Requiem: Fond Farewells

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Monica Pence Barlow, 36

When Monica Barlow, the Orioles public relations director since 2008, died not long into the team’s spring training this past February, players, coaches, and members of the media fought back tears, some unsuccessfully. Barlow succumbed to lung cancer, and had spent much of the previous five years since her diagnosis raising funds for and awareness of the disease for the nonprofit LUNGevity Foundation.

“Monica was able to walk that fine line between taking care of the players and handling all the responsibilities that come with being a club employee and taking care of the media’s needs and being a friend to so many of us,” recalls Roch Kubatko, who blogs about the Orioles for MASN. “More than one person in the organization told me that they felt as though she was celebrating with them after the Orioles won the division.”

To show their gratitude, Orioles players voted to donate a share of their post-season earnings to Barlow’s estate and to LUNGevity. Adds Kubatko, “I just hope she knew how much she was loved and respected inside that clubhouse.”

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Daniel Bedell

Frank Cashen, 88

When Frank Cashen took over as executive vice-president of the Orioles in late 1965, he boasted zero administrative or playing experience in baseball. He’d put in 17 years at the now-defunct News American (most as a sportswriter/columnist) and then six working for Orioles owner Jerry Hoffberger, first as publicity boss at Hoffberger’s harness racing track and later as advertising director for his National Brewing Company.

Improbably, through savvy trades (Hall of Fame outfielder Frank Robinson), inspired hires (manager Earl Weaver), and meticulous development of young players in the team’s farm system (third baseman Brooks Robinson), Cashen transformed the Orioles into a baseball behemoth. Under Cashen and director of player personnel Harry Dalton, the Orioles won four American League pennants and two World Series (1966, 1970), and then, with Cashen as general manager, two division championships after Dalton departed in 1971. Cashen himself left the team in 1975, and later guided the New York Mets to a 1986 world championship.

“Frank Cashen’s first big deal as a baseball executive exemplified his career—it worked on the field, in the clubhouse, and at the box office,” explains Stephen J.K. Walters, professor of economics at Loyola University Maryland and adviser to the Orioles. “When he and Harry Dalton stole Frank Robinson from Cincinnati in December of ’65, the city of Baltimore got just what it needed: a star and a leader who happened to be African-American and who would show his teammates and the fans just how good things could be here.”

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William G. “Bill” Evans, 83

Inventive, intrepid, jokey, and nimble with the language, Bill Evans applied his bulging bag of advertising tricks to campaigns for a gaggle of local products and services—Colt 45 malt liquor, McCormick spices, Ozite indoor-outdoor carpeting—while working at a series of Baltimore agencies from 1961 to 1992. His efforts earned him four Clio awards, the Oscars of the advertising universe.

But he left his most indelible mark with a slogan he wrote in the early 1970s as a public service to boost tourism in a Baltimore then plagued by a festering inferiority complex: “Charm City.” The phrase stuck, becoming part of the local DNA.

“Bill was an intuitive, clever copywriter,” says John P. McLaughlin, who worked with Evans at the Richardson Myers & Donofrio agency and later at their own firm. “I thought his special talent was writing for radio and the print media. He wasn’t without his complexities, and he wasn’t very patient . . . But [clients] eventually grew to appreciate the talent he brought to their businesses. His ‘Charm City’ copy was a brilliant branding line for the City of Baltimore.”

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June Wing, 98

June Wing walked the walk and talked the talk of an old-school 1960s leftie, building coalitions, educating the public, and working within the system on a host of social, environmental, and political issues, both locally and nationally.

At the height of the Vietnam War, she attended the raucous 1968 Democratic Convention in Chicago as a supporter of anti-war presidential candidate Senator Eugene McCarthy, and in the late 1960s participated in the successful effort to stop “The Road,” the proposed multi-lane East-West Expressway that would have rolled through the Inner Harbor, Fells Point, Highlandtown, and Canton.

In pursuit of her ideals, Wing served as president of both the Baltimore chapter of the League of Women Voters and the Maryland chapter of the Committee for a Sane Nuclear Policy. “Nuclear issues were of central concern to her,” says Mary S. “Mimi” Cooper, a teacher and activist who is a former member of the board of the Rachel Carson Council. “June enriched the lives of many with her wit, keen mind, and her willingness to question and seek solutions with others.”

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Courtesy of Maryland State Archives

Bishop Lee Robinson Sr., 86

When Bishop Robinson joined the city police department in 1952, segregation still permeated its ranks, with black officers forbidden from patrolling white neighborhoods. Over the next 35 years, Robinson’s constant professionalism in a panoply of leadership roles—commander of Eastern District, chief of Patrol Division, head of Operations Bureau, deputy commissioner, and, finally, the city’s first African-American police commissioner in 1984—helped to remove barriers for blacks in the department.

“He was a trailblazer in many ways,” recalls Fred Bealefeld, the city’s police commissioner from 2007 to 2012—Bealefeld joined the force in 1981—and who now holds the position of vice-president and chief global security officer at athletic-wear company Under Armour.

“He encouraged all of us to do better and dedicate ourselves to service,” adds Bealefeld. “He was a man that I could reach out to at any time and get advice without concern. He was patient, nonjudgmental, and kind, and I always felt reassured by him.”

After he stepped down as commissioner in 1987, Robinson served as secretary of the state Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services for 10 years, and, later, as Maryland’s juvenile justice secretary for four years.

“When I think of commissioner Robinson,” recalls Bealefeld, “I will always remember how confident and sure he was, and of the positive spirit he evoked in all of us.”

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Torrey C. Brown, 77

As a Johns Hopkins medical doctor and head of its hospital’s emergency room, Torrey Brown gained considerable experience administering to the needs of sick patients. As chair of the Environmental Matters Committee in the state House of Delegates, Brown became acquainted with the state’s land, water, and wildlife problems. He put those dual backgrounds to effective use when, in 1983, he took over as secretary of the state’s Department of Natural Resources.

His 12 years in the post included imposing a moratorium on striped bass fishing that revived depleted rockfish; supporting projects that reduced damage from acid mine drainage into the North Branch of the Potomac; promoting Program Open Space to protect Maryland’s lands; and urging passage of the Critical Area Act, which prevented pollution by curbing development along the Chesapeake Bay.

“Torrey had the gift of being able to work with everyone,” says Chesapeake Bay Foundation President William C. Baker. “He truly loved Maryland’s natural resources and the Chesapeake Bay, and stood firm in their defense.”

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Zachary Lederer, 20

Snapped by his father, the photo of Zach Lederer shows him lying in his hospital bed one hour after 2012 surgery for a brain tumor, his biceps flexed proudly in a muscleman’s pose. Zach immediately posted the image to his Facebook page. Soon others, friends and total strangers alike, did the same, and the photo of him “Zaching”—similar to the one below—went viral.

Diagnosed with a brain tumor at 11, Zach was given little chance to live another year. Remarkably, he recovered and went on to excel as a student—and play football—at Centennial High School in Howard County, and later enrolled at the University of Maryland, College Park, where he served as a manager for the men’s basketball team until his illness forced him to withdraw. Zach died this past March. But Zaching lives on.

“I don’t know what it is about [Zaching], if endorphins get going or what it is, but it does make you feel good,” his mother, Christine Lederer, said in an ESPN report. “And it just symbolizes hope and courage to me—not just for Zach, but for anyone going through a debilitating illness right now.”

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Courtesy of The Whiting-Turner Contracting Company

Willard Hackerman, 95

A lifelong overachiever, Willard Hackerman graduated from The Johns Hopkins University’s School of Engineering at age 19 in 1938 and then joined the city’s then-tiny Whiting-Turner Contracting Company. Eight years later, he ascended to the firm’s board, and, in 1955, became president and CEO.

Under Hackerman, Whiting-Turner mushroomed into the nation’s fourth-biggest general builder, with 2,500 employees, Towson headquarters, and 33 regional offices. Its signature local projects include Harborplace, M&T Bank Stadium, the National Aquarium, Joseph Meyerhoff Symphony Hall, Johns Hopkins’ academic and medical campuses, and the University of Baltimore’s striking new Angelos Law Center.

“Whiting-Turner is one of the giant companies that has built Baltimore over the past 60 years,” says M.J. “Jay” Brodie, former president of the Baltimore Development Corporation (BDC). Adds Kimberly Clark, current BDC executive vice-president, “Willard Hackerman may be best known [for his] legacy of the physical developments throughout the city, but more important are his philanthropic activities and support of foundations and nonprofits.”

That philanthropy, through Whiting-Turner and personally, has benefitted arts (The Walters Art Museum), educational (Hopkins, Notre Dame of Maryland), healthcare (Sinai Hospital), and cultural (The Associated) institutions.

“Willard Hackerman embodied tzedakah,” notes Brodie, “the Hebrew term for generosity without expectations of anything in return. I wish that I could have made a mold of him.”

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William Worthy, 92

With the Cold War at its frostiest in the 1950s and 1960s, Baltimore Afro-American foreign correspondent William Worthy boldly went where few reporters dared: Moscow, talking to just plain folks and interviewing soon-to-be Soviet premier Nikita Khrushchev; mainland China, speaking with ordinary citizens, quizzing premier Zhou Enlai, and interviewing American POWs from the Korean War; and Cuba, where he interviewed Fidel Castro and reported on race relations. In 1981, he toured Iran in the wake of its Islamic revolution and the takeover of the U.S. embassy there.

“William Worthy knew that the greatest attribute of a good foreign correspondent is the ability to reach the story, no matter who or what tries to stop you,” notes Dan Fesperman, thriller novelist and a former overseas reporter for The Sun. “In an era when his colleagues were easily cowed by travel bans and jingoism, Worthy got there anyway and delivered the goods, only to be punished by government officials. They took his passport, took him to court, and nearly took him to jail, but the one thing they never did was stop him.”

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Vivienne Shub, 95

For seven decades, Vivienne Shub cut a remarkable swath as both an actor and an acting educator, appearing most memorably at Center Stage and Everyman Theatre, while supervising Center Stage’s Children’s Theater, teaching kids at the Creative Arts Workshop and Children’s Drama Center, and conducting drama classes at Towson University. She also served as founder and head of the nonprofit Baltimore Theatre Alliance, which supports local stagecraft.

“Vivienne was in one of the first shows I directed at Center Stage,” remembers the theater’s longtime artistic director, Irene Lewis. “Her role called for a French accent, and hers was good enough to convince the entire cast that she was French.”

In 2008, Shub capped her distinguished theater life in Viva, La Vivienne, her final production. “She touched so many people,” says Harriet Lynn, founder of the Heritage Theatre Artists’ Consortium and Shub’s cousin. “Whether knowing her from watching her perform, working with her on stage, or being her student, we knew we were in touch with a woman deeply and emotionally committed.”

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Courtesy of Kimberley Amprey Flowers

Walter Amprey, 69

A Baltimore native, product of city schools (an Edmondson High graduate), and educator at the city’s Calverton Junior and Walbook Senior High schools, Walter Amprey knew the landscape intimately when he took over as Baltimore’s schools superintendent in 1991 after occupying various administrative posts in Baltimore County. He immediately embarked on a campaign of modernization and innovation, including bringing in one outside contractor to manage nine schools, and another to tutor faltering students.

“Dr. Amprey was selected to be superintendent based in part on the recommendations of a group of distinguished educators and elected officials who had knowledge of his experience as a successful administrator,” explains Kurt Schmoke, who, as Baltimore’s mayor, appointed Amprey, and who now serves as president of the University of Baltimore.

However, when pupils’ test scores failed to appreciably increase, Schmoke agreed to relinquish to the state some governance of city schools in exchange for a massive infusion of financial resources, in effect, putting Amprey out of a job when both he and the school board were replaced.

“That controversial but important decision significantly benefitted the children of Baltimore City,” notes Schmoke, who points out that, throughout the contentious process, Amprey remained “an energetic and inspirational advocate for Baltimore City public schools.”

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Nelson Carey, 50

At his subtly elegant Belvedere Square wine bar, Grand Cru, owner Nelson Carey created an atmosphere of relaxed bonhomie for everyone—employees, regulars, and newcomers.

“Nelson’s desire was to create the kind of place where he and his friends would like to hang out,” says longtime bartender Charles Vascellaro. “Working at Grand Cru always has felt more like being part of a club and less like an actual job, and that feeling has been extended by the staff to the people who also come in to hang out there—a feeling of casual intimacy.”

Carey immersed himself in Grand Cru, always striving to improve the place, including studying to be a master sommelier, a task he’d nearly completed when he died.

“At Belvedere Square and Grand Cru, all are welcome and welcoming in the spirit of shared community,” notes Bill Struever, a principal at Cross Street Partners, which manages Belvedere Square. “There was no greater ambassador for this spirit than Nelson Carey, who, through his wit and wisdom, was a beacon of good cheer for all.”

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