Varney Stuart WARD Jr.

1925 - 2017

WARD, Jr., Varney Stuart Varney Stuart Ward, Jr, born May 6th, 1925, in Roanoke, VA, passed away Wednesday, December 27th, 2017 in Chapel Hill, NC. In 1928 he moved with his family to the Brookwood Hills neighborhood in Atlanta, Georgia. He attended E. Rivers Elementary School and Middlesex Preparatory School in Concord, MA. Graduating Middlesex during WWII, he enlisted in the Marines and was assigned to the Navy V12 Officers' Training Program through which he attended Emory, GA Tech and Yale before entering active duty at the close of the war. In 1946, he completed his education with a degree in History from Yale. He moved to New York where he met and married Marian Irene Kissock Ward (b. 1926 d. 2013) of Barnett, Hertfordshire, England, in 1951. He continued to serve in the USMC taking the Wards to bases in Oklahoma and North Carolina until they finally settled in Atlanta. He remained in the Reserves attaining the rank of Lieutenant Colonel before retiring from USMC. He was employed in the banking industry and then focused his life's work in real estate including work in re-development/Urban Renewal, development and appraisal/analytics. His work with Cushman Corporation in Atlanta as the Director of Planning for the Colony Square development was exemplary of his keen interest in the competitive growth of Atlanta, and the study of place and purpose in urbanization. As dedicated as he was to his professional career, he would say his crowning achievement was his and Marian's 5 children (and their dogs!). He was fiercely loyal to them and his extended family providing support at all personal costs. He took great pride in his genealogical research of both sides of his family tree. He grew up as a member of St. Luke's Episcopal Church and was a founding member of St. Anne's Episcopal Church. He was a lifetime member of The Piedmont Driving Club and held membership in The Appraisal Institute. After raising their family in Atlanta, they retired to Chapel Hill, NC in 1991. There he pursued his original love of poetry and geography through Duke University's adult learning program. He was preceded in death by his beloved wife of 62 years, Marian; his parents, Varney Stuart Ward, Sr and Virginia Michael Ward; sister, Olive Jane Ward Girardeau and brother, James Stuart Ward. He is survived by his brother, Rev. Edwin Michael Ward; children: Catherine Ward (Peter Kernan), James Ward, Ballard Ward (Libby), Elizabeth Pickens (Robert), and Erica Speed (Stewart); grandchildren, Rainer Kernan Ellison (Chad), Amelia Kernan, Bo Ward (Whitney), Anna Ward, William Ward, Beth Ward, Ward Pickens (Becca), James Pickens, Isabelle Speed and Warner Speed; great-grandson, Alder Ellison. A memorial service will be held on January 19th, 2018, 11:00am at St. Luke's Episcopal Church in Atlanta, GA. In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to Middlesex School: https://www.mxschool.edu/make-a-gift in memory of V. Stuart Ward, Jr.