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A memorial service will be held at 2 p.m. Saturday, Feb. 10, in Colton Chapel for Sarkis Acopian ’51. Acopian, for whom Acopian Engineering Center is named, died Jan. 18 at his home in Easton. He was 80.
Funeral services will be held at noon Friday, Jan. 26, at St. Vartan Armenian Cathedral, 630 Second Ave., New York City. A graveside service is scheduled for 11:30 a.m. Saturday, Jan. 27, at Easton Cemetery.
Acopian is survived by his wife of 59 years, Bobbye; two sons, both of whom graduated from Lafayette, Greg Acopian ’70 and Jeff Acopian ’75; grandchildren and great grandchildren. Ezra Acopian ’03 is the son of Greg. Alex Karapetian ’04 is the nephew of Jeff.
Flowers may be sent to St. Vartan Armenian Cathedral or memorials made to an organization of choice.
The announcement that Sarkis and Bobbye Acopian would be the principal benefactors of a major renovation and modernization of Lafayette’s engineering complex was made in June 2001, during Sarkis’ 50th Reunion. Acopian Engineering Center, made up of the former Alumni Hall of Engineering, Dana Hall of Engineering, and Dana Engineering Laboratory, was dedicated in October 2003.
Born in Tabriz, Iran, to Armenian parents, Acopian grew up as a Christian Armenian in Iran, leaving that country in 1945 to study engineering at Lafayette. His education was interrupted when he was drafted into the U.S. Army. He met Bobbye while stationed at Lackland Air Force Base, San Antonio, Texas.
After being honorably discharged he returned to Lafayette, graduating in 1951 with a bachelor of science in mechanical engineering. During and after college, he worked for Weller Electric Corp. and designed a power sander which became one of the company’s main products.
Since early childhood, he dreamed of operating his own business. In 1957, he took out a loan from a local bank and began his journey. The same year he designed and manufactured the first solar radio. This led into the power supply business still operating today, Acopian Technical Company. From the early 1970s onward, Acopian piloted his own corporate-owned aircraft between the company’s manufacturing facilities in Easton and Melbourne, Fla.
A modest and civic-minded man, Acopian supported many local, national, and international causes. Named for him, in addition to Lafayette’s engineering complex, are the Acopian Center for Conservation Learning at Hawk Mountain Sanctuary; Kempton, Pa.; Acopian Center for Ornithology at Muhlenberg College, Allentown, Pa.; and Acopian Preserve for bog turtles at The Nature Conservancy, Lebanon, Pa.
The largest individual donor to the World War II Memorial in Washington, D.C., Acopian endowed environmental education programs at the American University of Armenia and Florida Institute of Technology; built St. Sarkis Armenian Apostolic Church, Charlotte, N.C., in memory of his mother, Arax Acopian; and made major contributions to other organizations.
In Easton he was a benefactor of the State Theatre Center for the Arts, National Canal Museum, and The Children’s Home of Easton, among other organizations.
Acopian was awarded the Ellis Island Medal of Honor by the National Ethnic Coalition of Organizations; the St. Gregory the Illuminator Medal by the Armenian Church, and an honorary doctor of science degree by Muhlenberg College.
In his later years he assembled a team of ornithologists in Armenia and the United States to work toward publishing a field guide on the birds of Armenia in hopes of introducing the former Soviet republic to the idea of environmental conservation. A Field Guide of Birds of Armenia was published in 1997. The first accurate map of the newly independent Republic of Armenia was also published as a result of the Birds of Armenia Project.