Warren Libensperger
September 23, 1940 - January 10, 2026
Some Recollections
I don’t recall actually meeting Warren, but it would have been in the early 1990’s when Patti Quinby was the marsh project manager for D&R Greenway Land Trust. It was she who developed marsh-related programs. Jim Amon, who was Director of the D&R Canal Commission and a member of Greenway’s Board of Trustees, came to know that there was property for sale at what we now call Bordentown Bluffs. The acreage was slated to be developed into 425 houses. There were some folks in Bordentown who were in total favor of this. Jim knew of the archaeological significance of the land. Greenway hired Patti to spearhead a marsh preservation project. She loved the marsh and was knowledgeable about things that should be done to make protection happen….she met the right people and organized programs to educate people. For the programs, she needed volunteers. Warren, retired after many years at General Motors, got involved.
Warren helped with many marsh activities. He was involved in the first Marsh cleanup that removed ~ 13 tons of trash. The marsh was a place where local companies dumped stuff. That practice was stopped. Many tires were removed during another trash pick up from the D&R Canal on Duck Island. In addition, Warren knew all the culverts carrying roadway trash that emptied into the marsh. Trash pickups often focused on those places.
Warren was also available for helping lead field trips – he helped the Mohawk Canoe Club and NJ Sierra Club with trips on the water, including several Delaware River Sojourns that visited the marsh. He knew the tides, directions and about the marshlands. These trips were very important. There were many canoes allowing many people to see the area from the water while they heard about the natural and archaeological history of the Abbott Marshlands from experts. He also helped with land-based field trips, planned by the Marsh Friends, as well as other groups.
First some eclectic volunteers’ memories:
1. We had a pot luck at Divine Word Missionaries (Point Breeze)… Warren made the best baked beans I ever had , and I am not a fan of baked beans. Somewhere I have the recipe.
2. Warren and Clyde Quin made next boxes for wood ducks – some they installed along Watson’s Creek. There was one labeled for Patti Quinby, positioned where she would see it from a canoe.
3. He and Clyde regularly picked up trash in the Spring Lake area. It’s now mostly tidy and Rain Gardens have been planted near the Spring Lake parking lot. More recently, Warren and Jack Graham built a bridge over a tidal channel at Northern Community Park to replace a make-shift one. The new bridge provides access to the flood plain and Crosswicks Creek. For this bridge, they carried several large cement blocks that anchored the ends of the bridge. (The old bridge had washed away). They carried the blocks from the parking lot, across the edge of the playing fields, down the bluff, and to the bridge position on the flood plain. That bridge was not going anywhere!!! And hasn’t!!
4. I worked on a research project that involved documenting the seeds/species present in the soil of the newly created wetland on Duck Island, which was built to replace wetland lost during construction of the highways through the marsh. Warren helped me move the heavily laden cart. (The cart was collapse-able and fit into my car trunk). It was a mile from one end of the mitigates site to the other and I had soil collection places near both ends and along the way. A total of four sites.
5. Warren helped guide field and paddling trips. He showed kids how to fish. He helped when-ever and wherever he could. He contributed to development of the two marsh management plans (1999, 2010) .
6. He knew the winter ducks! And generously gave D&R Greenway two decoys carved by his brother, Turk..
7. There are several lovely display cases in the nature center that Warren secured from the curbs near his house in Hamilton because he knew the nature center could use them.
Two additional notes. I don’t recall the dates. Warren would have known them.
I had been looking around in the north edge of the march below Bowhill Mansion, near Sturgeon Pond, for an orchid. Spiranthes is one of few extant orchids species, and I’d only found it there. On the orchid search I found someones belongings, but left them alone. Warren and Clyde, who were always exploring, later also discovered those belongings and found the owner; they called him ‘Homeless Joe’. Joe subsequently lived there a number of years. One time in winter I was nearby, walking there from Spring Lake. Warren and Clyde asked if I’d like to meet Homeless Joe. I said yes and we walked across the frozen marsh surface to Joe’s tarp. Warren and Clyde knew how to walk there. Joe, of course, was not expecting visitors. He scurried around, tidying up. I had never met a homeless person before. Joe had a tarp, no sleeping bag, and lived in a layer of newspapers. Clyde and Warren befriended him and would bring him water in the hot days of summer and food and coffee in the winter. A few years ago during a very cold winter period, Warren wondered how Homeless Joe was faring. He went calling with Charlie Fisher: Clyde, by then, had passed away. Warren told me that Joe was not in good shape. He went back the next day to see how Joe was doing and discovered that he had died. The police came and all Warren could tell them was that the dead man’s name was Joe, he’d been in the marsh for a long time, AND he’d been in the military. The police took Joe’s fingerprints. And from those and Joe’s military record, he was identified, and subsequently given a military burial at a base in NJ. Warren attended.
This doesn’t begin to tell Warren’s story nor convey his legacy to this area we call “The Marsh’. I am honored to have known Warren Libensperger. He was a keen and observant naturalist. He was a patient teacher and a good friend. He loved “The Marsh’.
For additional insights, see comments from his Volunteer Award:
https://abbottmarshlands.org/2020-mary-allessio-leck-award-for-vulunteer-service/
Mary Allessio Leck
Emeritus Professor of Biology, Rider University:
18 January 2026
