People F19
by Cynthia Marone
Jerry Lepping has seen the world, many times in a one-of-a-kind way. He has golfed in Scotland, where today’s modern game was created, and at Augusta, home of the Masters Tournament. He highly recommends sipping a Singapore sling at Raffles Hotel Singapore, where the cocktail was invented. He has even been invited to stay at a luxury hotel a stone’s throw from Kensington Palace.
As the owner of Atrium Travel, Jerry was in Europe for an international travel conference. The timing was perfect for the little London detour. Jerry, whose background had already included being a Marine, football referee and restaurateur, would soon add witness to history to the list.
“It was the week Princess Diana died,” he said of the trip that coincided with the English royal’s car crash on Aug. 31, 1997. “You could hear a pin drop. There was total respect for her. There were thousands of people and all you saw were flowers, but all you heard were the dump trucks coming to remove the flowers.”
Jerry not only saw the funeral procession from his hotel but also the flood of mourners that would eventually leave more than a million bouquets for the late princess. It was an unexpected vantage point to an unforeseen moment in history.
Jerry has had many unique perspectives throughout his life and career. He chalks up much of what he has experienced to timing, but also having the ability to see an opportunity when it crops up and to have the courage to act when it does. “Nobody can say I didn’t have guts,” he said. “I’ve been fortunate, but nobody in their right mind would plan the career I’ve had. It was interesting — I tell you that.”
For a man who admittedly hates hats, Jerry sure has worn many of them by way of his occupations. On June 30, he tossed one of them on the coat rack a final time when he retired as president/COO of the Visit Bucks County (VBC) tourism promotion agency. “It was time,” Jerry, who will turn 80 in November, said. “At my age, I should grow up and do something.”
Under his leadership since 2007, Jerry has much to be proud of when it comes to VBC, including its Visitor Center in Bensalem and its Tourism Grant Program, which has given millions of dollars to county organizations.
“Small groups really can use the grants, especially those that struggle,” he said. “Our Visitor Center is like a walk-in brochure. Our gift shop has items straight from Bucks. If you buy a Bucks T-shirt, it’s advertising. They will see Bucks.”
People definitely see Bucks County and many times because of VBC, whether due to a grant that helped a nonprofit like Quakertown Alive! print its brochures or through the visitors that amble along the wine, ale or ice cream trails. Jerry became head of the organization that keeps that visibility in the stratosphere after serving on the VBC board from 1998 to 2007, which included two terms as board president. “They asked me about taking the job. It was a paid position. I said paid is better than not paid,” he said with a dash of dry humor. “I was there for 12 years.”
Goodbyes do not seem to faze Jerry. He has said so long to many businesses, from his two restaurants to his travel agency, but the VBC departure is more of a see-you-later. He is serving as an advisor through November. Paul Bencivengo took over as president/COO July 1. “It’s a transition,” Jerry said. “I have a lot in my head for good or bad.”
Change is something Jerry knows about. His fearlessness, he said, began to take shape when he was sworn in as a Marine moments after his 1957 graduation from Father Judge High School in Philadelphia. He served three years in active duty as Military Police and three years in the Reserves. He also taught hand-to-hand combat and judo. “I was not a great student and not sure what I wanted to do. The Marines looked like a good alternative, and I thought I fit their philosophy best,” he said.
After the Marines, in addition to night classes at La Salle College, now a university, he took a job with PECO at his mother’s urging. He would leave the gas and electric utility company as a commercial representative 15 years later.
“My mom said, ‘Get to work.’ I said, ‘Can I unpack first?’ I got hired as a junior account clerk. I made $48 a week. A friend said to try refereeing. It paid $7 a game. I could do a few on Saturday, some on Sunday,” he said.
The bid to pad his paycheck launched a decades long side gig as a line judge for more than 200 football games, including several years with Division I of the Eastern College Athletic Conference. Aside from PECO, it may be his only foray outside of the industry that made up the bulk of his career.
“It has been all hospitality,” Jerry, who has lived in Bucks County for 51 years, said. “I think I had a good feel for what people liked, doing things that people wanted to know about. I’m doing what interests me, so it might interest other people. With all my experiences, I can strike up a conversation with anybody. It might be a dumb conversation, but I’m there.”
He was also all over Bucks County. Jerry was the opening general manager at The Face-Off Circle in Warminster while his Newtown Inn restaurant, now the Clubhouse Bar and Grill, was preparing for its opening. He sold that in 1980 but retained his second eatery, the Old Anchor Inn in Wrightstown, until 1984. Soon after, he opened Atrium in Newtown when his travel agent mentioned she was closing up shop.
“With restaurants, I was never hungry,” he said in his distinctive wry way, “but you worked when everyone was off. I had changed from having no idea to doing other things. It was my Marine Corps training. I was not afraid to do things and never afraid to work.”
Atrium was a such a smash Jerry was even doing bookings during his 5:30 a.m. workouts at Newtown Athletic Club, where he has been a member for 40 years. He let the agency go in 2000 when airlines shifted how much in commission they gave to agents. But hospitality was in his blood. He would move on to Apple Vacations as a cruise representative, Holiday Inn Select as director of food and beverage, and as a member of a Parx Casino restaurant’s opening crew.
He has also had roles in organizations that shaped the county and travel industry itself, including as chairman of the Chapter Presidents Council for the American Society of Travel Agents, which granted him a seat on the International Board of Directors, and as president of its Delaware Valley Chapter. He was on the board for both the Friends of Washington Crossing Park and TMA Bucks.
His lifetime of helping others have the time of their lives culminated in his role at VBC. After seeing the world, Jerry found it easy to extol the virtues of home. “There’s so much here that’s diverse. If you want to climb rocks or sit on one, it’s here,” he said while also reeling off Sesame Place, New Hope and Doylestown as destinations. “We get people who visit, then move here.”
Jerry was one of those people. While working in the county for PECO, he met a colleague named Marie Louise, who was from Delaware County. The couple, who will be married 51 years in December, realized they worked in but also liked Bucks County. They moved to Andalusia first, then Levittown. They ventured out to Newtown for breakfast one morning and found their future instead. “We spotted a development in Langhorne and saw a house for sale, so we bought it. We live in a great area. I sit by the pool and have a martini. I get use out of it,” he said of the pool that was once a draw but has since evolved into a love-hate relationship due to its upkeep.
With his retirement underway, Jerry Lepping says the only things on the horizon are sitting by that pool sipping his martini — dirty with three olives — and spending time with Marie Louise.
“Most things I didn’t plan,” he said. “They presented themselves, and I grabbed it or not. Right time, right place.”
Cynthia Marone is a freelance writer and editor who lives in Northeast