Don DiFrancesco ‘66 named Significant Sig for 2020

Hearty congratulations to our Brother Donald DiFrancesco being named as a Significant Sig for 2020. 

Don graduated in 1966.  Our Chapter house was still on campus, with it being a great time to be a Sig at Penn State. These were some wonderful years with fond memories which will remain with us forever.  After graduation, he attended Seton Hall University Law School, started practicing law and got involved in politics.  As fate would have it, we both were elected to our state legislatures in 1975; Don in New Jersey and I in Virginia, with our paths crossing at legislative conferences over many years.  Don quickly rose the ranks of power serving as Minority Leader from 1982 to 1984, and then in 1992 as President of the New Jersey Senate for ten years.

Senator DiFrancesco became Acting Governor DiFrancesco at least once a year from 1992 on -until January 2001 when Governor Christine Todd Whitman resigned to become Administrator of the Federal Environmental Protection Agency.  With a quirk in New Jersey’s constitution he became the most powerful official in the state serving in the dual roles of Governor and Senate President.

It fell to Governor DiFrancesco to lead New Jersey on September 11, 2001 when America experienced its most tragic of days.  One of his colleagues recalled that amid all those emergency meetings, the concern Governor DiFrancesco voiced early and often was, “What happens to those children?”  “What happens to those children whose parents will never return…?”

Don still maintains a successful law practice in New Jersey and has received countless awards and recognitions.  He was a wonderful brother when we were at Alpha Chi together, and it was my privilege to nominate him for the Significant Sig Award being seconded by our Order of the Constantine Brother Dave Kline.

Well done Don!  The values instilled by Sigma Chi are strong.