Richard La Meter Van Barre ’42

Dick, an advertising executive until an extraordinary career change, died June 29, 2004, at home in Cherry Valley, N.Y.

President of the National Honor Society at Uniontown [Pa.] High School, at Princeton he earned honors in English, won prizes in language and literature and, in his sophomore year, won the hand of high-school sweetheart, Vera Montagna. Thus began — with the dean's permission — a blissful marriage of 62 years. Vera died in 2002.

After serving in the Army during World War II, Dick engaged in advertising and rose to executive vice president at Hazard Advertising in New York. In 1970 he left the business, became a master cabinetmaker, and eventually found his calling in mentoring disturbed children and teaching them woodworking. To prepare his program for kids ages 6-14, Dick, at age 65, earned a master's degree in special education at Southern Connecticut College. He taught at the Green Chimneys School, a social-services agency in Brewster, N.Y.

Dick left these encouraging words for aspiring mentors and teachers: "I never cease to be astonished at the capacity of children to survive unspeakable abuses and in many cases even recover the capacity to love."

To Dick and Vera's children, Charles, Frances and Catherine, the class extends its deepest condolences.

The Class of 1942