Tracy Stebbins Voorhees 1890-1974

Tracy Voorhees was president of Long Island College Hospital from 1936 to 1944, and Under Secretary of the United States Army from 1949 to 1950. He also was Vice Chairman of the Rutgers University Board from 1949 to 1965. Several Rutgers landmarks are named after him, as well as a Park in New York City.

Voorhees was born in New Brunswick, New Jersey on June 30, 1890. He graduated from Rutgers University with a B.A. degree in 1911 and an M.A. degree in 1914. He received an LL.B. degree from Columbia Law School in 1915, was admitted to the New Jersey Bar in 1915 and the New York Bar in 1918.

Voorhees practiced law in New York in three different law firms between 1917 and 1942. In 1918 he served as assistant to the director, Bureau of Imports, War and Trade Board. During part of that time he also served as President of Long Island College Hospital from 1936 to 1944.

After the start of World War II Voorhees was commissioned Colonel in the United States Army and was posted to the Judge Advocate General’s Department and was detailed to the Surgeon General’s Office as Director of the Legal Division. He served in the European, China-Burma-India and Pacific theaters of operations.

In 1946 Voorhees became a Special Assistant to the Secretary of War Robert P. Patterson. Later as a civilian he was a special assistant to Secretaries of War Patterson and Kenneth C. Royall, and served as the War Department’s Food Administrator for Occupied Areas, from 1947 to 1948 and as Assistant Secretary of the Army from 1948 to 1949.

Voorhees served as Under Secretary of the Army from August 22, 1949 to April 24, 1950. From 1951 to 1953 he served as Chairman of the Committee on Present Danger, Department of Defense. From 1954 to 1961 he was Consultant to the Secretary of Defense. During that period he also was Chairman of the President’s Committee for Hungarian Refugee Relief from 1956 to 1957, and served as the President’s Personal Representative for Cuban Refugees, from 1960 to 1961.

Tracy Stebbins Voorhees passed away in Brooklyn, NY on September 25, 1974 at the age of 83. His papers are part of the special Collections and University Archives in the Alexander Library of Rutgers University Libraries in New Brunswick, NJ.

In 1974 following his death, the Board of Governors of Rutgers University renamed Rutgers’ Neilson Campus in New Brunswick the Voorhees Campus. It was later changed to the Voorhees Mall. Also the 5.25 acre Van Voorhees Park in Brooklyn, New York is named in honor of Tracy S. Voorhees and his family. He also was awarded the Army Distinguished Service Medal, the Department of Defense Award for Distinguished Public Service, and the Army Distinguished Civilian Service Award.