Edward James Popkins

POPKINS, EDWARD JAMES, age 81, a career mortgage banker from Connecticut who retired to Winter Park in 1999, died June 11, 2006, of complications from Alzheimer's disease. Born on November 20, 1924, in Sayre, Pa., to Edward Franklin and Marie Christensen Popkins, he grew up the eldest of five children in Greenwich, Conn., graduating from high school there in 1943. He served in the Army Air Corps from 1943-46 in the Pacific Theater during World War II and in the U.S. Air Force from 1951-52 in California during the Korean War. He married Ann Miriam Reardon of Waterbury, Conn., on Sept. 8, 1951, in Greenwich. They had three children, whom they raised in Greenwich, Ridgefield and Hamden, Conn. He and his wife divorced in 1987. Popkins' 38 years in the mortgage business included stints with Lomas & Nettleton Co. of Stamford, Conn.; Fairfield County Trust Co. (later Union Trust Co.) of Stamford; NBI Mortgage Investment Corp. of New Haven, Conn.; and Westport (Conn.) Bank & Trust Co. He had a bachelor's degree in business from the University of Bridgeport, received in 1961. He was a life member of Lions Club International, having joined in 1962, and was a past president of the Stamford and the New Haven clubs as well as a Melvin Jones Fellow. He also was a nearly lifelong member of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.). Having moved to Central Florida to be near his grandchildren, he had been a resident of Winter Park Towers since 2001. He is survived by a daughter, Marcella M. Curry of South Dennis, Mass., and her husband, David W. Curry; another son, Edward J. "Ned" Popkins Jr. of Orlando, and his wife, Marianne McClain Popkins; grandsons, Taylor Edward Popkins, John Francis Popkins and Duncan McClain Popkins, all of Orlando; and two sisters, Marie Reynolds of Naugatuck, Conn., and Eleanor Keene of Duxbury, Mass. A memorial service will take place Aug. 5 in Knapp Funeral Home in Greenwich. In lieu of flowers, memorial donations may be sent to the Lion's Club of New Haven Charitable Trust, P.O. Box 8012, New Haven, Conn. 06530.