John Henry Cuntz, 1866-1928

Publication Year: 1929.

JOHN HENRY CUNTZ

1866— 1928

John Henry Cuntz, a member of the Club since 1914, went over the range in May, 1928, in his sixty-second year. He was born in Hoboken, New Jersey, and was a graduate of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and of Stevens Institute of Technology.

At an early age he became interested in the electrical industry, and was for a year in the laboratories of Thomas A. Edison, and later joined the Coast and Geodetic Survey in New York Harbor. He was an officer in the Navy in the Spanish-American War. He spent twelve years or more in researches in wireless, in inventions of electric cables for high-speed transmission and in endeavoring to interest the large electric cable companies in his inventions. It was slow work, but finally he met with success.

In the World War he served in the Signal Corps and trained hundreds of men. He was interested in the Boy Scout movement, and in his church at Hoboken, where he served as an officer for many years.

He went with the Parker-Browne Mt. McKinley Expedition of 1910 as its scientific member. He made numerous ascents of the mountains in the western United States and Canada. He was a member of the Alpine Club of Canada and had been for two years the chairman of its New York Section. He was a devoted member of the American Alpine Club and served faithfully on its committees. He gave a strong impetus to the founding of the Yale Mountaineering Club.

In his death the Club loses a loyal member and a man of charming and lovable nature.

B. F. S.

[Word has just been received of the death of Val A. Fynn, an active member of the Club, which occurred at St. Louis, on March 21, 1929, after a brief illness.]