Anthony Duke died April 30, 2014, in Gainesville, Fla. He was the founder of Boys and Girls Harbor, an educational and social-service agency that has helped tens of thousands of New York’s disadvantaged children. He was a member of the family that founded the American Tobacco Co., and his mother was a member of the Drexel family that presided over a Philadelphia banking empire and founded Drexel University.
In 1935, while at St. Paul’s School, he worked as a counselor at a camp for underprivileged boys. At summer’s end, he drove two campers home to Harlem and saw the miserable conditions they lived in. In 1937, he started his own camp, but it fell dormant in 1939 when he left Princeton to enlist in the Navy. He first worked as a naval attaché in Buenos Aires, but during World War II he was commander of a landing ship, serving at the Normandy invasion and in the Pacific, earning three battle stars and a Bronze Star.
In 1954, he established the camp organization’s year-round counseling and tutoring program. Tony’s first three marriages ended in divorce, and he was separated from his fourth wife, Maria de Lourdes Alcebo.
He is survived by his sons, Anthony D. Jr., Nicholas R., John O., Douglas D., Washington A., and James B.; four daughters, Cordelia Duke Jung, Josephine Duke Brown, December Duke McSherry, and Lulita Duke Reed; 22 grandchildren; and 10 great-grandchildren.