MATTIE W. DUNN (Age 96)
On Wednesday, July 31, 2019, of Elkridge, MD. Beloved wife of the late William Joseph Dunn, Jr.; mother of William J. Dunn, III and his wife, Susanne. Also survived by granddaughter, Taylor Noel Dunn. One of 11 children of Michael and Julia Megles, Mattie came to Washington D.C. in the early 1940’s during WWII, along with two of her sisters to work for the Government, where she decided to pursue a career in nursing. She graduated in 1945 through the Catholic University nursing program, sponsored by the Sisters of Charity, all while maintaining her full time job with the Government. During her career, she worked as a nursing supervisor at Providence Hospital in Washington D.C., and Prince George’s Hospital in Cheverly, MD, along with private duty nursing. She was predeceased by her husband of 33 years in 1989. Relatives and friends may call at Holy Cross Church, 4900 Strathmore Avenue, Garrett Park, MD, Tuesday, August 06, 2019, from 10 a.m. to 11 a.m., where a Mass of Christian Burial will take place at 11 a.m Interment Gate of Heaven Cemetery. In lieu of flowers, memorial contributions may be made to The American Cancer Society , 7500 Greenway Center Drive, Suite 300, Greenbelt, MD 20770.
GRACE R. O’CONNOR (Age 98)
On Saturday, July 27, 2019, of Silver Spring, MD. Beloved wife of the late James F. O’Connor; mother of Janis M. O’Connor, Celeste A. Kleess, Stephen J. O’Connor, Christine O’Connor-Schramm, Michael J. O’Connor and the late Richard D. O’Connor; sister of William B. Schenck and the late Natalie Iannotti. She is also survived by several grandchildren, great grandchildren and other loving family and friends. Relatives and friends may call at Collins Funeral Home, 500 University Boulevard West, Silver Spring, MD, (Valet Parking), Thursday, August 8, from 7 to 9 p.m. Mass of Christian Burial will be offered at St. Peter’s Catholic Church Chapel, 2900 Sandy Spring Road, Olney, MD, on Friday, August 9, 2019 at 11:30 a.m. Interment Arlington National Cemetery at a later date. Memorial contributions may be made to the American Red Cross, National Capital Area, 8550 Arlington Blvd., Fairfax, VA 22031.
KEVIN A. FITZPATRICK
(Age 85)
On Thursday, August 1, 2019, of Silver Spring, MD, formerly of Fall River, MA. Beloved husband of the late Pauline C. Fitzpatrick (nee: Beauregard); father of Kelly M. Fitzpatrick, Tracy A. Pirozzi (Greg) and Michael K. Fitzpatrick (Caren); brother of Shaun Fitzpatrick (Mary); grandfather of Casey, Troy and Tyler Fitzpatrick and Stephen Pirozzi. Also survived by other loving family and friends. Family will receive friends at Our Lady of Grace Catholic Church, 15661 Norbeck Blvd., Silver Spring, MD on Wednesday, August 7, 2019 from 10:30 a.m. until Mass of Christian Burial at 11 a.m.. Interment will be at Arlington National Cemetery at a later date.
Mary-Hill French, Geologist, 102
Mary-Hill French, a geologist who prepared bomb target maps for the U.S. Army Air Force in World War II, became the first woman professional hired by the iron-mining industry in northern Minnesota, and collaborated for more than half a century in the research and writings of her husband, a NASA geologist and planetary scientist, died on July 26, 2019 in Bethesda, Maryland. She was 102 years old. Her husband, Bevan M. French, said that the cause of death was complications from a pulmonary infection.
Originally intending to become either a lawyer or a journalist (preferably an international reporter) when she arrived at college in 1934, Ms. French instead majored in geology after a freshman course with an exciting and inspiring professor. Needing tuition money, she happily accepted the job of geology lab instructor, and the die was cast. During the eight decades after graduation, she continually and energetically combined a wide range of different activities into a long and active life: graduate study, engineering work for a mining company, marriage, family, travel, and service to a wide range of scientific, educational, and social organizations. Since 1967, she was also a constant colleague, collaborator, and editor in the research, professional travels, publications, and educational activities of her second husband, Bevan M. French, now a retired NASA geologist, planetary scientist, and program administrator.
Mary-Hill French was born Mary-Hill Kueffner, on November 14, 1916 in St. Paul, MN, the daughter of William and Helen Kueffner. She attended local schools, including Summit School in St. Paul, then attended Carleton College in Northfield, MN, receiving a B.A. in 1938 Magna Cum Laude with a major in Geology. She subsequently received an M.A. in Geology from Carleton, then began work on a Ph.D. degree at Northwestern University in Evanston, IL.
In 1942, during World War II, she was recruited by the U.S. Army Air Force Information Service and served a year at the Army Map Service in Washington, D.C., an institution which she and her young colleagues referred to as the “Map Trap”. The duties of this group of young scientists were to review available maps to obtain information about military sites in Europe, Asia, and the Middle East and to construct target maps that the U.S. Army Air Corps could use in bombing missions. She combined these grim activities with the youthful exploration of wartime Washington (to the extent possible during severe gas rationing) and with the enthusiasm shared by a group of similar young people who were making a contribution to America’s war effort.
In 1943, Mary-Hill Kueffner resigned from the Air Force to marry Tappan Childs, a civil engineer from St. Paul, MN. She spent the rest of the war years moving with her husband from one military construction site to another, passing through such locations as Leadville, CO; Colorado Springs, CO; and Rough and Ready Island, CA, meeting a wide variety of Americans and learning such survival skills as boiling water at high altitude (use a pressure cooker) and getting a stuck car out of a mudhole (wait for the evening freeze, then drive out). After the War, the family (now including three children) settled in Hibbing, MN, a northern Minnesota town on the Mesabi Iron Range mining district, where Ms. Childs continued to raise her family and also found time to serve as President of the local chapter of the League of Women Voters and the American Association of University Women (AAUW).
With the sudden death of her husband in 1957, from an accidental fall at home, Ms. Childs found a geological position with Pickands Mather, an iron-mining company on the Mesabi Range. She was the first woman to be employed in a professional capacity by an iron-mining company and probably one of the first women to be employed professionally in the overall mining industry. She worked actively, with many male colleagues at Pickands Mather and other iron-mining companies, on developing the so-called “taconite process”, a series of technical procedures that made it possible to economically extract the low-grade iron ores that still remained after the removal of the high-grade “direct shipping” ores that had originally fueled the development of the Mesabi Range and other iron ranges in the region. This successful development of the complicated process, involving the conversion of fine-grained ores into pellets that could be used in existing blast furnaces, was largely responsible for preserving iron mining as a continuing economic activity on the Mesabi Range and in many similar mining districts in Wisconsin and Michigan. During her work, Ms. Childs became a member, and one of a few women, in the American Association of Mining and Metallurgical Engineers (AIME), presented papers on her work at national meetings, and published her results in the Association’s technical books and other publications.
Although working in a virtually all-male environment, she experienced little difficulty or friction on the job. She later recalled that “at first, my colleagues, from engineers to workmen, were skeptical about having a woman working with them, but before long that changed, and they became very protective of me. The workmen delighted in telling me dirty jokes, which I never understood, but I kept trying to laugh at what might be the right places, and these attempts amused them even more. Confidence gained, I realized that being unique could be good, and I started wearing a red dress to meetings.”
At a geological meeting in 1965, Ms. Childs met Bevan M. French, a NASA geologist who was giving a paper on his Ph.D. research on the rocks of the Mesabi Range. They were married in 1967 and settled in Chevy Chase, MD, where Dr. French continued a long career with NASA, including participation in the Apollo Program of moon landings, research on terrestrial meteorite impact craters, and the management of NASA’s scientific research on lunar samples and meteorites. In addition to remaining heavily involved in Dr. French’s scientific activities and popular publications (including The Moon Book, published by Penguin Books in 1976), Ms. French participated in Welcome to Washington, a group which provided joint educational and social activities for local residents and foreign visitors, and in the Geological Society of Washington, a local professional group, in which she served for two years as a member of the Council and as Assistant Treasurer for a year. The couple also travelled widely for scientific meetings, geological field studies, and tourism, visiting 32 different countries during their marriage. In addition to several visits to Austria, where Dr. French was a Visiting Professor at the University of Vienna, the couple spent a sabbatical year (1981-1982) in South Africa studying ancient meteorite impact craters and getting a close and detailed experience of the country during the apartheid era. In her 70s and 80s, Ms. French continued to participate in geological field excursions, including trips through the Australian and Namibian deserts.
Asked in an interview about what shaped her life, Ms. French answered, “Curiosity and the Depression, which meant a constant need for money, cheerfulness, and a sense of responsibility. So many people helped me that I wanted in return to help them and any others who might need money as I had. And there was the enjoyment of all the good things; each thing kept me looking forward to the next.”
Survivors include: Bevan M. French, her husband of 51 years, two sons, one daughter, eight grandchildren, and seven great-grandchildren.
A Private Funeral Mass will be celebrated at the Shrine of the Most Blessed Sacrament, 3630 Quesada Street, Washington, DC. Contributions in her memory may be made to the Kueffner Scholarship Fund, Carleton College, 1 North College Street, Northfield, MN 55057.
Joseph “Joe” Grenon
On Wednesday July 23, 2019, Joseph “Joe” Grenon passed away after a lengthy battle with cancer. He is survived by his two brothers, sister, numerous nieces and nephews, and his faithful dog, Iko, who has been adopted by his family.
Joe was born October 2nd 1952 in Sudbury, Ontario, Canada. The last of four siblings, he came into a world surrounded by love and left the world with them by his side. We all knew Joe with different hats on – brother, uncle, friend, acquaintance. Our memories of him are coloured by the passage of years and the stages of life in which we knew him.
His sunny childhood was spent blueberry picking, swimming at Mine Mill Beach, and swinging on monkey bars. There were mountains to be explored, tunnels to be followed, and beaver dams to be discovered. He and his brother, David, would build roads in sand piles and dirt that took them to new lands and far-off places. Highways to great cities and isolated islands, constructed with the imagination of 10-year-old boys, came into being only to be washed away by rain and the autumn weather. Summers gave way to winters equally magical and adventurous. Toboggans were connected to a Renault Dauphine, and kids, who often used their feet as emergency brakes, were towed down snowy streets by a mother who didn’t always realize the force of the car’s brakes.
There were chores to be done, TVs to be fixed, soda coolers to stock, odd jobs to be completed. The kids grew, and Joe’s intellect began to shine. An Ontario Scholar, Joe completed a year of architectural design at the University of Toronto before settling into and graduating with a BFA in photography studies from Ryerson University. After graduation, those old dirt roads Joe once followed in his dreams became the highways of Canada’s west. In Lloydminster and Edmonton, Joe worked in retail and then for the ground crew of Pacific Western Airlines. It was on vacation in Hawaii when Joe met the late Emory William (“Bill”) Reisinger III, who would become his partner in love and life. Bill convinced Joe to move to the United States and they made their home in Alexandria, Virginia, where Joe found he had a knack for restoring antiques of metal and wood. Joe also continued to wear many other hats, writing for the Hamilton Ontario Spectator, playing the role of Steve in A Streetcar Named Desire, and serving on the Floor Committee of Washington’s National Cotillion. In 1988, he was one of ten participants chosen for the Annual Perspectives in Conservation Invitational Workshop in Ottawa, Canada.
In Alexandria, he and Bill owned and operated The Place Where Louie Dwells, named for Bill’s former restaurant, where they dealt in antiques and restored furniture. Joe became renowned as a restorer of all things wood and brought back to life countless artifacts, from the smallest family heirlooms to pieces of American history from the White House, to the grand doors of the St. John’s Episcopal Church in Lafayette Square. It was through his skill as a restorer that he met his late, life-long friends, Mario and Elsbeth Werner, who remained pillars in his life until their passing.
Sadly, Bill passed away and a devastating fire destroyed The Place Where Louie Dwells, taking Joe away from Alexandria and the D.C. area for several years. Eventually, he returned and took on ownership of Awesome Metals Restoration in Kensington, Maryland, where he extended his restoration talents to metals such as silver, bronze, brass, and zinc dye cast and to the intricacies of porcelain and china. He was a man of many talents and a resource for so many that knew him. He remained in Kensington for the rest of his time, where he made many friends and adopted his best friend, Iko, a faithful Australian shepherd.
Later in life, Joe got into white water kayaking and found a passion for and sense of peace with being on the river. And even though Iko had a decided dislike for the water, it was not uncommon to find him right next to Joe, wearing his doggy lifejacket and standing sentinel as Joe’s protector. The two were inseparable until Joe’s passing.
Just as Joe conquered streams and rivers, he conquered the hearts of all who knew him. Joe had a reputation for being extremely passionate, and although he had some difficulty controlling its delivery, his compassion shone through and endeared him to the folks around him. It was not always easy to care for Joe in his final years, but the love he showed others came back to him tenfold toward the end. He was and his family are sincerely grateful to all those involved. We are particularly grateful to Dr. Hwang and his staff at Kaiser Permanente, Gaithersburg, to Joe’s long-standing physician at Kaiser, Dr. Cameron, and to Nurse Helen Wells and the rest of the team from Montgomery Hospice for their compassionate and diligent care. He will be remembered ardently by his friends and family and deeply missed.
Rest well, Joe, in love and peace.
We will not stand at your grave and weep
You are not there, you do not sleep
You are a thousand winds that blow
You are the diamond glints on the snow
You are the sunlight on ripened grain
You are the gentle autumn rain
When we awake in the morning hush
You are the swift uplifting rush
Of quiet birds in circled flight
You are the soft stars that shine at night
We will not stand at your grave and cry
You are not there, you did not die
Janet Hancheruk
Janet Hancheruk (LaScola), age 57, of Brunswick, MD, passed away the morning of August 1st, 2019 in Silver Spring, Maryland surrounded by loved ones. Her infectious smile and laugh will be missed by many. Janet leaves behind Michael Hancheruk and beloved daughters Megan and Angela. She was the daughter of Mario and Beverly LaScola (both deceased); and the sister to Sharon Mullen (deceased) (John; deceased), Donna Connors (Chris), Denise Nolan (Tommy), Gina Price (Harry), Anita Buckingham (Kenny), Tony LaScola (deceased), and Lynda Folk (Gary). Janet leaves behind many nieces, nephews, cousins, and friends.
Family and friends are invited to attend the visitation on Sunday, August 4th from 2- 4 and 7 – 9 pm at Francis J Collins Funeral Home, 500 University Blvd W, Silver Spring, MD. (Valet Parking). Mass of Christian Burial at St.John the Evangelist Historic Church & Our Lady Queen of Poland Parish (9700 Rosensteel Ave, Forest Glen, MD) on Monday, August 5th at 11 am.
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Carolyn Estelle (Ward) Pleasant-Hayes
Carolyn Estelle (Ward) Pleasant-Hayes, beloved mother, grandmother and friend passed away peacefully and with her children surrounding her on July 27, 2019 at Anne Arundel Medical Center, Annapolis Maryland.
Carolyn is survived by her children, son Oscar V. Pleasant, Jr (wife Monica), daughter, Tonya Pleasant, sons Desmond A. Hayes (wife Tinisha) and Douglas Scot Wellington Hayes. She is grandmother to Amara Jackson and Anthony Jackson, Jr, Destiny, Taylor and David Hayes. Sister to Erie Martinez Ward, Jr and Thomas A. Ward III. Sister to Eleanor T. Johnson. Other siblings, the late Cecil A. Ward and Walter Denham Ward Sr. Carolyn has a host of very precious nieces, nephews, cousins, other relatives and friends whom she loved deeply and so very much!
Relatives and friends will celebrate her life on Friday, August 9th, 2019 at First United Methodist Church of Hyattsville, Maryland – 9127 Belcrest Road at 11:00 a.m.
Edwin Michael Lynch (Age 87)
On Thursday, August 1, 2019, Eddie passed away in his home in Kensington, MD. Beloved husband of the late Mary Rose Lynch; father of Diane Mock and Michael Lynch; grandfather of Jennifer (Christopher) Burek and Michelle (Jack) McNellis; great- grandfather of Landon, Vale and Francis; brother-in-law of David Lloyd (Winnie) Boothe; Also survived by nieces and nephews. Eddie was born and raised in Washington, DC along with his two sisters. He graduated from Blessed Sacrament and Wilson High School. Eddie and Mary Rose made Kensington their home in 1958. He was a member of the teamster union for over forty years. He also enjoyed spending time at his river home in Rock Point MD. Relatives and friends may call at Collins Funeral Home, 500 University Boulevard West, Silver Spring, MD, 20901 (Valet Parking), Tuesday, August 6, from 2 to 4 pm and 7 to 9 pm. Mass of Christian Burial at Holy Redeemer Church, 9705 Summit Ave, Kensington, MD, 20895 on Wednesday, August 7, at 10:30 Interment Gate of Heaven Cemetery. In lieu of flowers memorial contributions may be made to Montgomery Hospice, 1355 Piccard Drive, Suite 100, Rockville, MD 20850.
Bebe Lila Melville (Age 89)
On Sunday, July 28, 2019, of Silver Spring, MD. Beloved wife of the late Leslie Melville; mother of Ferial Melville, Patrick Melville (Christine Archer), Gillene Nelson (Wayne) and David Melville; grandmother of Michele (Ivan), Nicole, Simone and Meagan; great grandmother of Dylan, Lola and Evan; sister of Derek Roy Mushrakeen (Ann), Farida Nilofar “Faye” (Grant), Amnah Bilkecee, Sheryl Jaffran, Gordon Shorab (Lyn), Nazellah Mariam “Girlie” (Terry), Brian Rustum “Bunny” (Judy), and the late Bibi Heena Veerasawmy (Ken), Charles Ramon “Boyie”, and Gerald Lancelot Fausma “Dickie”. She was preceded in death by her parents, Charles Isaac Spooner and Bebe Mariam Mahal Begum Khan0 Spooner. Relatives and friends may call at Collins Funeral Home, 500 University Boulevard West, Silver Spring, MD, (Valet Parking), Friday, August 9, from 3 to 5 p.m. and 7 to 9 p.m. Mass of Christian Burial at St. Andrew Apostle Church, Kemp Mill Road and Arcola Ave., Silver Spring, MD, on Saturday, August 10, at 10:30 a.m. Interment Gate of Heaven Cemetery.
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Francis J. Collins Funeral Home, Inc.
500 University Blvd. West
Silver Spring, MD 20901
Phone: 301.593.9500