William D. Hogan

William D. Hogan, 84, of Princeton passed peacefully at home on Wednesday, June 7 following a courageous 12-week battle with peritoneal cancer.

Born in Paterson, NJ, and raised in Hawthorne, he was predeceased by his parents Caroline and William L. Hogan; his brother Richard F. Hogan; his sister Maureen Hogan; and his daughter Erin Doreen Curcio.

Bill leaves behind his beloved wife Elaine (nee Martinetti); his daughter Kimberly and Karl Moore of New Hope; his son William P. Hogan of Hamilton; his adored grandchildren Audra (21) and Logan (16); his brother Kevin Hogan of Pickerington, OH; his son-in-law Shawn Curcio of Lenoir, NC; and many nieces and nephews.

A loyal Son of Xavier High School ’56 in Manhattan, Bill graduated as an ROTC Captain, and believed his Jesuit education became the foundation of his independent thinking, respect for hard work, and positive attitude.

He earned a BS and MA from Montclair State College, and began teaching math and coaching basketball at DePaul High School in Wayne and Our Lady of the Valley in Orange. At 28, he was recruited by IBM starting in their Cranford office, promoted to the Strategic Planning Staff at headquarters in Armonk, NY, and became sales manager when the Trenton office opened. He moved to Lawrenceville, and in 1969 was named basketball coach at Notre Dame High School.

He owned Hogan’s Restaurant and Carnegie Hall in Lawrenceville for 10 years.

Bill owned an executive search firm specializing in placing salespeople throughout the United States. He subsequently founded Hogan Leadership Group, a consulting firm working with small businesses to develop and grow their companies. He wrote and published three consulting books for his clients to use as reference tools. They included his trademark storytelling, time management and hiring skills, and an honest approach to selling. His third book, Stop Selling, is still being sought on Amazon.

He proudly served on the Board of Stuart Country Day School and was a longtime member of The Bedens Brook Club. 

Bill’s love of basketball was lifelong. He and Elaine were season ticket holders for Princeton University basketball for over 25 years where he shared many nights critiquing the game in the stands with Pete Carril. This year, he won the 2023 Moore Family March Madness Challenge trophy which his daughter, Kimberly, proudly presented to him.

Bill had a lifelong respect and passion for the game of golf. He was the first known player to shoot his age at Bedens Brook with a score of 73. Subsequently, he shot his age 18 times. In 21 years, he played 4,051 rounds of golf averaging over 200 rounds per year. He also had three holes-in-one. Two at Bedens Brook and one at Querencia, in Cabo San Lucas. He was truly the Bedens Brook Legends Club Champion and was honored this week with Mens Day being renamed The Hogan. His walk, smile, and swing will grace the course forever.

At age 19, Bill was honored to caddie for the legendary golfer, Ben Hogan, at a tournament at Ridgewood Country Club.

His passion for work and sports golf, basketball, tennis, and skiing were only surpassed by his love and unwavering commitment to his family, friends, and Catholic faith.

SON OF XAVIER, MARCHING ON!

A Mass of Christian burial will be celebrated at 11 a.m. on Saturday, June 17 at the Church of St. Ann, 1253 Lawrenceville Road, Lawrenceville, NJ 08648. Visitation will be in the church chapel from 9 a.m. to 10:45 a.m.

In lieu of flowers, the family kindly requests donations be made in Bill’s memory to Stuart Country Day School, 1200 Stuart Road, Princeton, NJ 08540.

Arrangements are under the direction of The Mather-Hodge Funeral Home, 40 Vandeventer Avenue, Princeton, NJ 08542.

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William Louis Howarth

William Louis Howarth died peacefully at the Princeton Medical Center on June 6, 2023, of interstitial lung disease. He was 82.

Will was born in Minneapolis, grew up in Springfield, Illinois, and received a B.A. from the University of Illinois at Urbana/Champaign in 1962 and a Ph.D. in English from the University of Virginia in 1967. He was a member of the Princeton University faculty for 51 years, specializing in American Studies, literary nonfiction, and eco-criticism. He served as Editor-in-Chief of The Papers of Henry D. Thoreau, wrote 14 books, reported on literary America for the National Geographic Society, and was a founding member of the Princeton Environmental Institute.

He is survived by his wife, Anne Matthews, three siblings, and a daughter and a son.

There will be no services, but gifts in his memory to the Ridgeview Conservancy of Princeton or to the Friends of the Princeton University Library are appreciated.

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Maxine A. Gurk
August 28, 1928 – June 7, 2023

Maxine A. Gurk, a longtime resident of Princeton, passed away at home on June 7, 2023. She was predeceased by her husband, Herbert M. Gurk in 2013. She is survived by her children Lisa Gurk Herman (Michael) of New Orleans, LA, David Gurk of Ann Arbor, MI, and Rebecca Gurk (Stuart Mangel) of Columbus, OH; her grandchildren Katie (Mike Noble) and Peter Herman, Josh, Molly, and Ben Mangel; and her great-grandson, August Noble.

Born to the late Bernard and Helen Auerbach, Maxine was raised in Philadelphia. In 1960 she moved to Princeton with her husband where they found a welcoming community and formed lasting friendships. Maxine was a frequent participant in charitable activities for the town and the local chapters of Hadassah and Jewish Women International. As a JWI member, she visited numerous schools, inspiring children with stories about heroes who fought for tolerance. She was deeply involved in the Princeton Jewish Center and served as president of its Women’s Division. Before Princeton Borough and Township consolidated, Maxine served for many years on the Joint Commission on Aging.

As a senior in high school, Maxine chose between two great interests: art and education of young children. She was awarded a scholarship to Moore College of Art but instead accepted one to the University of Pennsylvania, receiving her BS in Education in 1950. While at Penn, she combined her two passions by teaching ceramics at a South Philadelphia settlement house. After graduating, she taught first grade at the University of Pennsylvania’s Illman-Carter Children’s School, where she served as a demonstration teacher for educators from across the country and abroad. During that time, Maxine earned a qualification for teaching the deaf from Temple University, which she used to teach preschoolers at the Pennsylvania School for the Deaf and teenagers at the Society of the Friends of the Deaf in Philadelphia.

Maxine met and fell in love with her future husband, Herb, in 1951 while working as an arts and crafts counselor at Indian Lake Camp in the Pennsylvania Poconos, where he was also a camp counselor. They married in December 1952.

For the last 22 years of her career, Maxine worked at the Rocky Hill Cooperative Nursery School, serving as head teacher and director. She daily marveled at her good fortune to have a job she loved so much. In her retirement, her pleasures included writing memoirs and poetry and continuing her lifelong love of art as a prolific painter, using various media with an emphasis on watercolor. For several years she was the co-curator of the Princeton Jewish Center’s art gallery and, after moving to Princeton Windrows, served as an illustrator for a number of Windrows publications. She also enjoyed volunteering in the Grand-Pals program of the Princeton Senior Resource Center, as an English as a Second Language teacher, and as a tutor in Mercer County Community College’s Adult Literacy Program.

Services were held at The Jewish Center in Princeton followed by burial in Beth Israel Cemetery, Woodbridge, NJ.

Donations in memory of Maxine Gurk may be made to The Jewish Center of Princeton (thejewishcenter.org/donation) or the Princeton Senior Resource Center (princetonsenior.org/support/donate).

Extend condolences and share memories at TheKimbleFuneralHome.com.

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Martha Kingsley

Martha Kingsley passed away at Stonebridge at Montgomery in Skillman, NJ, on June 2, 2023.

Martha was born in Vienna, Austria, on July 7, 1925. At the young age of 13, she was forced, by Hitler’s advance into Austria, to leave her family behind and travel solo to New York aboard the Queen Mary. This was the beginning of the indomitable spirit that she demonstrated throughout her life. There she resided with her aunt and uncle until seven years later after the war when her mother and father were finally able to rejoin her.

She met her beloved husband, Ben, in a swimming pool in New York City where she mistakenly entered the deep end of the pool, and then suddenly had to call for help because she was not able to tread water.  Ben happened to be substituting for his cousin as a lifeguard that day, even though he actually had no training. He subsequently went in to try to “save” her, and Martha ended up pulling him down as well, inspiring one heroic soul to jump in and save the both of them! That was the beginning of a wonderful union which lasted 50 years until Ben’s passing, producing three sons, eight grandchildren, and three great-grandchildren!

Martha graduated from Julia Richman High School in Manhattan in 1942. Her senior yearbook memorably characterized her as a “sweet and sincere friend of the truest blend.” After 20 years of childraising, Martha was determined to go back to school, and subsequently obtained her teaching degree from Trenton State College.  She then taught for over 21 years in first grade in the Mill Lake School in Monroe, New Jersey. Martha used to joke that she “never graduated from first grade,” but that turned out to be a great benefit to the many students that were shaped and touched by her teaching.

At the end of her teaching career, her friends and colleagues wished her a proverbial “long and healthy retirement.” Little did they know how prescient that would be, as she pursued a healthy and active retirement for the next 34 years. During that time, she made good on some lifelong desires such as trying her hand at painting (she ended up producing more than 50 paintings in her Senior Center class) and taking trips around the world. She enjoyed many diverse experiences on those trips such as riding on an elephant or in a rickshaw in India; visiting Buddhist temples in Thailand; praying at the Western Wall in Jerusalem; cruising along the Rhine in Germany; donning a kimono in Japan; and coming full circle by going back to her home in Vienna, which she had been forced to leave some 50 years prior.

Not surprisingly, she always told anyone willing to listen (and usually more than once) that she had lived a wonderfully full life, had no regrets, and was SO grateful for everything, and most especially her beloved family! Perhaps that attitude was part of the “secret sauce” that enabled her to live until the ripe “young” age of 97.

At Stonebridge, where she lived out her remaining 13 years, she couldn’t walk through the hallways without numerous residents and staff members stopping her along the way with a warm greeting and a smile. One staff member commented that she’s “kind of like a legend around here.” Another said that Martha looked at her like an adopted daughter. What always stood out for those of us who knew and loved her were the warmth and kindness we could see shining through her eyes!

A Memorial Service will be held on Friday, June 16, 2023 at 2 p.m. at Stonebridge at Montgomery, 100 Hollinshead Spring Road, Skillman, NJ  08558.

Extend condolences and share memories at TheKimbleFuneralHome.com.