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Victor E. Hencken II, general contractor and Red Cross volunteer, dies

Victor E. Hencken II, a general contractor and volunteer leader of American Red Cross disaster relief operations, died of lung disease July 25 in hospice care at Mercy Medical Center in Baltimore. The Catonsville resident was 76.

Born in St. Louis, Missouri, he was the son of Virginia Leigh Cook, who ran the family home, and Harold F. Hencken, a mortgage banker. He earned a bachelor’s degree in political science from University of Arizona and was a member of the Sigma Chi fraternity.

He met his future wife, Florence Gaines, on a ski trip at Wisp Resort in Western Maryland. They married in 1976 and lived in Glyndon.

“Vic was easy to get along with. He was always joking around,” said his wife. “He was a people person. He was a planner and a builder. It wasn’t that he loved construction, it was just that he was so good at it. There was never a dull moment with Vic. He got so much done in a day.”

After graduating college he moved to Baltimore, and in 1980 he founded Hencken & Gaines Inc., a general contracting firm in Hunt Valley. He built shopping centers and restaurants throughout Baltimore and Washington, D.C. His projects included work at the University of Maryland Dental Museum, Boys’ Latin School and Sidwell Friends School in Washington. He retired as the firm’s president in 1997.

He and his wife became active volunteers with the American Red Cross and responded to more than 100 home fires in the Baltimore region.

“We arrived at a fire and found if people needed housing, clothing and food,” said his wife, Florence Gaines Hencken.

The couple also became supervisors of a team that responded to the 2001 World Trade Center attack. They spent three weeks in New York.

“We met families at the lobbies of hotels and wrote checks,” his wife said.

Mr. Hencken and his wife moved to Steamboat Springs, Colorado, more than 20 years ago.

“He wanted a place where he could ski in the winter and hike in the summer,” his wife said. “We also bought an RV and traveled all over the West.”

While in Colorado, he responded to the Hurricane Katrina disaster and worked at a Salt Lake City army base where victims were being housed temporarily.

They later spent several weeks in New Orleans helping those affected by the storm.

In 2023, the couple returned to the Baltimore area and settled in Catonsville.

“We’ve learned a lot, and it’s been a privilege to lend a hand to those whose lives have been turned upside down by disaster,” his wife said.

Mr. Hencken was a lifetime member of the Sigma Chi fraternity at the University of Arizona and was an honorary trustee of the Jemicy School in Owings Mills.

He served on the boards of the Green Spring Valley Hounds and the Farmers & Merchants Bank in Maryland, and the Walker Fire Department in Arizona. He was board chair of the Northern Colorado Chapter of the American Red Cross.

A celebration of life will be held at 5 p.m. Sept. 7 at the L’Hirondelle Club in Ruxton.

Survivors include his wife of 48 years, Florence “Flo” Gaines Hencken, a financial analyst; two sons, John Cook Hencken II of Catonsville and Andy Gaines Hencken of Germantown; a brother, John “Jock” Cook Hencken of Fort Worth, Texas; and three grandchildren.