Rash's Surname Index
Notes for Thomas Brinton DARLINGTON
Berry grower, pine guardian
By Sally A. Downey
Inquirer Staff Writer
Thomas Brinton Darlington, 84, formerly of New Lisbon, an engineer with a doctorate in clinical psychology and a "practical" environmentalist who operated his family's cranberry and blueberry business in the Pinelands for 55 years, died of heart failure Aug. 22.
Dr. Darlington was driving home to Medford Leas, a retirement community in Medford, when he became ill. He and his wife of 10 months, Virginia Jones Darlington, had been in Cape Cod to go whale-watching and meet two new great-grandsons.
Dr. Darlington grew up in Lansdowne and spent weekends and summers wading through cranberry bogs and picking blueberries at Whitesbog, the family farm in Pemberton Township. His great-grandfather James Fenwick began cultivating cranberries in the 1850s. Grandfather Joseph J. White expanded the business and established J.J. White Inc., which became the largest grower of cranberries in New Jersey. In the early 1900s, the farm extended its growing season after Dr. Darlington's aunt Elizabeth White pioneered the cultivation of blueberries in the state.
By his teens, Dr. Darlington was bossing crews of blueberry pickers, but he had other plans for his future, his daughter Katharine said.
He graduated from the William Penn Charter School and earned a bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering from Swarthmore College. During World War II, he served in the Navy and taught physics to officer candidates at Princeton University.
After his discharge, he designed jet engines for Westinghouse while his brother, Joseph, ran J.J. White. In 1948, his brother died, and two years later Dr. Darlington was persuaded to lead the company. He used his engineering expertise to improve the rustic bogs and designed harvesting machines that bear his name.
For more than 20 years, Dr. Darlington served on the board of Ocean Spray Cranberries Inc., a marketing cooperative owned by almost 1,000 growers. In the 1960s, he was involved in Ocean Spray's transition from primarily fruit and sauce to a major juice brand. He was also on the board of the Tru-Blu-Berries Cooperative Association. In 1995, he retired from J.J. White, now run by his son Joseph.
In 1977, Gov. Brendan T. Byrne named Dr. Darlington to the new Pinelands Planning Commission, which was charged with creating a management plan for the ecologically fragile area.
"He called himself a practical environmentalist," his daughter said. He reveled in walks in the woods and could identify numerous songbirds by their call, she said, and he believed that agriculture could coexist with nature.
Dr. Darlington, who served on the Pinelands Commission for 20 years, would come home from meetings exhausted, his daughter said. On the one extreme were preservationists who wanted to put a fence around the more than million acres of forests and wetlands. On the other were developers who hoped to build a jet port in the Pinelands. He felt he was defending the middle ground when both factions were angry with him, his daughter said.
Dr. Darlington served on several boards, including for Moorestown Friends School, the New Jersey Audubon Society, and the Whitesbog Preservation Trust.
Always pursuing knowledge, he earned a master's degree and a doctorate in clinical psychology in the 1960s from the University of Pennsylvania.
Dr. Darlington survived several life-threatening experiences. He built, flew and crashed ultralight planes; nearly died in a bicycle accident at 61 but was back to work in six months; recovered from a stroke and heart-bypass surgery; and walked away from an accident that totaled his car as he returned from the annual bird count in Cape May.
In addition to his wife, son and daughter, he is survived by another son, Mark; another daughter, Anne; six grandchildren; and three great-grandchildren. His wife of 56 years, Martha Burton Darlington, died in 2004.
A memorial service will be held at 2 p.m. Saturday at Medford Leas, 1 Medford Leas Way.
Memorial donations may be made to the Whitesbog Preservation Trust, 120-34 W. Whitesbog Rd., Browns Mills, N.J. 08015.
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