John died Oct. 14, 2007, at home in Forest Hills, N.Y.
At the time of our 25th reunion, John wrote with well-deserved pride of his arduous professional journey from completion of a Ph.D. program in clinical psychology at Adelphi University to his own private practice in Manhattan. Other good happenings in John’s life during the first 25 post-Princeton years include marriage in 1960 to Helen Gerken (also a clinical psychologist); the birth of their daughter, Donna, in 1964; the purchase of their much-beloved summer home in Amagansett, N.Y., in 1970; and the move six years later into their Tudor-style townhouse in Forest Hills Gardens, N.Y.
Before the end of the decade following our 25th, John faced the very demanding challenge of Parkinson’s disease. For the next 18 years John fought this affliction with the same determination that he showed on the basketball court at Franklin High School in New York City, on Princeton’s freshman and JV basketball teams, and on a very competitive Campus Club interclub team senior year. In later years John would go to the neighborhood park to shoot baskets, employing the two-handed set shot — his specialty many years before the 3-pointer came into being.
The class extends condolences to Helen, Donna, and John’s two grandsons on the passing of a very scrappy b-ball guy.