Frederick S. Nelson ’51

Sandy was born March 26, 1926, the son of W. Ripley and Margaret (Seymour) Nelson.

A graduate of Choate, he served in the Merchant Marine for three years before coming to Princeton, where he was a history major and business manager of The Daily Princetonian and belonged to Colonial. On Sept. 13, 1952, he and Cornelia Gibson were married.

Sandy had a remarkable career in the nascent world of business automation. Initially, he worked for Hamilton Foundry and Machine Co. in Hamilton, Ohio, where he first worked with raw materials, work in progress, finished goods, and related inventory controls. In 1955 he joined American Cyanamid, where he eventually headed the team that developed and installed the first inventory data-processing system of its kind in the country. In 1964 he moved to Clairol as data-processing manager, and eight years later to the top electronic data-processing job at its parent company, Bristol-Myers.

A resident of New Canaan, Conn., for over 54 years, Sandy was active in United Way, the New Canaan library, the Field Club, and St. Mark’s Episcopal Church. Sandy died Feb. 27, 2011, and is survived by Cornelia; their sons, George (“Toby”) ’76 and James (“Jim”) ’80; two grandchildren; and a great-grandson.