Gabriel A. Buzash died Thursday of natural causes at the age of 93.

Born on May 29, 1914, in Lyndora, he was the first of 12 children of Gabriel and Ester Buzash.

He graduated from Butler High School and began working at Armco Steel. After four years at Armco, he resigned to attend Slippery Rock College. Mr. Buzash was active in the college choir and was president of the Rifle Club. He majored in education and graduated in 1940.

He worked briefly at Mesta Machine, before being drafted into the Army, which sent him to Yale University to study Japanese. When World War II escalated, the Army shipped him to Europe and he served in Gen. Patton's Seventh Armor Division during the Battle of the Bulge in Germany.

At the end of the war, Mr. Buzash returned home to marry his college sweetheart, Lola McMullen of Slippery Rock, and began teaching science in Beaver Falls. He became the principal of the Center Township Elementary School, which was grades one through eight.

He earned his master's degree in education at Westminster College in New Wilmington and earned his doctoral degree in education at Pennsylvania State University, State College, in 1959. He began training elementary teachers at Baldwin-Wallace College in Berea, Ohio, and became the chairman of the Education Department.

In 1964, he moved to Glassboro State College, Glassboro, N.J., now known as Rowan University. There he was responsible for the thesis-writing course for the master's degree in elementary education. He retired in 1981.

Mr. Buzash took voice lessons from Michael Dolan of Butler as a young man and always enjoyed singing for pleasure, accompanied by Mrs. Buzash on the piano.

He was an avid gardener of fruits and vegetables when he was younger and continued to grow beautiful flowers until recently. As he approached retirement, Mr. Buzash began oil painting and leaves a collection for the family.

Mr. Buzash was a Mason, a member of the Parian Lodge 662 F. & A.M. in New Brighton and the Scottish Rite Valley of New Castle.

Mr. and Mrs. Buzash maintained their ties to the Butler/Slippery Rock area by spending the majority of every summer in Slippery Rock. Although they lived in Ohio and New Jersey and visited Florida, Arizona, Germany and Hungary, Western Pennsylvania was always "home."

He and his wife, a speech pathologist and audiologist, moved in 2001 to a retirement community on Long Island, N.Y., to be near their daughter, Elizabeth "Betsy" Pollert, and her husband Fred, of Setauket, Long Island, N.Y., who survive.

Also surviving are two grandchildren; three brothers, Ernest of Erie, Andrew of Butler, and Edward of North Carolina; and three sisters, Leona Eaton, formerly of Butler, Eleanor Broderick and Elsie Neve, both of Butler.

<B>BUZASH — </B>Friends of Dr. Gabriel A. Buzash, who died Thursday, April 3, 2008, will be received from 1 to 4 p.m. Sunday at the <B>Geibel Funeral Home</B>, 201 E. Cunningham St., ButlerFuneral services will be at 11 a.m. Monday by the Rev. Pamela Gardner of the United Methodist Church of Slippery Rock. Interment will be at the Slippery Rock Cemetery.Masonic services will be held at 4 p.m. Sunday at the funeral home by the officers and members of the Victory Lodge 694 F. and A.M. of Butler.Information also is available at www.geibelfuneralhome.com.