William B. Carlin *56

William Carlin, music composer as well as a former administrator and board member of noted public-nature organizations, died May 11, 2014. He was 86.

After serving in the Army from 1946 to 1947, Carlin studied at University of California, Berkeley with the composer Roger Sessions, receiving a bachelor’s degree in music in 1952. He earned an MFA degree in music from Princeton in 1956.

Carlin was the director of the Third Street Music School in New York City, the nation’s oldest community school for the arts. He became director of development for the Nature Conservancy and later also for the World Wildlife Fund before retiring to his summer cottage in Niantic, Conn., and returning to writing music.

He was instrumental in turning his family’s farm into the Weir Farm National Historic Site in 1990, preserving the legacy of his grandfather, American Impressionist painter Julian Alden Weir. Carlin was a board member of the New York Botanical Garden, the Weir Farm Trust, and the Point Reyes National Seashore Association. He also served on the advisory boards of the Trust for Public Land and the National Maritime Museum.

Carlin is survived by his wife, Elizabeth; two children; a granddaughter; and a great-grandson.

Graduate memorials are prepared by the APGA.