Obituaries 11/12/14
Margaretta Rodgers Cowenhoven
Margaretta Rodgers Cowenhoven of Chestertown, Md., died on Friday, November 7, 2014 at Heron Point. She was 102.
Born on October 21, 1912 in New Brunswick, she was the daughter of Charles T. and Emily Rodgers Cowenhoven. Ms. Cowenhoven was a lifelong resident of Princeton. She graduated from Miss Fines School in 1930 and from Wellesley College in 1934. In 1942, she entered the Navy as a midshipman and was promoted to Lt. Commander in Navy Supply Corp at the Philadelphia Naval Yard. Ms. Cowenhoven was employed as personal secretary to the CEO and founder of Johnson and Johnson. She was also employed by Princeton University as assistant to the Secretary of the University where she was the highest-ranking female employee. Ms. Cowenhoven retired in 1975 and moved to Heron Point in Chestertown in 1991 with her sister, Mary Coyle, who predeceased her in 2008.
Ms. Cowenhaven was related to both Dan Coyle and Donald Stuart, founders of the Town Topics Newspaper of Princeton in 1946.
She was an avid birder and an accomplished bridge player.
Ms. Cowenhoven is survived by four nieces, Georgiana Evans of Centreville, Md., Margaretta Kildebeck of San Francisco Calif., Margaret Cowenhoven of Waltham, Mass., and Emily Searle of Newburyport, Maine; nephews Charles Stuart of Nobleboro, Maine, Nicholas Cowenhoven of York, Maine, and Andrew Cowenhoven of Concord, N.H.; and numerous great nephews and nieces and great-great nieces and nephews.
A memorial service will be held on Thursday, November 13, 2014 at 2 p.m. at Heron Point — Wesley Hall 501 E. Campus Ave. Chestertown, Md.
Arrangements by: Fellows, Helfenbein & Newnam Funeral Home, P.A. 130 Speer Road, Chestertown, Md. Online condolences may be sent to the family at www.fhnfuneralhome.com.
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Jude T. Rich
Jude T. Rich, former president and CEO of the Princeton management consulting firm Sibson & Company, passed away in his home on November 6, 2014 after a decade-long struggle with Alzheimer’s disease. He was 71.
In the 1980’s, when the issue of runaway executive pay emerged, Mr. Rich called for closer alignment between compensation and financial performance. He was a pioneer in developing stock option-based incentive plans for corporate leaders and consulted for most companies in the Fortune 100. Over the course of his career, Mr. Rich authored more than 45 business articles, spoke at nearly 200 conferences and appeared on numerous television and radio broadcasts.
Prior to joining Sibson, Mr. Rich was a Partner at McKinsey & Company, where he led the human resource management practice. Previously, he held various positions at Johnson & Johnson, AT&T, and RCA. He obtained his Master of business administration and Bachelor in economics from Rutgers University.
Mr. Rich found time in his busy schedule to volunteer with Recording for the Blind & Dyslexic, The Conference Board, SCORE, Junior Chamber of Commerce, and Stuart Country Day School. He served as president of Rosedale Acres and Gramercy Tower Homeowners Associations and coached youth basketball and soccer.
While proud of his contributions to business and his community, Mr. Rich always considered his family to be his greatest legacy. His adoration, respect, and love for Mary, his wife of nearly 40 years, inspired all those who had the chance to see them together.
In addition to his dedicated wife, Mr. Rich leaves behind five children, Denise Rich, Jude Rich, Jr., Dina Lemmond, Victoria Rich Glass, and Jessica Horton; four sons-in-law, Scott Finkernagel, G. Chris Lemmond, Mark Glass, and Robert Horton; daughter-in-law, Francine Poppo Rich; sister, Marie Chandler; brother, Gerald Rich; eight grandchildren, and many nieces and nephews.
A visitation for friends and family was held at The Mather-Hodge Funeral Home at 40 Vandeventer Avenue, Princeton, on November 9, 2014 from 2 to 4 p.m., and a Mass of Christian Burial was celebrated at the Church of St. Charles Borromeo, 47 Skillman Road, Skillman at 10 a.m. on Monday, November 10, 2014.
In lieu of flowers, the family requests that donations be made to the Alzheimer’s Association in the hopes that Mr. Rich’s children and grandchildren will know a world without this devastating disease.
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Gareth Pierce Williams
Gareth Pierce Williams died on November 5, 2014 at the University Medical Center of Princeton at Plainsboro.
He was born on October 16, 1939 in Penrhynside, Wales, to Thomas and Myfanwy Williams. From childhood he excelled in mathematics, in which he earned his undergraduate and doctoral degrees at the University of Wales at Bangor. In 1964 he married Janet Harding, whom he had met while she was vacationing near his seaside village. A keen bicyclist, he once rode 100 miles to visit her at her home in England. After a honeymoon in Corsica, they crossed the Atlantic on the Queen Mary for Gareth to take up a postdoctoral fellowship at the U.S. Government’s new Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory (GFDL) in Washington, D.C. Very quickly he was offered a permanent position and moved with the lab to Princeton in 1968.
In the course of his 40 years at GFDL, he distinguished himself as a leading expert on the mathematical modeling of atmospheric systems, especially in groundbreaking work on Jupiter and Earth’s jet stream. He published dozens of articles in the flagship journals of his field, was elected a fellow of the American Meteorological Society, and in 1989, was invited on a lecture tour of Japan. He also served as a consultant to the Jet Propulsion Laboratory on its Pioneer and Voyager missions.
His greatest love was for his family: his wife Janet, with whom he has recently celebrated their 50th anniversary; his sons Kieran and Kirk, their wives Laura and Kristine; and grandsons David, Philip, and Hagan. Even after becoming a U.S. citizen, Gareth remained deeply attached to his Welsh roots and his native Welsh language, and passed to his sons his passion for walking the Welsh hills. A devoted listener of classic music, he and Janet were season ticketholders at McCarter Theatre’s music series for 40 years.
A memorial gathering was held on November 11, 2014 from 2 to 4 p.m. at the Kimble Funeral Home, 1 Hamilton Avenue, Princeton. In lieu of flowers, memorial contributions may be made in his name to support Parkinson’s by visiting www.apadparkinson.org or www.lightofday.org or www.michaeljfox.org.
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