Samuel Wilson Marshall

Samuel W. Marshall III (Sam), 81, a resident of White Stone, VA, was born in Dallas to Samuel W. Marshall, Jr. and Frances McClellan Marshall on September 8, 1934 and died on August 7, 2016 in Richmond, VA.

Sam is succeeded by his devoted wife Virginia, his brother Bishop John Marshall of Dallas, Texas, daughters Anne Marshall and her husband Bruce Mobarry of Moscow, Idaho, and Frances Marshall and her husband David Prawdzik of Estes Park, Colorado, and son James Marshall of Berkeley, California. In addition, there are Frances’s four children Timothy Marshall (Kandice), Amy (Marshall) Crawford (Nate), Nathan Marshall, and Kevin Marshall.

Except for war years, he grew up in Dallas and followed in his grandfather’s and father’s footsteps to Virginia Military Institute, majoring in physics. His first job after graduating from VMI was rough-necking on an offshore drilling rig for what is now Exxon. On June 9, 1956, he married Virginia Cox Bruns of New Orleans, whom he had met while she was in Hollins College. Married one week, he entered the Air Force for pilot training. Following graduation, he was a flight instructor and aviation physiologist for two years. He then left active duty to resume working in Houston for Exxon. However, in 1960 they moved to New Orleans where he took MS and PhD physics degrees at Tulane University.

Subsequent to his formal education, in 1965 he joined the physics faculty at Colorado State University and began research on underwater acoustics. In 1970 he left to continue this work at Naval Research Laboratory, Washington, DC, with specialty in ocean ambient noise. In 1977 he moved into a division head job at the newly formed Naval Ocean Research and Development Activity in Bay St Louis, Mississippi. In 1983, he was offered an assignment as Science Advisor to the Naval Surface Force, Atlantic, and became director of that program two years later. In 1987, he left government to do similar research in private industry, first with Bolt, Beranek and Newman, and later at Lockheed Corporation, retiring in 1998 after commuting to Sunnyvale, California, for 8 years. For over 25 years, he did acoustic experiments in the world’s oceans. His last work for Lockheed involved system engineering in stealth technology. He was a member of the American Physical Society and a Fellow of the Acoustical Society of America where he published numerous technical papers and presented contributed and invited talks.

In addition to his vocational efforts, Sam played saxophone in the VMI band and led the Commanders dance band, and played varsity tennis in high school and VMI. He flew F-102s in the Louisiana Air National Guard and later had a private plane. He and Virginia raised their family and enjoyed many domiciles, most especially New Orleans with Virginia’s parents, the outdoors in Colorado, and sailing on the Rappahannock River and Chesapeake Bay. While in Alexandria, they discovered Lancaster County and built a cottage on Fleets Bay in 1975 where they enjoyed many weekends and summers and the people, ultimately retiring to their new home in White Stone in 1988. In retirement, Sam was an avid racer at the Rappahannock River and Fishing Bay Yacht Clubs. Socially, he enjoyed memberships in the VMI Alumni Association and the Society of the Cincinnati.

A memorial service will be held September 24, 2016, 11:00 am, at Grace Episcopal Church in Kilmarnock, VA, followed by burial in St. Francisville, LA, November 12, 2016.