A LONGTIME FORCE IN SOUTH JERSEY, WILLIAM G. ROHRER DIES AT AGE 79

Author: Christopher Hepp, Inquirer Staff Writer

William G. Rohrer, 79, whose successes as a politician, banker and businessman made him a legend in his South Jersey home of Haddon Township, died yesterday at his home.

As a politician, he dominated South Jersey Republican politics for half a century, serving as Haddon Township's mayor for 36 years while also exerting his influence at the county and statewide levels.

As a businessman, he took over his father's car dealership in the 1930s and made it one of the nation's largest.

As a banker, he launched First Peoples Bank of New Jersey, using his marketing and investment skills to make it one of South Jersey's most successful financial institutions.

As philanthropist and humanitarian, he founded a scholarship fund, raised money for the Catholic Diocese of Camden and the Shrine Hospitals for Crippled Children, headed Red Cross Blood drives for many years, and served on the boards of numerous charitable groups.

"Mayor Rohrer is, was and always will be Haddon Township," said George Geist, Camden County Republican chairman. "Haddon Township derived its quality and reputation from his qualities and his leadership. His death represents a loss to the entire community.

"He was, in capital letters, a leader," said Geist.

Born in Williamsport, Pa., in 1909, Mr. Rohrer worked first at his father's grocery store before selling cars at his father's car dealership in Pottsville, Pa., in the late 1920s. In 1929, anticipating a boom in South Jersey's economy, his father moved the dealership, the Rohrer Chevrolet Agency, to Camden.

Mr. Rohrer served first as parts manager for the agency and then service manager before becoming owner in 1935 after his father's death.

Barton Harrison, who worked for 14 years with Mr. Rohrer as senior vice president of First Peoples Bank, said that when Mr. Rohrer took control of the car agency, there had been some concern among General Motors' executives about the 26-year-old's business skills.

"In his youth he had been more of a playboy than a businessman," Harrison recalled. "When his father died and he took over the business, a lot of people said he couldn't do it."

But Mr. Rohrer threw himself into the business, turning it into one of the nation's largest Chevrolet dealerships by 1947.

That year, he became active in politics, running unopposed for the Haddon Township Committee. In 1951, he sponsored a successful referendum question that converted Haddon Township's government to a three-member commission. That year, he also was elected to the newly formed commission and then was selected the township's first mayor. He would serve as mayor until 1987, when he was defeated by current Mayor Bill Park.

"He was always as a very community-minded, dedicated public official," Park said yesterday. "He always seemed to have Haddon Township first in his heart. He certainly will be missed."

While mayor, Rohrer played a significant role in South Jersey Republican politics.

"He was a major-league player," Geist said. "His success in the public and private sector established Mayor Rohrer as the top of the totem pole. Although he never served in higher political office, he certainly had the capability."

As his political career began taking off, Mr. Rohrer also decided to branch out in his professional life. In 1955, he purchased a small South Jersey bank having $2.9 million in deposits and renamed it First Peoples Bank. His goal was to turn it into one of South Jersey's most successful. He succeeded.

Within 15 years, his bank could boast more than $100 million in deposits. By the early 1980s, it became South Jersey's first billion-dollar bank, according to Harrison.

"He was a very astute businessman and could size up very rapidly any proposal that was presented to him," Harrison recalled.

Vernon W. Hill, president and chairman of Commerce Bank, worked for Mr. Rohrer for a time as a lending officer.

"He was a very important person in the growth of the South Jersey business area, and it's sort of a passing of an era with his dying," Hill said yesterday. As a banker, Hill recalled, Mr. Rohrer "supported the local business community and was responsible to a large measure for the dynamic growth that South Jersey has experienced."

A rotund man given to cigars and rumpled suits, Mr. Rohrer cut a memorable figure. At his bank, he could be found seated at a desk littered with stacks of confused paperwork.

"Yes, his desk was piled high with papers and correspondence," Harrison said. "But if he had to select something, he knew exactly where to find it. ''. . . He was a very soft-hearted man, with an exterior that would never suggest it. He found it very difficult to say 'no' to a person in need."

That side of him was evident his involvement in numerous charities, including the Camden County Heart Association, Camden County Association of Workers for the Blind, the American Red Cross, the United Fund and the Salvation Army.

For all his successes, however, Mr. Rohrer's life was not trouble-free. In his later years, he suffered significant business, political and personal setbacks.

His first marriage, in 1942 to Floretta Tulk, with whom he had four daughters, ended in divorce. In 1982, his second wife, Mimi, was charged with having killed the couple's adopted son, William G. Rohrer 3d, in 1975. Charges against her were dropped in 1984 after her trial ended with a hung jury. He later divorced her.

The year of his wife's arrest, Mr. Rohrer's bank suffered $18.7 million in operating losses. When the losses were made public in 1983, Mr. Rohrer was removed as First Peoples chairman.

Also in 1983, Mr. Rohrer saw signs that his political popularity was waning, as he barely won re-election, by 500 votes. In 1987, his active political career ended with his defeat by Park.

In recent years, Mr. Rohrer had been in ill health.

He is survived by his former wife, Floretta; four daughters, Wilma Abrams, Linda Rohrer, Carol Moss and Eileen Rohrer; five grandchildren, and two sisters.

There will be a viewing from 3 to 10 p.m. Monday and 9 to 11 a.m. Tuesday at Haddonfield United Methodist Church on Warwick Road, Haddonfield. Services will be at 11 a.m. at the church. Interment will be at Locustwood Memorial Park in Cherry Hill.