Leslie Seigle, 93, former professor, dies

Leslie Seigle, 93, proved that good things can come to those who wait by gaining his high school diploma at age 89 - after already having gained a bachelor's, master's and doctorate in science.

Seigle, who retired from the Stony Brook University at 70, died Aug. 31 at his home in Stony Brook.

He had been a 22-year professor of material science at the university.

With his parents, Seigle emigrated from Dumbarton, Scotland, in 1920 and grew up in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn.

The man who would later serve a governor and president was a 17-year-old senior at Brooklyn Technical High School when his father died. He quit high school and got a job as a page boy at the now defunct Hanover Bank in Manhattan.

While there, his family said, he went to Cooper Union with a friend who was taking a college-entrance exam. When an exam was placed in front of him, he took it, passed it and entered college as well. He graduated in 1941 with a degree in chemistry.

While in school and for a couple of years after, said his wife of 60 years, Mary, he worked at a nickel processing company as a lab technician.

He earned his master's degree at the University of Pennsylvania in 1948 and his doctorate at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1952.

"The funny thing is that he never went after the degrees," Mary Seigle said.

After MIT, Seigle went to the atomic energy division of Sylvania Electric Laboratories and became manager of metallurgy research from 1956 to 1965. During that same time he was an adjunct professor at New York University. In 1957, he was part of the NYU-Moscow Steel Institute exchange, studying metals.

In 1961, President John F. Kennedy appointed Seigle to his Materials Advisory Board, which he chaired for two years. "In that position he traveled all over and advised the president's science people," Mary said. "His expertise was in high temperature alloys."

He also developed an expertise in the developmentally disabled because one of his children was mentally challenged.

He was a founding member of Opengate, a residential treatment center in Westchester County for mentally challenged young adults. He served on the board for more than 40 years.

In 1984, Gov. Mario Cuomo appointed Seigle to the board of visitors of the now defunct Central Islip Psychiatric Center, where he served more than 10 years.

"He was a renaissance man, an accomplished violinist, amateur gymnast and faculty adviser to Stony Brook's gymnastic club for years and a long-distance cyclist," Mary Seigle said.

Other survivors include sons William and Jonathan of Stony Brook; a daughter, Roxanne Avery of North Babylon, three grandchildren and four great-grandchildren.

Remains were cremated. A memorial service will be held Oct. 2 at 2 p.m. at the Setauket Presbyterian Church. The ashes will be buried in its yard.