Obituary: Winthrop Seeley Pike, Former Township Mayor

Winthrop Seeley Pike, former mayor of Princeton Township and long-time resident of Princeton and Montgomery Townships, died July 6 at Brandywine Senior Living at Princeton. He was 92.

He was born on February 9, 1920 and died on July 7, 2012. 

Born in Boston and raised in Wellesley,Mass., he was the son of the late Lewis Freeman Pike and Vida Seeley Pike, and brother of the late Vida P. Morrison.

He graduated from Williams College in 1941 with a B.A. in physics.

Immediately following graduation, he entered the U.S. Army, serving as a radar officer in the Signal Corps during World War II in both the European and Pacific theaters. In 1946, he was honorably discharged at the rank of captain.

He then moved to Princeton and joined the technical staff of RCA Laboratories, David Sarnoff Research Center. There, he worked closely with Vladimir K. Zworykin on the early development of color television. Among many other projects, he also developed sensory devices for the sight-impaired, highway vehicle control devices, color television receivers, storage tubes, weather balloon sensory instruments, portable television cameras and encoders, integrated circuits for stereo sound, and high altitude balloon-born television systems. He earned seventeen U.S. patents and was the recipient of five RCA Achievement Awards. Following his retirement from RCA in 1987, he consulted with Princeton Scientific Enterprises, Inc. in the development of a blood gas analyzer device and high voltage ignition circuitry for military ordnance.

On a visit home to Wellesley, he met his future wife, Nancy E. Peakes at church. They were married in 1954.

He was elected to the Princeton Regional School Board in 1967, and served for 14 years, including several years as President. In 1981, he was elected to the Princeton Township Committee, and as a member of the Committee, was elected to the position of Mayor the following five years.

A long-time member of Trinity Episcopal Church in Rocky Hill, he served as a member of the vestry for nineteen years. He had also served as a lay reader, usher and member of the vestry of All Saints Episcopal Church in Princeton.

He started playing the organ in his teens, and was an avid musician, favoring, in particular, early classical music. A model train enthusiast and voracious reader, he relished family vacations in the Adirondack Mountains and seeing the great pipe organs of Europe. During retirement, he also enjoyed monthly meetings with his fellow retired RCA employees and the weekly Tuesday Lunch Group. He also authored several articles for consumer electronics and model railroading magazines.

He is survived by his wife of 57 years, Nancy, and their children: Kristina Hadinger and her husband Alfred, Chrisopher and his wife Lelia Shahbender, Karen, Jonathan and his wife Kelly, Eric and his partner Stefan Steil, and Amy Sharpless and her husband Peter. He is also survived by nine grandchildren: Jon, Alfred, Julia, Alexandra, Katherine, Justin, Morgan, Sophia and Serena.

The funeral will be held 10 a.m. Wednesday, July 11, 2012 at Trinity Episcopal Church, Crescent Ave., Rocky Hill.

Burial will be in All Saints Cemetery Princeton.

Calling hours will be held Tuesday, July 10 2012 from 7 to 9 p.m. at The Mather-Hodge Funeral Home, 40 Vandeventer Ave, Princeton.

In lieu of flowers, memorial contributions in his name may be made to the Trinity Episcopal Church Rocky Hill Memorial Fund, P.O. Box 265, Rocky Hill, NJ 08553; The Mary Jacobs Memorial Library, 64 Washington Street, Rocky Hill, NJ 08553; or Montgomery EMS, P.O. Box 105, Belle Mead, NJ 08502.