George Robert Welti, 91

George Robert Welti of Leesburg, Virginia, passed away on January 9, 2015 following complications from hip surgery. He was born in 1923 in Bern, Switzerland. George was named after St. George, the Patron Saint of Boy Scouts, and Sir Robert Baden Powell, the British founder of boy scouting. George came to the United States in 1935. He entered Principia Upper School in St. Louis, Missouri, where he played the trumpet in a swing band, sang in the chapel choir and captained the swim team, graduating in 1940. He attended M.I.T., earning a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering in 1943.

Following graduation, he joined the Army and trained in the antiaircraft artillery. His unit was sent to France, Belgium and Germany during World War II. After the war, he returned to M.I.T. earning M.S. degrees in both Mechanical and Electrical Engineering.

George’s first full­time job was at the Sperry Gyroscope Company in New York. At that time, part of the Sperry plant was being temporarily occupied by the newly created United Nations while the U.N. headquarters were under construction in Manhattan. In the shared cafeteria, George met his future wife, Corry Marie Groenhart, a U.N. translator from Dordrecht, the Netherlands. They were happily married for 39 years until her death in 1988.

During the 1950s, George worked for the M.I.T. Division of Industrial Cooperation and then Raytheon. In 1966 he relocated from Newton, Massachusetts to Leesburg, Virginia with his family, now including six children, to work at the Developmental Engineering Corporation (DECO) headquarters. Later he worked for the engineering divisions of COMSAT and Stanford Telecommunications. As a consultant for NASA, George earned 10 patents in the field of space communications.

George enjoyed rowing on the Potomac River, but found it awkward having to look over his shoulder to see where he was headed, so he constructed a forward­rowing shell by replacing the oarlocks with a pair of rails that held the oar and stroked it backwards. After retiring at age 78, George joined the New Dominion Chorale, played tennis with the Fairfax Racquet Club, and became an active member of the Potomac Ski Club. He and his companion, Sally Jane Finan, traveled extensively.

In 2010, George moved into the Ashby Ponds Retirement Community, where he swam seven days a week, and enjoyed solving math and logic problems; playing chess and scrabble with his family, friends, and caregivers; and watching sports, especially his beloved Red Sox.

In addition to his wife, George was preceded in death by his sister Grace Hedrick, his sister Milti Hoadley and her husband, Dave, who was George’s good friend from Principia; and Sally Finan, his companion of 16 years. He leaves behind to cherish his memory six children ­­ Jennifer Welti, Jacqueline Carlton (Mel), Susan Goode (David), Theodore Welti (Kathleen), John Welti (Phyllis), and Alexander Welti; 14 grandchildren; 12 great­grandchildren; his brother­in­law, Mike Hedrick; and several nieces and nephews.

George will be laid to rest in Union Cemetery, Leesburg, Virginia.

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