Paul H. Voreacos

Retired Westinghouse business manager was known for love of education, devotion to his church

Paul Howard Voreacos, a former business manager at Westinghouse Electric Corp. who had a passion for education, died of congestive heart failure June 5 at Blakehurst Senior Living Community in Towson. He was 89.

Mr. Voreacos helped lead Notre Dame of Maryland University’s Renaissance Institute, a program offering classes to older adults, and was a former president of the Blakehurst Residents Scholarship Foundation. He also long served as an elder and treasurer at Brown Memorial Woodbrook Presbyterian Church on North Charles Street.

“He was a very committed man,” said the Rev. Randall Clayton, co-pastor of Govans Presbyterian Church, which merged with Woodbrook Presbyterian last year. “He was very well respected and well liked.”

Mr. Voreacos grew up in Hammond, Ind., the son of Paul Voreacos, a house painter and construction tradesman, and Vivian Voreacos, an educator. His father traveled the world as a Greek merchant sailor before immigrating to Chicago from a town in what is now Turkey. It was his mother who instilled in him high standards for learning, said his son, David Voreacos, of Teaneck, N.J.

Bill Vobach, a childhood friend who lives in Denver, called Mr. Voreacos “an achiever” who was an Indiana state champion debater and a star center on the football team at George Rogers Clark High School.

“Paul was a very friendly and easy-toknow person,” Vobach said. “He was of a charismatic nature. He was a good leader.”

Mr. Voreacos studied business at Harvard College, earning bachelor’s and master’s degrees. It was there that he met his future wife, Sally Cahill, at a dance in his dormitory. Paul and Sally Voreacos married in December 1951 in New Haven, Conn., where she was studying at Yale Divinity School.

They soon moved back to Mr. Voreacos’ hometown, where he started his career as a manager at Inland Steel Co. After three years, they moved to Baltimore, where Mr. Voreacos began a 36-year career as a manager in the defense electronics division at Westinghouse. While working there, he earned a law degree at the University of Maryland.

At Westinghouse, he oversaw production of radar and communications systems used in Air Force planes and weapons systems like the Mark 48 submarine-launched torpedo.

A longtime Stoneleigh resident, Mr. Voreacos was known as a passionate Baltimore Colts fan, woodworker and gardener. He built a coffee table and other furniture for his home, and grew large crops of tomatoes and other vegetables each summer, David Voreacos said. He kept careful records of his produce, counting and weighing it each season.

“He was quite meticulous,” David Voreacos said.

Mr. Voreacos and his wife spent years studying at the Renaissance Institute, and given his passion for its mission and his business and leadership skills, he for a time came to lead the organization’s board.

“He was quite a good organizer and manager,” his son said.

He was a member of Brown Memorial Woodbrook for more than 50 years, serving as a ruling elder on the church’s session, the lay leadership council.

Mr. Clayton called him a “tireless supporter” of the congregation who always took care to ensure its fiscal stability. That included helping to make the decision to merge the congregation with that of Govans Presbyterian — the two churches became one last December.

“He was always very concerned that our budget balanced, and if it didn’t, that we had a plan for where we would go,” Mr. Clayton said.

Sally Voreacos died in 2005. Mr. Voreacos moved to Blakehurst in 2007.

A private memorial service is planned for Saturday.

In addition to his son, Mr. Voreacos is survived by a daughter, Susie Ellicott, of Springfield, Va.; a sister, Eugenia Roelofs of Battle Creek, Mich.; and three grandchildren. Mr. Voreacos met his future wife, Sally Cahill, at a dance at his Harvard dormitory.