Chemical Engineer

Nicholas Salvatore Capasso, a retired chemical engineer and volunteer, died of cancer Saturday at Harford Memorial Hospital in Havre de Grace. He was 82. The longtime Bel Air resident began working at Edgewood Arsenal in 1962, where he supervised the development and disposal of chemical and biological munitions. He retired in 1981. After retiring, he was a consultant to Foster-Miller Inc., a Waltham, Mass., engineering firm, and ITT Research Institute in Chicago. Mr. Capasso was born in New York City and raised in Brooklyn, N.Y., where he graduated from Manual Training High School.

Jack Reston Stuetz, a retired chemical engineer who helped create Kiwi liquid shoe polish formula, died Saturday of kidney failure at Lorien Riverside Nursing and Rehabilitation Center in Belcamp. He was 87 and lived in Edgewood for many years. Born and raised in Philadelphia, where he graduated from Germantown High School, Mr. Stuetz earned a degree in chemical engineering from the University of Pennsylvania in 1939. Moving to Relay in Baltimore County to become director of plant education at the Calvert Distillery division of Joseph E. Seagram & Sons, he helped train its 900 employees and learned to operate equipment to make the Calvert Reserve and Lord Calvert brands of blended whiskey and gin. He ran distilling operations in Louisville, Ky., and in Bristol, Pa., leaving in 1954 to become plant manager of Kiwi Shoe Polish, an Australian firm that expanded to Britain and the United States and was enlarging a Pottstown, Pa., division.

Maclyn McCarty Jr., a retired chemical engineer who was a liberal voice in the House of Delegates three decades ago, died of an aneurysm Friday at Johns Hopkins Hospital. He was 66 and had lived in Charles Village for more than 40 years. A two-term delegate elected to the House in 1966 and 1970, Mr. McCarty broke political ground as a founder of the city's New Democratic Club as a way of giving voice to his opposition to the Vietnam War. "Mac was one of the earliest of the peace advocates in the 1960s," said J. Joseph Clarke, a real estate developer and former club officer.

Ida V. Garrettson, 92, store saleswoman Ida V. Garrettson, a retired department store saleswoman and a volunteer, died Saturday of lung cancer at the home of her daughter in Westminster. She was 92 and lived in Randallstown. Ida Virginia Baxter was born in Baltimore. Her parents died when she was 13, and she went to live with friends of her family. She dropped out of Patterson High School at 17 to go to work. In 1935, Mrs. Garrettson started working at the Hecht Co. department store, then known as the Hub, in downtown Baltimore.

George Andy Xenakis, 76, chemical engineer George Andy Xenakis, a chemical engineer with the Army's Aberdeen Proving Ground for 27 years, died Thursday of heart failure. He was 76. A native of West Virginia, Mr. Xenakis had lived in the Baltimore area since 1959. Mr. Xenakis earned a bachelor's degree in chemical engineering from Tri-State University in Angola, Ind., in 1946. But he returned to his hometown of Weston, W.Va., to help run his family's restaurant business -- including a bar called The Manhattan and the Commodore restaurant -- for 11 years before pursuing an engineering career.

Preston L. Veltman, a retired chemical engineer and inventor who helped develop the atomic bomb during World War II, died Tuesday of Alzheimer's disease at Chesapeake Future Care in Arnold. He was 87 and lived in Severna Park. Mr. Veltman, who was director of research and development for W. R. Grace & Co. for 32 years before retiring in 1977, was a plant engineer for Texaco Oil Co. in Port Arthur, Texas, when he was tapped to join the Manhattan Project in 1942. The top-secret project, based in Los Alamos, N.M., led to the development of the atomic bombs that were dropped on Japan in 1945.

Edward Barron Leech Sr., 75, owned market stallEdward Barron Leech Sr., a retired owner of a Cross Street Market stall, died Sunday of cancer at Charlestown Retirement Community. He was 75 and had lived in Catonsville.Until he sold his business in 1978, he operated a wholesale meat business in Southwest Baltimore and had a veal, lamb and beef stall at Cross Street Market."He worked decades in the old, pre-yuppie Cross Street Market and had a bevy of stories about all the market rats [hangers-on]

William Palmer Kees, 74, engineer, designer of roadsWilliam Palmer Kees, a civil engineer who helped design roads in Maryland, Africa and Thailand, died Friday of complications of diabetes at home in Hagerstown. He was 74.The Baltimore native graduated from Polytechnic Institute and the Johns Hopkins University's McCoy College with a degree in civil engineering. He served in the Army Air Corps in Guam during World War II.Working as a surveyor for the Baltimore engineering firm of Kooken & Co., Mr. Kees helped to redesign the seating area at Memorial Stadium during the 1950s.

Dana D. Davis, 86, chemical engineerDana D. Davis, a retired chemical engineer, died this month from complications after surgery at Harbor Hospital Center. The Linthicum resident was 86.A native of Gallipolis, Ohio, Mr. Davis graduated from Ohio State University in 1938 and moved to Maryland that year as a chemical engineer for U.S. Chemical Co., which later became the FMC Corp. He retired in 1976. He volunteered for Meals On Wheels and enjoyed gardening, stamp collecting, classical music, and hunting and fishing.

As the United Nations struggles with Iraq over chemical and biological weapons, the U.S. Army -- in a little-noticed event -- is poised to demolish one of the most prominent symbols of its chemical warfare history: Building E5625 at Aberdeen Proving Ground.For almost a half-century, in strictly enforced secrecy, scientists at the "Pilot Plant" produced and experimented on an array of lethal compounds.They worked with mustard agent, a carcinogen that blisters the skin, eyes and lungs, and with an LSD-like substance that causes hallucinations and disorientation.