William M. Damerel ’59

Born in Detroit, Mich., Bill came to Princeton from the Kingswood School in West Hartford, Conn., preceded by his father, who was in the Class of 1928; his great-grandfather, who was in the Class of 1871; and three uncles. Enrolling in the electrical engineering department, he complemented his academic pursuits as an engineer at WPRB while also preparing for military service with Navy ROTC. In his sophomore year he joined Cloister Inn. Shortly thereafter he left Princeton to enlist in the Marines, serving as an air traffic controller and attaining the rank of sergeant.

Bill returned to academia at Auburn with a Marines scholarship, where he called on his WPRB experience to work part time as a disc jockey at a local radio station and earned a bachelor’s degree in 1964. While at Auburn he met and married Theresa Hodson, and following graduation he embarked on a 48-year career with IBM, starting as a systems engineer in computer systems design. By the early 1990s he was a senior planner for IBM, living in Rochester, Minn. Retiring in 2014, Bill could look back on significant contributions he made to the development of IBM computers.

Bill died April 26, 2019. He is survived by his wife, Theresa and his daughter, Nicola. We have sent condolences.