HOWARD LOOMIS PAGE
Howard Loomis Page passed away on Sunday, July 19, 2015 at Galloway Ridge. He was born in Norwich, NY on September 8, 1931 to Howard Lloyd Page and Doris Madeline Loomis. He grew up on the family dairy farm in New Berlin, NY with his two younger brothers, David and Raymond. He attended Syracuse University, where he met his future wife, Carol Wharton, while playing bridge at a fraternity-sorority mixer, beginning a relationship and bridge habit that would continue for nearly sixty years. They were married in 1955 in Washington, DC, Carol’s hometown.
After college, Howard attended Officer Candidate School and was commissioned a Second Lieutenant in the Marine Corps. He and Carol started their life together in Cherry Point, NC, where Howard was on active duty at the Marine Corps Air Station. After leaving the Marine Corps as a First Lieutenant, he returned to Syracuse for a graduate degree in mathematics. Howard began a long career with IBM in Endicott, NY in 1961. In 1979, thanks in part to Carol’s suggestion that it would be good to return to the South where it was warmer, he moved to Charlotte, NC, to work at IBM’s new labs. During the course of his IBM career, Howard developed software for many of IBM’s important products, including the IBM 360 system, computerized bank check processing, automated teller machines, and phone voice-response systems.
Howard was a devoted fan of Carolina Tarheel basketball and Dean Smith, and it was established practice that family trips needed to be planned in order not to miss viewing any games. In 2011, he and Carol moved to the Galloway Ridge retirement community near Chapel Hill.
Howard is survived by his wife Carol Wharton Page; his brothers David Page and Raymond Page; his sons Stephen Jeffrey Page of Syracuse, NY, David Scott Page of Austin, TX, and Philip Howard Page, of Chapel Hill, NC; as well as his three grandchildren, Lloyd Wharton, Lionel Howard and Linette Carol Page of Austin, TX.
The Page family will receive visitors at Walker’s Funeral Home (120 W. Franklin St., Chapel Hill) from 6PM to 8PM on Friday, July 24. In lieu of flowers, donations can be made to the Fisher Center for Alzheimer’s Research Foundation (http://www.alzinfo.org/).