This article is republished with the permission of PhillyLacrosse.com. A celebration of Peter Samson’s life will be held Friday, Aug. 30 at 11 a.m. at Wayne Presbyterian Church. A reception will follow at St David’s Golf Club in Wayne, Pa.
Peter Samson, an icon in the Philly lacrosse scene for decades for his years of service building and coaching Radnor youth lacrosse and for creating the Katie Samson Lacrosse Festival and Foundation, died tragically Saturday after a bicycle accident in New England.
Details on the accident are scarce, but close friends of family members said Samson, 68, was bicycling on a path Friday near his family’s Westport, Mass., home at the Rhode Island border at Little Compton when the accident occurred. No other information was available.
Mr. Samson was inducted into the Eastern Pennsylvania Chapter of the US Lacrosse Hall of Fame in 2017 and also was honored with the prestigious Founders Circle Award at the 2009 US Lacrosse Convention.
The Founders Circle Award is a unique award given every few years on the national level to someone who has founded a program, product or idea that has staying power within the sport. It is given to someone who has a positive impact on the youth game and/or its constituents and embraces the mission and vision of US Lacrosse.
Mr. Samson’s lacrosse accomplishments are many, including serving as the founder, director and coach of Radnor Youth Lacrosse for close to 30 years.
Mr. Samson also was past president of the Southeastern Pennsylvania Youth Lacrosse Association (SEPYLA). He may be most known for founding the Katie Samson Festival (KSF), which was created to raise money and awareness for spinal cord research and its causes in the name of his daughter. The Festival, which will be 20 years old next April, has long been the single largest one-day high school event in the country (27 games) and has helped the Foundation raise $2 million since its inception in 2001.
Mr. Samson also served as an assistant boys’ coach at Radnor High this year for the first time. The team reached the state semifinals. He also coached the A1 Radnor youth team to a championship.
When Mr. Samson received the Founders Circle Award, he grudgingly took credit. “Obviously, I’m incredibly honored,” he said after learning of the news. “I look at the people involved in nominating me. If someone is judged by the people who speak well of him, I’m a pretty lucky guy. I was thinking about the fact that someone would say, ‘Gee, you spend an awful lot of time for these programs,’ I was reflecting on how much I’ve gotten back form it; the enjoyment, the support of my family, the opportunity we have to be a positive force in kids’ lives.”
Mr. Samson practiced law in Philadelphia for 43 years. After starting his legal career at the Defender Association, he was a partner at White & Williams for many years and then went to Cipriani & Werner where he was Of Counsel in the firm’s Philadelphia office.