Paul William Stephanz died on Thursday, December 24, 2009, after a year-long battle with cancer.

A Mass of Christian Burial was celebrated at Our Lady of Grace Catholic Church at 11 am on Monday, December 28, with Msgr. Anthony Marcaccio officiating. Burial followed at Forest Lawn Cemetery.

Paul was born on December 14, 1926, in Norfolk, VA, where his parents, Clara Hennig Stephanz and Mathias Paul Stephanz, a career Naval man, were stationed at the Norfolk Air Station.

In 1944 Paul graduated from Robert E. Lee High School in Jacksonville, FL, and accepted a football scholarship at Duke University.

His freshman year, Paul played for Duke in the Sugar Bowl, blocking a crucial field goal to help the Blue Devils defeat Alabama 29-26 before 73,000 fans on January 1, 1945.

A few months later, Paul enlisted in the United States Army and served two years in the South Pacific before receiving an Honorable Discharge.

He then returned to Duke and played three more years of football. On October 7, 1947, Paul was named the first Athlete of the Week by Smith Barrier of the Greensboro News and Record.

Paul graduated from Duke in 1950 and went to work for the Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond. After two years there, he joined Wachovia Bank and Trust in Winston-Salem, for which he worked the remaining 37 years of his career. Wachovia moved Paul to Burlington in 1954 and promoted him to head of that office in 1959.

While working, Paul earned a graduate degree from the Rutgers University Graduate School of Banking in 1958 and completed the Executive Program at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill as a member of the eight Executive Group in April, 1961. In 1959, Paul was named Young Man of the Year by the Burlington Junior Chamber of Commerce and was named one of three Outstanding Young Men of the Year in North Carolina by the United States Chamber of Commerce.

In October 1968, Paul was transferred to Greensboro as executive vice president of that office in Wachovia. Five years later, Wachovia decided to regionalize the state into six parts and Paul was named Northern Region Executive. After a long and successful career, Paul retired in June, 1988.

Paul was preceded in death by his parents; his son, Bill; and two sisters, Marguerite Wescott and Virginia Stephanz.

Paul is survived by his wife of 60 years, Bess Williams Stephanz; his daughter, Paula Dennis (Paul) of Greensboro and their daughters, Abby and Kelly; his daughter, Beth Wentz (Skip) of Raleigh and their children, Bess and Drew; his daughter, Lynn Harrington (David) of Durham and their children, Bess and Ben; and his son, Mark of New York, NY, and his children, Hannah, Liza, and Grant and their mother, Rita McCloy Stephanz, of Larchmont, NY; his brother, Edward Stephanz of Chesapeake, VA; and his sister, Clarice McCarthy of Louisville, Kentucky.