Son of Raymond A. and Alma C. (Billig) Vanderslice of Phoenixville, PA. He is survived by three daughters, Mary Rorke of Peterborough, Ontario, Nancy Vanderslice of Parsippany, NJ, and Janice Coppola (Vincent) of Pittsburgh, PA, and two grandsons, Pasquale Charles and Charles Raymond, as well as three step children, Bruce Adelberg (Barbara) of West Cornwall, CT, Paul (Diane) of Rancho Cucamonga Ca. and Dawn Kierzek (Joe) of Brooksville, FL, plus his two beloved cats, Treasure and Gem.
Ray was born in Phoenixville, PA the year of the stock market crash in 1929. He was the eldest of three brothers, predeceased by Richard in 1966 and Paul in 2015. He graduated from Phoenixville HS in 1947 and graduated with honors from Westchester State Teacher’s College in 1955. In 1959 he received his Master of Music followed by his DMA in church music in 1966 from Eastman School of Music.
While in Penfield, NY, Ray taught at the Cobbles Elementary School and loved to retell stories of his years there as music teacher. He was very proud of the impact he made on the music program at Cobbles School. After receiving his doctorate from Eastman, he moved his family to East Stroudsburg, PA where he taught at East Stroudsburg State College, eventually renamed East Stroudsburg University, until his retirement in 1995. After retirement, he taught in the Older Adult Learning Center in East Stroudsburg until 2005.
He served in the Marine Corps from 1951- 53 and was discharged from the Marine Corps Reserve in 1959 with the rank of sergeant. During his time in service he was a member of the Marine Corps Band, playing clarinet, piccolo, flute and alto saxophone (not at the same time!).
Ray was also active as a singer and soloist in many ensembles throughout his life, including the Shawnee Choir of Delaware Water Gap, PA, the Pocono Choral Society of East Stroudsburg, PA and The Water Gap Singers of Blairstown, NJ. He frequently soloed with these ensembles and sang a Bach Cantata in his daughter Nancy’s high school oboe recital in 1980 and a duet with Jerrold Fisher for his daughter, Mary’s, wedding in 1990.
He was married to Hilda Ruth Gutshall, a fellow musician, teacher and performer, in 1951 until her death in 1985.
He married Barbara Martin Adelberg, a colleague in the Pocono Choral Society, in 1988, residing in Johnsonburg, NJ until 2015, moving then to Heath Village in Hackettstown. Barbara passed away suddenly in the winter of 2018.
In his free time, Ray took correspondence courses in calculus and received his MBA in the 1980s and also learned to write DOS programs in the 1990s. He contributed to the creation and maintenance of the Pocono Choral Society’s website.
Ray was an avid reader of historical nonfiction being partial to science and American History.
He was also very dedicated to his churches as a lay reader, choir member and most recently was a member of the congregation at St. Peter’s Episcopal in Morristown, NJ.
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