Bob Bell

First I want to acknowledge the fact that I was very lucky to have landed accidentally in Rose Tree Union School District when I was in the middle of eighth grade. I had come from some very poor schools in Maryland and had never attended any single school for longer than two years. The result was that  I was woefully behind in nearly every subject except math. However, some very dedicated teachers got me up to speed in less than a year and made it possible for me to benefit from the four years I was so lucky to have at Penncrest. Many kudos go to those teachers. Also thanks go to my friends and classmates who tolerated my many defects and made those four years very special.

After Penncrest I worked my way through college in six years. I was able to work nights and weekends in the clinical pathology lab at Presbyterian Hospital – Philadelphia. With that job and occasional gigs, playing sax and clarinet at dances, frat parties and such, I was able to graduate from Rutgers in 1966 with a B.A. in chemistry. After a brief stint in grad school at Penn, I went to work in the chemical industry where I spent the next 35 years. Thirty-two of those years were with Rohm and Haas Company. I lived in New York, New Jersey,  the Philippines, and finally in Texas. Most of my career was in support of R&H’s foreign subsidiaries, so I travelled more than I care to remember. I retired in 2001.

Along the way during this breathless half-century, I married Janet Stout, a Plymouth Whitemarsh grad. We had a son, who lives in Austin, TX, and a daughter, who lives in northern California. Janet and I eventually divorced. In 2006 I was lucky enough to meet Suze Stiegler, a sweet, feisty, native Texan who now lights up my life. She is a retired stock broker. We were married in 2008. Suze has a daughter in Austin, TX, who recently presented Suze with a beautiful grandson. We are convinced that he is the best-looking and smartest child who has ever been born. Suze is still getting used to being married to a Yankee, and I think she is beginning to warm to that fact. Still, she frequently asks me if I needed a passport to move to Texas, as she was sure that Texas had secured its borders. She also reminds me that I am the one who talks funny. We live near our wonderful in-town lake where I keep a small daysailer and make good use of the bike paths. When I’m not in a sailboat or on a bike, I can probably be found in a concert hall or in one of the art museums in Dallas or Fort Worth. Life is very, very good!