Another eminent and fascinating great-grandson of the Captain is George Richard Kirkman, an outstanding New York City civil engineer and talented artist.

The second of three children of World War I combat veteran George Moore Still Kirkman and Vicentia Gertrude Foti Kirkman, George was born Aug. 14, 1933 in Valhalla, Westchester County NY, raised in nearby Larchmont, and graduated from Mamaroneck High School.

A hard driving workaholic, George is one of five family members who attained college degrees in the mid 20^th century. He became a civil engineer by studying at five educational institutions: Westchester Community College, Manhattan College, New York University, New Jersey Institute of Technology and St. Peter’s College in Jersey City. He also won credits from the American Society of Civil Engineers.

George began his career in 1955 as an inspector, surveyor and office engineer for Briggs, Blitman and Posner, designers of the New York State Thruway, then joined Mt. Vernon Contracting, an interstate highway contractor. In 1964, he became a project supervisor, estimator, project engineer and job superintendent for Raymond International, Inc., the world’s leading foundation contractor, and worked on construction projects in New York, Indiana and Illinois and Massachusetts.

He joined the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey in 1969 where he was an office engineer, field inspector, designer and assistant resident engineer at Newark International Airport, the Holland and Lincoln Tunnels, George Washington Bridge, Manhattan’s World Trade Center and Midtown Manhattan’s Bus Terminal.

George retired from the Port Authority after 25 years to pursue his other love: painting — an avocation he began at age 11 and burnished into a second profession. He has painted approximately 70 exquisite outdoor scenes and still lifes, including some that won New Jersey art shows in 1975 and ‘76 and sell for $200 to $6,000. A number of his works soon will be reproduced as salable prints.

In late 1998, George resumed his engineering career by becoming a Quality Assurance Engineer for a massive upgrading of New York City’s John F. Kennedy International Airport. Working for Bechtel, Inc., he is monitoring the strength, quality and durability of more than 500 construction projects that will modernize JFK’s runways, taxi ramps and terminal building. It’s one of the Big Apple’s top priority public works improvement.

The charming and loquacious George resides in Morganville, NJ, 40 miles south of Manhattan. His marriage to Elizabeth Mary Swanby of the Bronx ended in divorce, and he has two children: a daughter Lauren, born in 1971, and a son, George Moore Kirkman, born in 1972.

World War I doughboy George M.S. Kirkman also had two daughters, Mary Gertrude and Annette, both born in Valhalla, NY and raised in nearby Larchmont, Westchester County.

Annette Kirkman Joyce, born Nov. 18, 1937, is a very pretty, convivial lady who married a boy who lived across the street and resided in New Rochelle, NY for more than 40 years. In an odd coincidence, Annette married ex-Marine Joseph Richard Joyce in Larchmont on the same day (June 16, 1956) that her cousin Don married Natalie in Youngstown, Ohio. So two Kirkmans married 500 miles apart on the same day.

Annette has two children, Mrs. Joanne Elizabeth Caliendo, and Joseph Richard Joyce, Jr, and a granddaughter. Her machinist husband Richard, unfortunately died Dec. 22, 1998 after a long bout with lung cancer. Annette is carrying on as a school bus supervisor for the New Rochelle school system.

Her sister, Mary Gertude Kirkman Shaw, born April 19, 1931, had eight children, but died at age 50 of a medication overdose.