WASHINGTON — Stephen Lorenzetti, who spent his career with the National Park Service and rose to the top executive ranks overseeing a restoration of the Washington Monument, as well as planning and construction of the National World War II Memorial and other sites , died Sept. 21 at a hospital in Rockville. He was 54.
He was mountain biking at Schaeffer Farms, a biking trail in Germantown, Maryland, when he suffered a heart attack, said his wife, Maureen Lorenzetti.
Lorenzetti joined the Park Service in 1984 as a mechanical engineer. After 11 years assigned to the national capital regional office, he served as chief of resource management at the National Mall and Memorial Parks, which includes the Mall and other Park Service properties in the area.
Since 2005, he had been deputy superintendent for planning of the National Mall and Memorial Parks — placing him in charge of preserving and enhancing many memorials and monuments in his jurisdiction.
In the late 1990s, Lorenzetti had primary responsibility for overseeing restoration of the Washington Monument’s facade; he also oversaw rehabilitation of the monument after an earthquake struck the area in 2011.
Lorenzetti played a key Park Service role in overseeing the construction of memorials such as the Franklin D. Roosevelt Memorial, dedicated in 1997, the National World War II Memorial, 2004, the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial, 2012, and the American Veterans Disabled For Life Memorial, which is scheduled for dedication next month.
Stephen Charles Lorenzetti was born in Washington on March 21, 1960. He grew up in Bethesda, Maryland, where he was a 1978 graduate of Walter Johnson High School. He received a bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering from the University of Maryland in 1983.
He was a Bethesda resident and a volunteer with Manna Food Center, a food bank in Gaithersburg, and a girls’ coach with MSI Soccer in Montgomery County, Maryland. His avocations included ultimate Frisbee.
Survivors include his wife of 27 years, Maureen Shields Lorenzetti, two daughters, Gina Lorenzetti and Claire Lorenzetti, and his mother, Esther Lorenzetti, all of Bethesda; and two brothers, Peter Lorenzetti of Kensington, Maryland, and David Lorenzetti of Silver Spring, Maryland.