Maria Szczepkowski

Maria E. Szczepkowska (nee Kamieniecka), beloved mother and grandmother, aged 99, passed away July 15, 2024. Maria lived a long and varied life. She valued family and friendships, enjoyed social engagement and had a strong education and work ethic.

She was born in Lwow, Poland but was forced to finally flee with her family to Krakow near the end of the Second World War. At the end of the war, she continued her education earning two Master’s degrees in geography and geology. The first woman to earn such degrees from Jagiellonian University (oldest University in Poland established 1364) and continued further studies in engineering and geology at AGH University. She was always a strong proponent of education for all.

In her early career, Maria worked as a geologist for several years when she co-authored a book on the geology of Poland. She became an assistant director at Centralny Urzad Geologi (Central Administration for Geology) that oversaw all geological studies and testing in Poland. In this role, she appeared before the Polish Sejm (Polish congress) to testify about the geologic conditions in Warsaw when an initial metro system was being planned.

In 1961, Maria married the late Stanislaw Szczepkowski, an officer that served in the Polish Army and later in the British Army, leaving her career and moving to the United States to becoming a wife and mother. In 1971, when her husband became sick and needed to end his work career, Maria began her second career. She worked for over 20 years at Combustion Engineering in Windsor CT first in nuclear power systems and later with power generation boiler systems specializing in life extension and creep analysis.

Maria retired from work to care for her husband until his death and later moved to the Cincinnati area. She lived independently in Loveland and maintained an active social life. Later, when her health started to decline she moved closer to her son and then lived with his family until 2019. Finally, she became a resident at an assisted living facility where she was kindly cared for until her death.

Maria is survived by her two sons, Michael (Clara), Gregory (Agnieszka), her three grandchildren, Matthew, Anna and Michael as well as her sister Zofia. She was preceded in death by her parents, Franciszka and Michal Kamieniecki, her brothers, Zbigniew, Slawomir, Roman, as well as her sister Barbara.