Harry J. Russell Jr., 82, of Edison died Tuesday, Dec. 18. Born in Roanoke, Va., Russell was a resident of New York City and Perth Amboy before moving to Edison in 1963.

Russell was a 1949 graduate of White Plains High School, White Plains, N.Y., and was inducted into the school's hall of fame in 2007. He was a graduate of Champlain College in Plattsburgh, N.Y., where he majored in psychology and sociology. He received his master's degree from the Columbia University School of Social Work in 1959.

He was a U.S. Army veteran during the Korean War conflict.

Russell began his career as a social worker in 1952 at the Blythedale Home for handicapped children. He later was appointed supervisor in the Rockland State Hospital social service department. For eight years, he served as supervising psychiatric social worker at the Perth Amboy branch of the Middlesex County Mental Health Clinic. He opened the mental health department at the former Perth Amboy General Hospital. In 1972, he became vice president for mental health and community services at JFK Medical Center in Edison, where he served until his retirement in 1995.

Russell was one of the original members of the Comprehensive Mental Health Center for Middlesex County and founder of the county's first mental-health halfway house. In 1975, he was named Outstanding Social Worker of the Year by the New Jersey Chapter of the National Association of Social Workers. Later, the same organization named him Administrative Social Worker of the Year.

Russell was the first African American member of the Edison Board of Education and served on the board for about a decade from the 1970s to 1980s. In 1999, the auditorium at John P. Stevens High School in Edison was named in his honor.

Russell served on a number of boards and organizations, including the Metuchen-Edison YMCA, Middlesex County College, DeVry University, the Minority Achievers Program, Edison Sheltered Workshop, Middlesex County Economic Opportunity Corp., the Central Jersey Chapter of the National Council of Christians and Jews. He was a former president of the 200 Club of Middlesex County.

He was a member of the Perth Amboy branch of the NAACP, Council on Compulsive Gambling of New Jersey, Middlesex County Human Services Commission. He was a fellow of the Academy of Psychosomatic Medicine, the American Orthopsychiatric Association and the American Group Therapy Association. He was appointed by the Supreme Court of New Jersey to the Advisory Committee on the Lawyers Assistance Program.

Russell was a lifelong Giants football fan and a decades-long season ticket holder.

He is survived by his loving wife of 58 years, Sylvia Whiteman Russell; three daughters, Sharon Russell-Fowler of Belmar, and her husband, Manny; Suzanne Russell, a reporter for the Home News Tribune, and her husband, George; and Heather Russell of Los Angeles; three granddaughters, Lauren, Taylore and Gabrielle; one brother, Jerome Davis of Washington, D.C., and several nieces and nephews.

Visitation will be from 1 to 3 p.m. Sunday, followed by a celebration of life service at 3 p.m. at Flynn & Son Funeral Home, 23 Ford Ave, Fords, NJ 08863. A private burial will follow on Monday.

In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to the Metuchen-Edison YMCA, 65 High St., Metuchen, NJ 08840.