Judah Leon Jacobowitz, 81, of South Brunswick, a resident of the Princeton area since 1971, died in Princeton on December 23, 2005.

Born in the Bronx, where he grew up, he moved to New Jersey nearly 35 years ago.

He worked as a mechanical engineer for the Mobil Oil Corporation in Pennington until he retired in 1989. In that work, Mr. Jacobowitz helped design oil refineries, inventing a spiral that loops up and around smokestacks to help strengthen them against strong winds. Before Mobil he worked for the M.W. Kellogg Co., until they moved to Texas in 1970.

After attending Townsend Harris High School, he entered the City College of New York where he earned a bachelor’s degree in Civil Engineering. He also served in the Army Air Corps during World War II.

Although his professional career was in engineering, his personal preference was writing poetry. He published a book of poetry A Taste of Bonaparte and over a hundred poems in poetry journals. He won the 1985 New Jersey statewide Poetry Competition and was a finalist in the 1984 Discovery/The Nation contest. He also served as a president for the Delaware Valley Poets and is listed by “Poets & Writers Directory of American Poets and Writers.

He was a member of “Community Without Walls.”

He is survived by his wife, Celia; a son, Elliott of Andover, Mass.; a daughter, Diane of Brooklyn, N.Y.; and his two granddaughters, Eliana and Jessi.