DR. ROBERT ENGISCH M.D.

DR. ROBERT ENGISCH, MD WILLISTON - Dr. Robert Engisch, of Williston, passed away peacefully on July 3, 2011, at the age of 81. Dr. Bob, as he was known to friends and family, was a father and a grandfather, who practiced medicine as a board certified neurologist at the Fletcher Allen Hospital in Burlington, the Kerbs Memorial Hospital in St. Albans, at his office in Plattsburgh, N.Y. and at the home office located on his farm in Williston. Dr. Engisch was born and raised in Elizabeth, N.J. He spent his high school years at The Pingry School in Elizabeth, N.J., and went on to graduate from Union College in Schenectady, N.Y. in 1951, after studying abroad on a fellowship at the University of St. Andrews in Scotland. Dr. Engisch won the prestigious Royal Blue as a student at St. Andrews. He earned his medical degree in 1954 from Cornell University Medical College and served as a captain in the United States Army. During his residency at the Columbia Presbyterian Hospital in New York City, Bob met and fell in love with an aspiring young artist who was a student at Columbia's School of Painting and Sculpture, Joan Lloyd. Joan and Bob were married in 1952, and eventually purchased their farm in Williston in 1964. It was their dream to live in a place as lovely as Vermont. Joan passed away in 1985. He loved skiing with his family at Smugglers Notch, and playing soccer, tennis and squash. He traveled extensively, and loved hiking in the mountains and working in the woods, both in Vermont and near his residence in La Punt, Switzerland. Home was filled with the sound of jazz and classical music and the laughter that stemmed from listening to comedy from the BBC. In 1990, Dr. Engisch married his childhood friend from Elizabeth, Mary-Grace Collinge of Millersburg, OH. She survives him. Dr. Engisch is survived by six children: his daughters, Cindy Lisner of Gers, France, Glynis Sutter of Scottsdale, Ariz. and Hilary Engisch-Klein of Stowe and his sons, Geoffrey of Mesa, Ariz., Peter of Williston and Christopher Winter of Winooski; and seven grandchildren, Lola, Evan, Ula, Teagan, Gaelyn, Joanna and Nora. A memorial service will be held for Dr. Engisch at the First Unitarian Universalist Society Church at the top of Church Street in Burlington, 152 Pearl Street, at 7 p.m. on July 20, 2011. In lieu of flowers, the Engisch family requests that you kindly donate to the Sierra Club Foundation to help their noble work to protect our planet and preserve the sanctity of its natural beauty, which Dr. Engisch dearly loved.