Brantley Alexander Weathers III '45
Brantley Alexander Weathers III died on May 11, 2007, in Orlando, FL, at age eighty four, after several months of cardiac problems. Brant was one of my earliest and closest friends at Amherst. Fraternities in 1941 had a “Rush Week,” when freshman visited all of the fourteen fraternities. Brant was a good looking, tall young man to whom I was introduced in six different houses. At the end of the week, we joked about being “old friends.” Later, with Doug Milne, the three of us became roommates at Psi U.
Brant was an Amherst “legacy” in almost a dozen ways. His father (BAW Jr.) was in the Class of 1911, and his uncle, Paul D. Weathers ’16, was treasurer of the College and a member of the board of trustees. Eliot Brooks Weathers, a cousin, was in the Class of 1944. Numerous other cousins were in various earlier classes.
Brant came to Amherst from New Trier High School and Deerfield Academy. In 1943, he enlisted in the Navy’s V-5 Program and became a naval aviator in late 1945, when the war was over. Like a lot of us, he returned to Amherst in the summer of 1946, graduating in 1947.
Brant’s first job was in a training class with International Nickel when I was in a similar training program with Merrill Lynch, Pierce, Fenner and Beane in New York. We lived in Brooklyn Heights with four other trainees until Brant accepted an invitation from a family-run citrus packing company in 1949 to move to Orlando. While there, Brant met a lovely young lady named Martha McCord (Rollins College, ’47) and began a fifty-six year family life enriched by three tall sons, none of whom went to Amherst.
The family business was taken over by much larger Inland Container Corporation in 1959. Brant continued to work in the citrus packaging industry until he joined the Ferren Engineering Group in 1975 and retired in the mid-1980s. He much enjoyed woodworking as a hobby. I should mention that in the Amherst summer session of 1946, Brant almost single handedly constructed a wood paneled bar and recreation room in the Psi U. house basement.
Next to his family, Brant loved sailing. At age seventy-nine, he bought a new small sailboat to use on a local lake. For twenty-five years, we were lucky enough to have Brant and Martha visit us at our Vermont house immediately following Amherst reunions. He was a true friend and will be missed by all who admired his appreciation of humor and his integrity in all seasons.
—George L. Shinn ’45