Lee F. Mercier ’67

Lee died Aug. 7, 2024, in Jacksonville, Fla., after a three-year battle with Parkinson’s and cardiovascular disease.

He graduated from Hamilton High School East in Hamilton Township, N.J. He was president of the student council and lieutenant governor of the New Jersey District of Key Club. He played soccer, baseball, and participated in school theater productions.

At Princeton, Lee majored in English and graduated magna cum laude. He was a member of Tiger Inn and roomed at 312 Walker Hall with George Wilgus and the late Lee Knauerhaze and Jim Clegg. Lee was president of Chapel deacons and chairman of the class memorial fund drive and the New Jersey Schools Committee. He was a member of Orange Key and Triangle.

Lee joined the Peace Corps after graduation, serving in Ghana, West Africa, for two years. He then attended the University of Virginia Law School for a year, got drafted, and went to OCS. He served in the Navy for three years as a lieutenant junior grade on the USS Stribling based in Jacksonville, Fla. After deployments to the Mediterranean and the Persian Gulf, Lee went back to complete his law degree at the University of Virginia. Returning to Jacksonville, he began a 43-year legal career concentrating in wills, trusts, estates, and special-needs trusts.

As in college, Lee was prodigious in volunteer service, including 20 years as chairman of the Northeast Florida Princeton Alumni Schools Committee. He served on the boards of Pine Castle Inc., an organization for disabled persons; the Children’s Home Society of Jacksonville; the Episcopal Cathedral Foundation; All Saints Episcopal Church; and the Jacksonville Marine Institute. He was an active Rotarian for 43 years and a volunteer soccer coach for 15 years.

Lee is survived by his wife of 53 years, Roberta “Bobbie,” whom he met at a mixer at Tiger Inn in February 1967.