Submitted by: Dan Rich

South Bend Tribune 4/10/1996

PAUL IZDEPSKI, 80, WORKER ON MANHATTAN PROJECT, DIES

SOUTH BEND - Services for Paul R. Izdepski, 80, who had a scientific role in the development of the atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki during World War II, will be at 10 a.m. Friday in St. Matthew Cathedral.

There will be no processional from the funeral home. Burial will be in St. Joseph Cemetery. Friends may call from 4 to 8 p.m. Thursday in Kaniewski Funeral Home, 3545 N. Bendix Drive. Memorial contributions may be made to Logapedics or Hospice of St. Joseph County Inc.

Mr. Izdepski, of Southeast Drive, who died of natural causes at 11 a.m. Monday in his home, was drafted in 1945 while a chemist at Studebaker Corp. and was chosen to work at a plant at Oak Ridge, Tenn.

He was one of 2,500 scientists and chemists who worked on what would become the Manhattan Project during World War II.

Mr. Izdepski retired in 1988 as a chief chemist from AM General Corp. He was born June 29, 1915, in New Carlisle. On July 4, 1941, in South Bend, he married Marifrances Couch. She died May 5, 1980. In 1982, in South Bend, he married Ruth French Cole. She died in 1994. He is survived by two daughters, Marti Gilmore and Trichia Izdepski, both of South Bend; three sons, Mikel Ladd of Portland, Maine, David Ladd of Holland, Mich., and Richard Izdepski of Fort Wayne; a stepdaughter, Beverly Brooks of Mount Pilot, N.C.; a stepson, David B. Cole of Tennessee; five grandchildren; two step-grandchildren; two great-grandchildren; a sister, Marguerite Sherry of San Diego; and a brother, Stanley of Conrath, Wis. He was a member of Society for the Preservation and Encouragement of Barbershop Quartet Singing in America, Knights of Columbus Santa Maria Council 553, St. Vincent DePaul Society, and the church choir and was an Army veteran of World War II.