William T. Barry III ’50

Bill died Jan. 9, 2010, in Chapel Hill, N.C. He was one of our oldest classmates, born in 1923.

Bill graduated from George Washington High School in Alexandria, Va., and served in the Army as a second lieutenant before coming to Princeton. He majored in English, belonged to Dial, was news editor of The Daily Princetonian and “On the Campus” columnist for PAW, and was active in Whig-Clio, Orange Key, and the Intramural Athletic Association. He married during his senior year.  

He was called up by the Reserve during the Korean War. After five years with the Bureau of National Affairs in Washington, he moved into personnel, with jobs in North Carolina and New York, and then joined Avon Products, where he met his second wife, Audrey. He retired from human-resource management and counseling in 1988.

After relocating from a longtime residence in Westport, Conn., to Chapel Hill, he wrote that he had become a “compulsive gardener and landscaper.” Occasionally leaving his garden, he and Audrey traveled stateside and in Europe.

Bill considered himself a liberal Democrat and was a devoted Episcopalian. He always spoke fondly of his Princeton days.

Our sympathy goes to his wife; his three children from his first marriage, Patricia, William, and Caroline; and a grandson.