George H. Ingram Jr., a retired Temple University public relations man, author, and freelance writer, died October 17, 2021. He was 81 and lived in Ocean City, NJ.
Mr. Ingram’s career at Temple spanned more than three decades, and involved working closely with three university presidents-Paul R. Anderson, Marvin Wachman, and Peter J. Liacouras, in that order. He started at Temple in 1969 as an assistant to James. M. Shea, the Vice President for University Relations. When he retired in 2001, Mr. Ingram was Associate Vice President for University Relations.
At various times during in his tenure he was responsible for the institution’s news bureau, publications office, Health Sciences Center public relations, advertising, drafting the president’s annual report and the University’s annual budget presentation to the House and Senate Appropriations Committees in Harrisburg, and radio station WRTI-FM.
Like many public relations practitioners, Mr. Ingram came to the field via journalism. A 1958 graduate of the 210th class of Central High School in Philadelphia, and a 1962 Temple graduate, he started as a reporter for The Press of Atlantic City before working as a reporter for The Times of Trenton, and then for The Philadelphia Inquirer.
As a freelancer he published many articles on food, travel, hunting, and fishing for such publications as The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Inquirer, Pennsylvania Game News, Jersey Man Magazine, New Jersey Federated Sportsman News, and The Fisherman magazine.
In 1997, Temple University Press published “Fishing the Delaware Valley,” a book written by Mr. Ingram and two Temple fishing buddies, the late English professor Robert F. Marler, Jr., and Robert R. Smith, then-dean of the School of Communications and Theater. He co-authored a second book, “Jersey Lawman: Life on the Right Side of Crime,” with former U.S. Marshal and Cape May Sheriff James T. Plousis, in 2019.
A former trustee of the historic Ocean City Fishing Club, he chaired its 100th anniversary celebration in 2013 and served the club as its publicity chairman for 17 years.
Mr. Ingram is survived by his partner of more than 40 years, M. Patricia Staub, of Ocean City; a daughter from a previous marriage, Pamela Walsh, of Cherry Hill, NJ; granddaughter Rachael Walsh, of Cherry Hill; grandson George H. Ingram IV, of Lake Havasu City, AZ; and three sisters. Mary Stroup (George), of Atco, NJ; Marsha Reilley (Michael), of Tabernacle, NJ; and Marguerite Mufalli (John), of Mays Landing, NJ. His son, George H. Ingram III, died of cancer at the age of 49 in 2018.
Mr. Ingram believed funeral services to be a waste of time and requested that none be arranged. Donations may be made in his memory to Temple University’s Office of Institutional Advancement, 100 Sullivan Hall, 1330 Polett Walk, Philadelphia, PA 19122 or The US Marshal’s Survivors Benefit Fund, PO Box 11730, Bozeman, MT 59719.
For condolences to the family visit www.godfreyfuneralhome.com.