LI physicist Martin Kramer dies at 70

Martin Kramer, a Shoreham physicist who explored the fundamental building blocks of matter as a researcher at Brookhaven National Laboratory and taught for decades at City College of New York, has died.

Kramer had been in poor health since a stroke two years ago. He died Nov. 28 at age 70.

Friends and family remember him as a meticulous, diligent physicist who prized learning and lovingly insisted that his children do the same.

"If they came home with a low grade, it was unacceptable," said his wife, Carol Kramer, 68. "He valued education above almost anything else."

Kramer was born in upstate Ellenville in 1941. His father owned a bottled gas delivery business and his mother was a housewife, according to Carol Kramer.

After graduating as valedictorian at Ellenville High School, he attended Columbia University, where he went on to receive a doctorate in physics. He did postdoctoral work at the University of Chicago.

Carol Kramer met her husband while attending nursing school at The Mount Sinai Hospital in Manhattan. At a mixer for nursing and Columbia students, she was passing potato chips. "And I offered him one," she said. "He said, 'No, but I would like a dance.' "

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The couple married in 1963 while living in Manhattan and moved to Shoreham in 1971. Kramer would become deeply involved in the Shoreham Civic Organization and in bringing programs for gifted students to area schools, Carol Kramer said.

Physicist Leslie Camilleri and Kramer worked under Nobel Prize-winner Leon Lederman when pursuing doctorates at Columbia. Camilleri and Kramer became close friends as they attempted to determine the shape of protons.

"He was a very competent physicist" said Camilleri, 69, who lives in Westchester County. "He didn't jump to conclusions unless he had cross-checked everything."

Kramer's son Scott also went to Columbia and studied physics as an undergraduate. He now works in Chicago managing technology for a financial firm. Scott Kramer said his father stressed the value of education to him and his sister.

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"He pushed us to excel and I benefited from that," said Scott Kramer, 44. "To him an A was not acceptable if A+ was offered."

He said his father could seem distracted, especially when handling routine chores around the house, but that was because he was thinking about the riddles of physics.

"A lot of people considered him pretty quirky because his mind was on a different level," he said.

Other survivors include a daughter, Karen Thakral of Dix Hills; a brother, Ivan Kramer of Cleveland; and five grandchildren.

Contributions in his memory should be sent to Temple Beth Emeth of Mount Sinai, P.O. Box 409, Mount Sinai, NY 11766.