The Memorial Wall

Tom Luddy

Tom Luddy

June 4, 1943 - February 13, 2023

Known for his association with Francis Ford Coppola, Werner Herzog and many others, he was also a founder of the Telluride Film Festival.

om Luddy, a quietly influential film archivist and movie producer who was also a founder of the idiosyncratic Telluride Film Festival, died on Feb. 13 at his home in Berkeley, Calif. He was 79.

The cause was complications of Parkinson’s disease, said Julie Huntsinger, executive director of the Telluride festival, a half-century-old gathering of cinephiles held in a tiny former mining town in Colorado.

A transplant from the East Coast, Mr. Luddy landed in Berkeley in the 1960s, just in time to join the radical political activity that was afoot there, notably the Free Speech Movement that dominated the University of California campus in 1964.

He worked at the Berkeley Cinema Guild, a two-screen art house that had once been managed by the film critic Pauline Kael, after which he ran the Telegraph Repertory Cinema, another art-house theater, and joined the Pacific Film Archive, part of the U.C. Berkeley Art Museum, which he turned into a vital resource for film devotees and scholars.

By the early 1970s he was organizing as many as 800 programs there each year, from Preston Sturges retrospectives to programs of Russian silent films, new German cinema and movies from Senegal. He presented the United States premiere of Werner Herzog’s “Aguirre, the Wrath of God,” a Conradian tale starring Klaus Kinski as a Spanish conquistador who sets out to find a lost city in Peru, after it had been rejected by the New York Film Festival.

As director of special projects for Francis Ford Coppola’s company American Zoetrope, he produced movies like Paul Schrader’s “Mishima: A Life in Four Chapters” (1985), a complicated film about Yukio Mishima, the eccentric Japanese author who killed himself publicly in 1970 — a passion project that Mr. Schrader has described as “the definition of an unfinanceable project.” Mr. Luddy was its tireless booster and supporter, funding it early on with his American Express card.

In an email, Mr. Schrader described Mr. Luddy as “the big bang of film consciousness.”

He had a capacity for connecting artists to ideas, and to one another, that went beyond mere networking; it was a kind of vocation. The New York Times called him a human switchboard.

It was Mr. Luddy who suggested that Agnès Varda, the French New Wave filmmaker who was in Berkeley in the late 1960s, document the Black Panthers’ efforts to free the Panther leader Huey P. Newton from prison in 1968; her sobering portrait of the activists and their mission captured in two half-hour films is an urgent record of those fractious times.

 

When Laurie Anderson set out to make “Heart of a Dog,” her 2015 meditation on love and loss, and wanted to learn how to make an essayistic film, Mr. Luddy asked her to phone Philip Lopate, the film critic and essayist, for a tutorial.

It was a measure of Mr. Luddy’s influence, The Times noted in 1984, that he showed “The Italian,” a 1915 film that is considered a model for the immigrant-gangster epic, to Mr. Coppola before he made “The Godfather,” and “I Vitelloni,” Federico Fellini’s 1953 film about a group of young men on the brink of adulthood drifting about in a small Italian village, to George Lucas before he made “American Graffiti.”

And it was Mr. Luddy who introduced Alice Waters, his girlfriend at the time, to the work of Marcel Pagnol, the French filmmaker, in particular “Marius,” “Fanny” and “César,” the trilogy he produced in the 1930s about a group of friends finding their way in Marseille. That inspired the name of Ms. Waters’s restaurant Chez Panisse, the Berkeley institution that ignited the farm-to-table movement.

“We saw the films on three consecutive nights and I cried my eyes out, they were so romantic,” Ms. Waters recalled in a phone interview. “I knew I wanted to name the restaurant after one of the characters. We talked about Marius, Fanny’s lover, and Tom said, ‘Oh no, it has to be after that kindly man who married Fanny, and that was Panisse. And besides, he was the only one who made any money.’”

Chez Panisse would go on to global fame, but it remained Mr. Luddy’s dining room, where he could collect like-minded artists and watch the sparks fly. He and the restaurant also figured largely in a footnote to the moviemaking ethos of that decade, or at least of Mr. Luddy’s cohort, captured in an affecting short film by Les Blank called “Werner Herzog Eats His Shoe.”

 

As the story goes, Mr. Herzog challenged his fellow filmmaker Errol Morris to a bet, which was either a publicity stunt organized by Mr. Luddy or a genuine goad from Mr. Herzog: Mr. Herzog told Mr. Morris that if he succeeded in his seemingly quixotic mission to finish his first film, “Gates of Heaven,” a quirky, Gothic documentary about pet cemeteries, Mr. Herzog would eat his shoe. The movie was completed by 1978, and Mr. Luddy, Ms. Waters and Mr. Herzog set to work to honor the bet.

Ms. Waters decided, she said, that the best way to get the job done was to treat the shoe (a leather desert boot, actually) like a pig’s foot or a duck and braise it for hours in duck fat and herbs, which they did in her kitchen.

Later, at a screening of “Gates of Heaven” in 1979, Mr. Luddy played master of ceremonies as Mr. Herzog, with the aid of a pair of cooking shears, tackled his meal, which was laid out on a table on the theater’s stage. He bravely choked down a few bites, as did Mr. Luddy. Mr. Blank’s film is a touching, and very funny, ode to art-making, and also to the skillful machinations of Mr. Luddy.

In 1974, Mr. Luddy and a group of friends, Stella and Bill Pence and the film historian James Card, conceived a film festival to be held over three days in September in the picturesque former mining town of Telluride, Colo. (Bill Pence died in December.)

There would be no prizes, no angling for distribution, no marketing, no paparazzi and no red carpets — just an almost inconceivable amount of screenings, talks and shenanigans. They would show old films and new, local films and foreign, and art films as well as more popular fare, the offerings curated according to the organizers’ own appetites and interests. There would be guest curators from outside the film word, too, like Salman Rushdie, Don DeLillo, Rachel Kushner and Stephen Sondheim.

You might find Louis Malle at the bar, Robert Downey Sr. declaiming in the town’s plaza that plots were dead, Mr. Herzog and Barbet Schroeder playing table football. Mr. Lopate recalled that during the festival’s first year he found himself on an elevator with Leni Riefenstahl, the Nazi propagandist, and Gloria Swanson. The two women were trading health secrets involving sesame seeds.

“It mixes new directors and old ones — the venerable King Vidor is here this year — actors, distributors, scholars and the bristly and ardent society of film buffs,” The Times wrote in 1976. “Everyone is available to everyone else — names and no‐names, young and old — up to the point of exhaustion and past it.”

In 2016, A.O. Scott of The Times described the festival, then in its fifth decade, as “a gathering of the faithful, consecrated to the old-time cinephile religion,” adding: “The local school gym and a hockey rink on the edge of town are temporarily converted into what screening M.C.s unironically refer to as cathedrals of cinema. Everyone is a believer.”

Mr. Luddy might have been cinema’s most fervent believer, as well as its main officiant. The festival reflected his tastes, which were, as David Thomson, the San Francisco-based British film critic and historian, said, “both catholic and universal.” But, he added, “friendship was Tom’s art, really. He was unlimited in his wish and ability to help people in the broad area of film, and he did it without any ulterior motive, which is not common in the movie world.”

 

Thomas William Luddy was born on June 4, 1943, in New York City, and grew up in White Plains, N.Y., raised by staunch Democrats in what had been a monolithically Republican community. His father, William Luddy, who had worked in newspaper advertising and founded a national merchandise reporting service, was campaign manager for various candidates and, finally, chairman of Westchester County’s Democratic Party. His mother, Virginia (O’Neill) Luddy, was a homemaker and political volunteer.

At the University of California, Berkeley, Tom studied physics and then literature, graduating with a B.A. in English. He also ran a film society and played on the varsity golf team.

Mr. Luddy is survived by his wife, Monique Montgomery Luddy; his brothers, Brian, James and David; and his sister, Jeanne Van Duzer.

Although Mr. Luddy spent most of his time behind the scenes, he did appear in one movie: Philip Kaufman’s 1978 remake of “Invasion of the Body Snatchers,” in which he played to the creepy hilt one of the first humans to metamorphose into a pod person.

“Ah, the ubiquitous Tom Luddy,” The Times quoted a member of a film crew as saying in 1984. “It always seems like there were three or four of him!”

Remembering Tom Luddy

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Elliot Lubin

Elliot Lubin

July 22, 1926 - February 12, 2023

July 22, 1926 - February 12, 2017 Elliot is survived by his beloved wife Lorraine, children Robyn Sandys, Daniel Lubin, Yocheved Herrmann-Blanton, Ellen Sanitsky, 10 grandchildren and a great-granddaughter.

Elliot earned a BA from Rutgers University and an MBA from Pepperdine University. Following his Navy service, Elliot embarked on an illustrious fifty-year career as an executive in footwear/retail. Elliot was a gifted member of SongShine, gaining vocal strength for victims of Parkinson's disease, which he endured with dignity for 15 years. Elliot was honored with the Spirit of Life® Award from the City of Hope.

Remembering Elliot Lubin

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Joe Mendelson

Joe Mendelson

July 30, 1994 - February 7, 2023

Mendelson Joe, a singer-songwriter, artist and longtime activist, died at the age of 78 on Tuesday.

Joe's wife, Karen Robinson, confirmed he died at his home in Emsdale, Ont., north of Toronto, through Canada's medical assistance in dying after living with Parkinson's disease for more than five years.

Born Birrell Josef Mendelson in Toronto, Joe began his decades-long career performing as a blues musician in 1964 and later teamed up with guitarist Mike McKenna to form the band McKenna Mendelson Mainline.

Joe turned his artistic endeavors to painting in 1975 with his works focusing on political and social commentary including one of his most famous pieces depicting former prime minister Brian Mulroney with a backside for a face.

Joe went on to record thirty albums and he would later write several works of fiction, some unpublished.

In his obituary, which he wrote, Joe says Parkinson's was a "dead end" for him and thanked Canada for allowing medical assistance in dying, adding it was a "sign of a civilized society."

Remembering Joe Mendelson

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William Daly

William Daly

April 4, 1939 - January 31, 2023

Daly, William, - 83, of Port Republic, passed away at home on January 31, 2023, after battling Parkinson's Dementia.

He was born in Doylestown, Ohio on April 4, 1939 to John Ralph and Margaret Daly. After high school graduation, Bill attended George Washington University for his undergraduate degree and then went on to Princeton University to pursue his doctoral degree. Bill was a professor of political science for nearly 50 years; first at the University of Missouri Kansas City in 1966, then at Grinnell College in Iowa in 1970, and finally at his beloved Stockton University , where he was a founding faculty member.

Over the course of his career he earned countless accolades. At The University of Missouri Kansas City he received the Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching award in 1970. He was formally cited for Excellence in Teaching by the Political Science Department at Grinnell College in 1971. However, he spent the vast majority of his career at Stockton University where he was selected nine times as Professor of the Year in the Social Sciences. Outside of the classroom he initiated many educational programs which still carry on today, including the Educational Opportunity Fund program for disadvantaged students. He also wrote, and hosted the first video taped T.V. course of 26 half hour segments called America and Her Critics from 1973-1975 and rebroadcast from 1978-1979. He was also the first chairman of the New Jersey Department of Higher Education's Basic Skills Council from 1977-1982. He founded The Stockton Connection, which worked for years with high school teachers across the state to bridge the gap between college and high school. He was promoted to positions outside the classroom, including Dean of General Studies and Acting Academic Vice President. Ultimately, he decided to return to the classroom where he could help his "young scholars", which was where his true passion lay. He was also recognized for his excellence in education outside the Stockton community in 1989, winning the Alvin C. Erlich award for his educational innovations, a national award with a 10,000 dollar prize. He also served as a consultant for many other college programs, such as The Harvard Institute, The University of New Hampshire, The Vermont State College System and the New York State Department of Education, to name a few.

He had other titles as well, but the ones he cherished most were husband, daddy and grandpa. Bill will be sorely missed, but his love for his family, his passionate work ethic and his sense of humor will live on.

Bill is predeceased by his parents, John and Margaret Daly, and his older brother Dan. He is survived by his loving wife of 61 years, Nancy, his two daughters Beth (Jon) DeVos and Kit (John) Tidwell. He is also survived by his four grandchildren, Schuyler and Paige DeVos and Sarah and Emma Coe. Additionally, he is survived by his brother Jack (Barbara) Daly, his brother Bob (Sharon) Daly, his sister Dorothy (Michael) Cherry, his brother Tom, and many nieces and nephews.

Remembering William Daly

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Dr. Dennis O'Leary

Dr. Dennis O'Leary

January 1, 1938 - January 29, 2023

Dr. Dennis Sophian O'Leary passed away on January 29, 2023 in Kansas City, 85 years and one day after his birth in Kansas City's Menorah Hospital to writer/editor Theodore Morgan O'Leary and Mrs. Emily Sophian O'Leary of Fairway, Kansas. His maternal grandparents were internist Dr. Abraham Sophian Sr. and Mrs. Estelle Felix Sophian of Mission, Kansas. His paternal grandparents were University of Kansas professor of English Raphael Dorman ("R. D.") O'Leary and Mrs. Mathilde Hendricks O'Leary of Lawrence, Kansas.

Dennis was the top male academic graduate in his class of 599 students at his beloved Shawnee Mission High School in 1956. After earning his bachelor's degree in 1960 from Harvard College and his doctor of medicine degree in 1964 from Cornell University Medical College (of which Drs. Abraham Sophian Sr. and Jr. were alumni, classes of 1906 and 1941), he trained in internal medicine and hematology at the University of Minnesota Hospitals and Strong Memorial Hospital. He headed the blood coagulation unit in the hematology laboratory at the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research from 1969 to 1972, attaining the rank of major in the US Army.

In 1972, he joined the internal medicine faculty at George Washington University Medical School, being promoted to full professor by 1979. He loved administration and became dean for clinical affairs at GWU Medical Center in 1979, in which role he became nationally known as the calm, articulate

spokesman in the roiling aftermath of the assassination attempt on US President Ronald Reagan (March 30, 1981), who received his care at GWU Hospital.

The membership of the District of Columbia Medical Society elected Dennis - an academic teaching physician - as their president (1983–1984), during which time he helped guide the rational updating of the city's archaic hospital licensure laws. In 1985, leaders of the Am. Med. Assoc., Am. Hosp. Assoc., Am. Coll. of Surgeons, Am. Coll. of Physicians, and Am. Dental Assoc. persuaded Dennis to serve as president of the Chicago-based Joint Commission, the major US accrediting body of hospitals and other health care organizations. He served unswervingly for twenty-one years in that role, instilling a patient - centered ethic and leading difficult initiatives in performance measurement, continuous improvement, and patient safety.

Dennis always wanted to come home to Kansas City, which he finally was able to do in 2007. He rehabilitated his childhood house, adding a library to hold his late parents 15,000 books still stacked up floor to ceiling in most of its rooms. He was a devoted sports fan and expert crossword puzzle solver. He was a quiet but intense person with a beautiful resonant speaking voice, a quick droll wit, and a twinkle in his eye even during the tensest moments. He developed Parkinson's disease in 2013 and lived with it for ten years before succumbing to its ravages. His younger brother Theodore Morgan O'Leary Jr. pre - deceased him in 1972. He is survived by his wife of 42 years, Dr. Margaret Wiedman O'Leary and their children Margaret Rose and Theodore

Morgan II.Published by Chicago Tribune on Feb. 2, 2023.

Remembering Dr. Dennis O'Leary

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George Ridout

George Ridout

January 1, 1943 - January 27, 2023

George passed away January 27, 2023 from Parkinson's Disease. His loving wife Nancy was at his side.George was an exceptional man beloved by his family, his many friends, and the students he guided through their years at Madrone, San Rafael, and Terra Linda high schools. He was ultimately fair, funny, could tell a great story, and loved to sing. He was an accomplished runner having completed 26 marathons, many in under 3 hours, an avid birder with a life list of over 4,000, and was supremely happy backpacking in the mountains, especially the Sierras. He could fix anything and was an exceptional craftsman who carved wildlife and built beautiful furniture and with his twin brother Ted, built a home for their parents during a summer while in college.

He was born to Margaret and Theodore Ridout in Concord, Massachusetts and spent his childhood there with his parents, older sister, and twin brother. After graduating from Concord High School as a National Merit Scholarship Program finalist, he studied at Yale University (BA), Union Theological Seminary (M Div.), University of California Berkeley/Graduate Theological Union (Ph. D) and the University of San Francisco (Ed. D).George began his association with the San Rafael High School District in 1972 and served there for 35 years as a teacher, vice-principal, and principal. He greatly enjoyed working with students and staff.

After he retired, he continued his running and logged even more time backpacking in the mountains. But his passion for birds, instilled by his mother, motivated him to travel the country and the world (including Mexico, Central America, South America, Australia, New Zealand, China, Japan, India, Tibet, Africa, Europe, and Canada) to see amazing birds.

George was an active member of the First Presbyterian Church of San Rafael and contributed his talents as an Elder, Sunday School Superintendent and teacher, and as a member of the choir and the handbell choir (the large bells!) He was also in charge of the renovation of the sanctuary. George was drawn to the philosophy of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and attended the March on Washington in August 1963. Throughout his life, he practiced the principles of Christian nonviolence.George met his wife Nancy at Union Theological Seminary and they were lovingly married for 57 1/2 years and had two sons, Joseph and Joshua, who grew up in Novato. George was dedicated to his family and loved them wholeheartedly and they loved him back. He laughed and cried with them, played and was silly with them, and taught them what family is all about. His joy was having his family, including his three wonderful granddaughters, together in Marin.

George is survived by his loving wife Nancy, devoted sons Joe and Josh (and wife Margot), granddaughters Sierra, Serena, and Ruby, sister Emily, twin brother Ted (and wife Chris), nephews Drew, Matt, Dan, and Tim, and nieces Meg and Robin.The family would like to thank Ana, Rose, June, Rodeo, Maria Elena, Mariel, Esme, and Mina, the owner and staff of Loving Long Life, for their compassionate care for George during his last months.

Remembering George Ridout

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Tom Allen

Tom Allen

March 14, 1970 - January 26, 2023

SINTON, Texas — Former Sinton head football coach and athletic director Tom Allen died Thursday night.

Allen was forced into an early retirement in December 2018 after being diagnosed with Multiple Systems Atrophy, a disease similar to Parkinson’s,  two years earlier, a progressive neurodegenerative disorder that affects the nervous system.

Omar Garcia is the Head Boys Basketball Coach of Sinton. He was brought on by coach Allen.

"He gave us a shot. He gave us that opportunity. He didn't have to. I was a nobody and he let me come in. I owe him everything," said Garcia.

Current Sinton Head Football Coach and Athletic Director Michael Troutman said coach Allen was filled with lessons. Ones he'll carry on with him.

 

"Have integrity with the choices that you make. You may not make everybody happy, but as long as you have integrity, you can hold your chin up high," said Troutman.

He always did what was in the best interest of the kids.

"He said to treat it like it's your Super Bowl and those kids will follow, those kids will feel that excitement so I kind of took that to heart and just coached every day like this was the most important time and this was the most important place," said Garcia.

They said, one of his best qualities was coach Allen's kindness.

"His classic phrase after a call that he disagreed with "you're not getting a Christmas card from me this year" and I always found that to be about as mean as he could get," said Gene Kasprzyk, the former Sinton Baseball Coach.

Allen coached 12 years in Sinton, winning 106 games in that time and leading the Pirates to the state semifinals in back-to-back seasons in 2013 and 2014.

Remembering Tom Allen

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Lionel Duffin

Lionel Duffin

August 8, 1945 - January 26, 2023

Lionel Duffin died at Aldingham Care Home several years after being diagnosed with Parkinson's disease.

The former shipyard worker was known as "The Cat" because of his agility and ability to overcome his 5ft 8ins height and dominate the goal area.

He played for the Bluebirds between 1964 and 1978.

Son John Duffin, a revered artist, said his father was a "local hero" who would be "greatly missed".

Born in Newton, Mr Duffin left school at 15 and was already a track star and athlete but football was his "complete obsession".

He was inspired by young footballers of the day and often spoke of watching the legendary Busby Babes Manchester United team of 1958 play and of meeting them all after the game and getting their autographs. 

He was soon in the reserves at Barrow before being signed as a professional in 1964.

He "lived and breathed football" and travelled the length and breadth of the country with Barrow AFC in the 60s team that went from strength to strength and found fame in the third division of that time.

He brought great joy and entertainment to the Barrow fans for nearly 15 years. 

One report from that era in The Mail wrote that "as the away team piled on more and more pressure on Barrow’s goal area the Barrow defence continually crumbled leaving only Lionel Duffin to save the day - he stopped every ball that was aimed at the goal, it was a brave lone goalkeeper versus the opponents for the final 35 minutes, Lionel won the game for Barrow."

He served his apprenticeship at Vickers Shipyard as a fitter and turner and worked there for 30 years before running his own building firm for many years.

He leaves behind his children and 15 years of memories at Holker Street.

Remembering Lionel Duffin

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Jan Lovell

Jan Lovell

October 7, 1944 - January 24, 2023

Longtime Detroit News staffer Jan Lovell died Tuesday, Jan. 24, 2023, leaving behind a legacy of more than four decades in journalism.

Mr. Lovell of Grosse Pointe was 78. He had battled Parkinson's and cancer in recent years, his family said.

A funeral was Saturday in Grosse Pointe Woods. Family, friends and colleagues shared memories and posted photos and remarks in an online obituary.

Charlotte Massey, a former assistant photo editor at The Detroit News, said Lovell was her favorite person to work with. She met him in 1998 when she was an imaging technician and Mr. Lovell was an imaging supervisor.

Mr. Lovell worked at The News for more than 40 years, leaving the newspaper by 2010, relatives said."He was just an all-around great guy ... he was really good at his job," Massey said. "He did various jobs at the paper. He was an editor, copy editor, production editor, ran the imaging desk. He was wonderful. He was the kindest man I ever worked with."Everybody loved him. He was amazingly conscientious. He was superb to work for. He treated everybody with respect, dignity and kindness."And, she said, "he had a great sense of humor."

The relationships in the newsroom were key to Mr. Lovell's tenure, said Beverly Lovell, his wife of 54 years. "He liked the people he worked with."Besides his wife, other survivors include three children, Ian, Drew and Gwyndolyn; and seven grandchildren.

Patricia Anstett said in a Facebook post that Mr. Lovell was "friendly, helpful, very professional" and "designed great, newsy pages. He always brought an A game.” 

Susan Burzynski Bullard, a former managing editor at The News, called him "calm and collected under pressure.""He never had an unkind word for anyone," she said in a Facebook post. "He's exactly the kind of presence you want in the newsroom, particularly on a crazy news day."

Nancy Hanus met Mr. Lovell in 1986, when she was a copy editor at The News."We became close colleagues and then good friends," she said, especially in 2002, when they started working together in the Photography Department."He quietly did his job, but also was that person ... that you could always count on, and he was invaluable to me because I came in as photo director and I had never been a photo director," Hanus said. "He was there every single time I had a question, every single time I needed something."

She saw him change departments at The News multiple times. He always was dependable and accountable, no matter what position he had, she said."He was like the calm in the storm, that person in the newsroom that never drew attention to himself, but was always there for everyone," Hanus said. "He was like that person everyone could go to ... get advice. He was super, super smart and he knew a lot, not just a ton about the local area, but pictures and the world."

Born Oct. 7, 1944, in Canada, Mr. Lovell and his family relocated to Metro Detroit.

Drawing on the language skills he learned in Catholic school, he worked at Wayne State University's student newspaper while a student there, his wife said. He later was drafted into the Army and spent nearly two years at Fort Carson in Colorado, where he used his typing and photography skills, and earned a commendation for meritorious service, Beverly Lovell said.

Back in Metro Detroit, Mr. Lovell started working for a newspaper in Wyandotte before graduating from Wayne State, she said.For years, he told his family about how he applied to The News and was hired after a one-day trial run, his wife said. "He was very proud of himself."

After leaving at age 65, Mr. Lovell focused on passions including cooking and heading outdoors, including reunions near the Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore.

"He said his retirement was a blessing of sorts because he was always planning meals for friends, family and neighbors," his wife said. "He did a lot more camping. Being in nature was his favorite activity."Hanus recalled those long-held interests.

"When I left The News, he gave me a compass and he said: '... Figure out which way to go' ... that's the kinds of things he would do. He would come up with something meaningful and share it."

Remembering Jan Lovell

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Robert DuBeau

Robert DuBeau

January 1, 1934 - January 21, 2023

Longtime Wellfleet resident Robert DuBeau succumbed to Parkinson’s disease on Jan. 21, 2023 after trying to ignore the affliction for years.

Bob was born in Willimantic, Conn. in 1934, the third of four children of Conrad and Esther (Parent) DuBeau. He attended Windham Regional High School, where as a freshman he met his future wife, Marsha Turshen. He was admitted to Harvard, where he worked to pay his tuition by establishing a food concession at the residence houses. By the time he graduated in 1956, his multi-employee business was taken over by the college as part of its food service.

Bob first fell in love with the Outer Cape when, shortly after graduation, he was drafted and stationed at Camp Wellfleet — then an Army outpost near Marconi Beach in what is now the National Seashore. After his discharge, Bob attended the University of Connecticut Law School and entered practice in nearby Rockville. Bob, Marsha, and their growing family soon started vacationing in Wellfleet.

After several years of renting, they purchased a cottage on Lieutenant Island before it had electricity or telephone service. As their children reached driving age, the tide-ruled access to the island became untenable. Wishing to stay in the area, they were among the first to purchase a parcel of the former Camp Mar-Ven and Camp Chequessett, converting the old counselor and guest house into a summer cottage. When they retired, they renovated the house for year-round use and moved to Wellfleet.

Bob quickly became a member of the Wellfleet Housing Authority, helping to provide affordable housing for year-round local workers. He helped found Nauset Neighbors, the volunteer network to help aging residents stay in their homes. He was the first representative from Our Lady of Lourdes parish to the area interfaith council. He was an enthusiastic golfer at the Chequessett Yacht & Country Club and a volunteer at Wellfleet Harbor Actors Theater.

Bob was full of wit and fun, once leading a passel of family kids down Commercial Street in Provincetown after a Marx Brothers movie at the Waters Edge Cinema, all striding like Groucho. Many friends from Rockville were invited to visit the DuBeaus on their Wellfleet vacations, and several, including Pat and Dick Dimock, established their own connections to the Outer Cape in part based on Bob’s enthusiasm.

“You don’t have a boat,” said one curious friend. “You don’t seem to like sitting on the beach. What is it about Wellfleet?” to which Bob answered, “I just love to look at it.”

Bob is survived by his wife, Marsha; his five children: Dr. Catherine DuBeau of Lebanon, N.H., Matthew and wife Leslie Haynes-DuBeau of Nyack, N.Y., Peter and Lisa DuBeau of Norfolk, Va., Adam and Lauren Love-DuBeau of Marcellus, N.Y., and Sarah DuBeau-Farley and Stephen Farley of Dorchester; his grandchildren, Madeline, Henry, Julia, Jack, August, Sam, and Elise; and the families of multiple nieces and nephews.

Remembering Robert DuBeau

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Address
Parkinson's Resource Organization
74785 Highway 111
Suite 208
Indian Wells, CA 92210

Local Phone
(760) 773-5628

Toll-Free Phone
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info@parkinsonsresource.org

 

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Updated: August 16, 2017