Irving Ligetidied peacefully at the Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center after a brief illness on Wednesday, March 4th, 2015. He was 94 years old. He was born, as he liked to say, in the shadow of the Williamsburg Bridge, in Brooklyn, New York. His parents, Arman and Ilona Ligeti were Hungarian immigrants and naturalized U.S. citizens.

Irving attended NYC public schools and graduated from James Monroe High School, in the Bronx. After graduating, he worked for Western Electric and attended New York University at night. When America entered World War II, he enlisted as an aviation cadet in the US Army Air Corps. He had an aptitude for mathematics and was trained in air navigation. Ultimately he became a high-altitude technician and survival instructor stationed in Monroe, Louisiana. Improbably, when the army gave him a day off, he hitchhiked to a nearby branch of Louisiana State University to take piano lessons. There he met a 19-year-old student, Gloria Faye Allison McLemore. Anyone who was even casually acquainted with him knew, and he often said, that this was the best thing that ever happened to him. They were happily married for nearly 70 years.

Among his accomplishments were a NYC Master Plumber's license and the founding of a successful construction business that was preeminent in its region. He was proud of the mechanical ability that seemed to come naturally to him, and he was diligent, practical and effective as a manager.
He had a passion for offshore fishing and navigated the waters south of Long Island flawlessly, long before GPS, with only a magnetic compass, carefully studied charts, and a lifetime of local knowledge. He made many spot-on landfalls in near-zero visibility and always brought his boat and his family safely through the treacherous currents and breaking inlets that guard Long Island's South Shore. Perhaps the high point of his career as a sport fisherman was landing a 9-foot sailfish in the waters off Acapulco, Mexico. His wife, tactful and demure, landed a 6-footer soon after.

He moved to Vermont in the 1960's, where he built and managed a successful ski lodge, The Pico Peak Motor Lodge, in Killington, Vermont. After several years he sold the business and retired to South Florida, where he and his wife pursued their love of deep sea fishing, and where he cared for his elderly mother. In the 1980's, he returned to New England and built the Higbea Motel (now a Days Inn) on Route 120 in Lebanon. After a few years of successful ownership and management, he sold the business and retired again.

Irving loved downhill skiing and continued to ski until he was 78 years old. He was unbeatable at chess, and neither human opponent nor computer program could lay a glove on him. Lacking a worthy opponent, he finally lost interest in the game"€"except to teach and amuse his children and grandchildren.

Aviation in any form fascinated him. He even took up hang gliding in his late fifties, when the sport was young and often dangerous.

Though the war interrupted his formal education, he was largely self-educated, with interests ranging from the mechanical to the metaphysical, and he remained studious throughout his life. He read the entire Old Testament in its original language and culled from it moral principles embedded in the narrative, which he believed transcended the ritual and myth that had been part of his religious training since boyhood. Later he read a shelf full of books on other world religions, and came to believe that many of the same moral principles were common to them all. He was an unpretentious man who disliked prejudice, unfairness in any form, and hierarchical, self-aggrandizing institutions. He lived simply, deliberately and entirely by his own lights. In addition to the openness of sea and sky, he loved the mountains and unspoiled forests of northern New England. He was kind and generous with his family and, when the occasion arose, with associates, employees, and with complete strangers. When young missionaries came to his door, he enjoyed sharing his insights with them, but remained unconverted.

He was a beloved husband, father, grandfather and great grandfather who touched and guided many lives. His passing is an incalculable loss to his family and friends, whose grief is mixed with celebration of a long life well lived.

He is survived by his wife, Gloria; son and daughter Robert Ligeti and Andrea Volinsky; daughter-in-law Wendy Ligeti; son-in-law Jim Volinsky; grandsons Jesse Zabski and Noah Ligeti; grandson-in-law Nat Merrell; granddaughters-in-law Sarah Volinsky and Leila Volinsky; great granddaughters Anya Zabski, Julia Zabski, and Avery Duval; and by his sister Dorothy Simon. In addition, he leaves a niece, Jody Vialy; and nephews, Richard Stoler, Paul Stoler, Dr. Daniel Stoler, Dr. Gary Simon, David Simon, Adam Russell and Scott Russell.

Arrangements are under the direction of the Rand-Wilson Funeral Home of Hanover, NH.