Dr. Walter Ingun Hahn passed away at Lexington Medical Center Hospital in Columbia, SC at the age of 100. He was a brilliant man with an uncommon work ethic and integrity.  No human being could outwork our father. After graduating from the Seoul National University, he earned a doctorate in nuclear Physics from Florida State University and then did postdoctoral research at the University of Florida. He started his Physics teaching career at the State University of New York (SUNY) College at Fredonia he then moved to Benedict College in Columbia. At Benedict College where he taught for some 30 years before retirement, he started the 2 + 2 Physics Engineering program where students spent the first 2 years at Benedict and then went on to an Engineering degree at a number of universities. He helped many students achieve their dreams by helping them learn to understand and appreciate Physics as much as he did. He developed the articulation agreement for the engineering program with many universities including Georgia Tech, Georgia Southern and Rensselaer Polytech University (in NY). He increased the number of Physics majors at Benedict College by astronomical numbers through this program still in effect today. He also wrote the lab textbooks used at Benedict College for Physics and Physical Science even for several years after his retirement. He proudly told us that he had managed to gift Benedict a nuclear reactor.    

He also did research at SUNY for seeding clouds to make it snow. We remember he drove into snow fields out in the middle of nowhere to collect snow samples while we played nearby. He then did neutron activation analysis for an environmental research project at Benedict for years. There are pictures of our father with about a dozen Benedict students working on the research project. Because he changed the lives of his students to exciting engineering jobs, his students would contact him for years saying that he changed their lives.    

He passed on this work ethic, integrity and intelligence to his children and built a warm, supportive home with his wife. His wife, Mrs. Margaret Hahn, passed on her intelligence, integrity and kindness to their children. His son, Dr. James Hahn, has a doctorate in Computer Science from Ohio State University and is a tenured professor of computer science and the school of medicine at George Washington University in Washington DC. Dr. James Hahn conducts research in the application of computer technology for medicine.  

His daughter, Dr. Juliet, who has a doctorate in Chemistry, taught college chemistry at colleges with a BS to small Ph.D. program for some 20 years. She did research in her tenure track positions on understanding how sunlight causes skin cancer and developing synthetic organic methodology for neurobiological molecules. She also taught in non-tenure track teaching positions at Francis Marion University, Presbyterian College, the Citadel and Coker University nearby her parents in recent years. She is currently teaching science full-time for Lexington 2 at New Bridge Academy (an alternative school).

Dr. Walter Hahn was born in what is now North Korea and survived World War II and the Korean War. He was pulled out of college in Japan when the Korean War broke out and was moving away from the war front trying to stay alive but was selected out of a group of Korean men because he had taken English in college by the U.S. Army to be their interpreter. He tested for the Fulbright program when he was a mechanical engineering professor at Seoul National University and had the highest score in English. He left Korea and was placed at Florida State University into their Nuclear Physics Ph.D. program. James was a toddler, and Margaret was pregnant with Juliet when Walter came to Florida.      

After retirement he spent 30 years walking every other day at Riverbanks Zoo with his wife, Margaret. There is a zoo walker’s plaque from 2016 that says that Walter and Margaret walked a documented 8,000 miles at riverbanks zoo over a period of 20 years. Walter and his wife were always together in Walter’s retirement. Some people remarked that they would often see one of them and then the other one was always nearby. Instead of doing Physics research he started doing research on how to live in good health as long as possible and he almost made it to 101. He also bought a house in the Coldstream subdivision more than 40 years ago. He planted all sorts of wonderful flowering trees and bushes. He kept the garden immaculate until the garden overgrew his abilities in recent years.    

The family would like to thank Dad’s caregivers, Kim Keller and Sarah Trezoglou, for caring for him. We would also like to thank all the doctors and staff at Lexington Medical Center for their care during his final hours. He passed away with a smile on his face with both his children there, perhaps seeing Margaret again.

Dr. Walter Hahn lived a wonderful life filled with the love of his wife (of about 70 years), Margaret (passed 2022) and his children inherited his integrity, work ethic and intelligence. He is survived by his son Dr. James Hahn, and his daughter Dr. Juliet Hahn, his daughter-in-law Mrs. Ayaka Hahn, and his grandchild George Hahn (Dr. James’s son).    

Joke: A medical doctor says Dr. Hahn has passed away. The doctor’s colleague says I am talking to Dr. Hahn, he does not look dead. Another colleague says, Dr. Hahn is a woman what are you talking about?

His funeral will be at the Thompson Funeral Home chapel on Leesburg Rd. on October 11, 2024 at 2:00 pm with interment to follow at Greenlawn Memorial Park.