy beaches on “D-day plus 3” (June 9, 1944), he served as an artillery forward observer, was wounded twice, received the Purple Heart and was awarded the Bronze Star for bravery during the rescue of six stranded enlisted men. He was with his unit when it liberated one of the Nazi concentration camps.

Upon returning from the war, he married his high school sweetheart, Katherine Holohan of Plainsboro, in December 1945. He earned his law degree from the University of Pennsylvania and joined his father’s office on Charlton Street in Princeton in 1948. He served as Princeton Borough attorney from 1958 to 1961. From 1970 to 1973 he was chairman of the New Jersey State Commission of Investigation, an agency established to expose organized crime and public corruption. His law partners included former Governor William T. Cahill, former State Commissioner of Transportation John Sheridan, and Mercer County Superior Court judges Coleman T. Brennan, Theodore Tams, and F. Patrick McManimon. Mr. McCarthy practiced law in Princeton for sixty-four years.

A founding member of the Bedens Brook Club, Mr. McCarthy was also a member of the Nassau Club and Springdale Golf Club. He attended daily Mass at St. Paul’s Church, fulfilling a solemn promise he made on the battlefields of France.

When former governor Brendan Byrne spoke at the 250th anniversary of Princeton University, he joked: “Princeton is known as the home of three famous people: Albert Einstein, Woodrow Wilson, and Jack McCarthy.”

Mr. McCarthy is survived by his wife of sixty-six years; two sons, Jack and Kevin of Princeton; and five grandchildren.

Visiting hours will be on Thursday, June 28 from 2 to 4 p.m. and from 7 to 9 p.m. at the Mather-Hodge Funeral Home, 40 Vandeventer Avenue, Princeton. A Mass of Christian Burial will be celebrated at the Princeton University Chapel on Friday, June 29 at 10 a.m. with a reception to follow at Prospect House, Princeton University. The burial at St. Paul’s Church, Princeton, will be private.

In lieu of flowers, the family requests that contributions be directed to the John F. McCarthy Jr. Class of 1943 Memorial Fund at Princeton University, P.O. Box 5357, Princeton, N.J. 08543-5357; or to the Catholic charitable association, Mount Carmel Guild, 73 North Clinton Avenue, Trenton, N.J. 08609.

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Helen M. Halvorsen

Helen M. Halvorsen, 86, of Griggstown, died Saturday, June 2, 2012 at the University Medical Center of Princeton at Plainsboro.

Born in New York City, she has been a resident of Griggstown since 1953. Helen was a nurse at Carrier Clinic and was previously employed by the Princeton Medical Center.

Daughter of the late Axel and Augusta Josefina (Johansson) Hallberg; and wife of the late Anker N. Halvorsen; she is survived by two sons, Len and Paul Halvorsen; and a sister, Vivian Svendson.

The burial of ashes will take place Saturday, June 30, 2012 at 10 a.m. at the Griggstown cemetery. The memorial service will be held at 11 a.m. at the Bunker Hill Lutheran Church, 235 Bunker Hill Road, Griggstown.

Casual attire suitable for hot, humid weather conditions is appropriate.

In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to Bunker Hill Lutheran Church.

Arrangements are under the direction of The Mather-Hodge Funeral Home, Princeton.

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Heinrich D. Holland

Professor Heinrich Dieter Holland, known fondly by his family, friends, colleagues and students as “Dick” Holland, died peacefully in his home on May 21, 2012 as the result of a recurrence of cancer. He had already bravely survived two bouts with the disease.

Heinrich D. Holland was pre-deceased by his wife of 57 years, Alice Tilghman Pusey Holland, in November of 2010; and also by their youngest son, Matthew Tilghman Holland, in February of 2004.

Heinrich D. Holland leaves behind him three children, Henry Lawrence Holland of West Windsor, Anne Liebrecht Holland of St. Helena, Calif., and John Pusey Holland, currently of Riyadh, Saudi Arabia; four grandchildren, Benedict Merwyn Holland, Esther Holland Rhoades, Nathaniel Chase Holland, and Samuel Denison Holland; a younger brother, Hans Joachim Holland of Salt Lake City, Utah; and a beloved younger sister, Anne Holland Hohenemser of Eugene, Ore.

Heinrich D. Holland headed up one of the first academic research groups to put geochemistry on a firm quantitative footing. His early papers on the application of thermodynamic data to the origin and formational processes of hydrothermal deposits of copper, zinc, lead, silver, and other metals earned him the title of the Father of modern economic geology. His work and that of his research group on the chemical evolution of the atmosphere led to a theory of the Great Oxidation event ca. 2.4 billion years ago, a paradigm that is now conventional wisdom.

Heinrich D. Holland was born in Mannheim, Germany of German Jewish parents. In 1939 just prior to the beginning of World War II, he and his younger brother, Hans Joachim, escaped Hitler’s pogrom via kindertransport to England where the boys were adopted. The boys were later re-united with their parents and younger sister in the Dominican Republic. The family then travelled to the United States where they first resided in Kew Gardens in New York.

Heinrich D. Holland earned his BS in chemistry at Princeton University, graduating with highest honors in 1946. He then served in the U.S. Army from 1946 to 1947 assisting the government with his work on secret and classified projects with Wernher von Brown, the Father of V-2 rockets. In 1948, he earned his Master’s Degree in geology from Columbia University and in 1952, his Ph.D. as a member of the first group of geochemists ever assembled at Columbia by Professor Laurence Kulp.

In 1950, Heinrich D. Holland commenced his career as a professor in the geology department at Princeton University. During summers in the late 1950’s he served Princeton as its director of summer studies. His tenure at Princeton University lasted until 1972 when he made the decision to move his career to the department of earth sciences at Harvard University.

In 2000, Heinrich D. Holland retired from his position at Harvard University as the Harry C. Dudley professor of economic geology. He, nevertheless, continued to contribute to the science community and to work tirelessly with the colleagues and students to which he dedicated his life’s work.

In 2006, Heinrich D. Holland moved with his wife to Philadelphia, Pa. where he served as a visiting scholar in the department of earth and environmental sciences at the University of Pennsylvania. After a career already spanning some five decades, “Dick” Holland remained actively engaged in research and mentoring students there until only a short time prior to his death.

Heinrich D. Holland served as vice-president of the Geochemical Society from 1969 through 1970 and its president from 1970 through 1971. In 1994, he received the Goldschmidt Medal and Award, the society’s highest award.

In 1995, the Society of Economic Geologists awarded him its Penrose Gold Medal. In 1998, he was awarded the Leopold von Buch Medal by the German Geological Society during the society’s 150th Anniversary celebrations.

Heinrich D. Holland was a distinguished lecturer in 1969, a von Humboldt senior fellow at Heidelberg University in 1980-1981 and the Thayer Lindsley Lecturer in 1981-1982.

During his long academic career, Heinrich D. Holland enjoyed visiting appointments and sabbaticals in geology departments at Oxford and Durham Universities in England, the University of Hawaii, Heidelberg University in Germany, Pennsylvania State University, Imperial College in London, United Kingdom and his last at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, Israel.

Dr. Heinrich D. Holland died a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Science and member of the National Academy of Sciences.

His major published contributions to the field of geochemistry remain The Chemistry of the Atmosphere, published in 1978; The Chemical Evolution of the Atmosphere and Oceans, published in 1984; and the 1995 elementary text Living Dangerously he co-wrote with Ulrich Petersen at Harvard University. He served with Karl Turekian of Yale University as executive editor of the historic ten volume Treatise on Geochemistry published in 2004 and continued to work, up to his death, on an expanded second edition of the Treatise with an anticipated publication date in 2013.

“Dick” was known by his students and fellow researchers as a man of scientific rigor and great intellect. All who knew him for any length of time also came to know him as a committed citizen of his adopted country, as a committed teacher working at all levels, from science instruction of inner-city youth to mentoring some of the greatest minds in the geochemical community today through the finest universities internationally, and as a highly valued general counselor on science policy through his work with the National Academy of Sciences.

Dick’s friends always found him to be a man of taste and humor. He was as fond of good food and great arguments as he was of laughter and knowledge of the fine arts, history, and literature in several languages. Dick was a connoisseur of wines but loved best his German rieslings.

Above all else, Dick will be remembered as a man of great loyalty to his friends and to his students. He will be sorely missed by both his family and by his adopted family, the international geo-sciences community at large.

In lieu of flowers, the immediate family requests that donations be forwarded in memory of Heinrich D. Holland to The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum or to the National Academy of Sciences’s Committee on Human Rights.

An open memorial event will be announced for a date later this year.

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Memorial Service

Dawn A. J. Moses

Dawn Anne Jahn Moses, 46, of Arlington, Mass., died June 6, 2012 following a long illness. A celebration of Dawn’s life will be held at Town Hall in Arlington, Mass. on July 14 at 2 p.m. In last week’s obituary, the location of the service was incorrectly given as Arlington, Virginia. Town Topics regrets the error.