In Memoriam

William Stirlen

William N. Stirlen died on June 19, 2013 in Pacific Grove, California, from cancer.

Bill matriculated at Yale with the Class of 1961, withdrew for two years, and then returned and graduated as a member of our Class.  

After graduating from Yale, Bill received an MBA from Northwestern, and served as CFO of four publicly traded companies, beginning in Rochester, New York and ending in the San Francisco Bay area. 

Bill stayed in close touch with his roommates, Dick Hopper and Mike Green. 

Bill is survived by his wife, Shu-Tin, sons, Chris and Bryce, and several grandchildren.

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Mike Green remembers Bill as follows:

 “Bill was Iowa through and through, born in Muscatine and growing up in Barrington.  He was a star athlete at Barrington High School in football, baseball, and track and was also an accomplished piano player.  

I always accused him of having a multitude of personality defects because he was the son of a mortician and enjoyed working in his father’s mortuary.  However, Bill was warm, engaging, fun, and smart, except when he took the field to play for the Calhoun and Ezra Stiles football teams.  He loved the physical contact and I remember that in a number of games he would emerge with a broken nose spread across his face and not even realize it.  It was that toughness that I believe made him so successful in life.  He fought his cancer with the same warrior spirit he exhibited on Yale’s playing fields.”  

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