Friday, December 29, 2006
Nora Davis BurtonVolunteer
Nora Davis Burton, 88, a Washington area volunteer and the wife of a Marine Corps officer, died Dec. 14 of ovarian cancer at her home in Fairfax City. She had lived in Northern Virginia since 1959.
Mrs. Burton was born in Honolulu in what was then the territory of Hawaii. After graduating from high school in 1936, she married a Marine Corps lieutenant. The couple lived in Virginia, South Carolina and Cuba before being transferred back to Hawaii, six days before the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.
During World War II, Mrs. Burton volunteered with a Honolulu blood bank while her husband fought in the South Pacific. She continued her volunteer work during her years in Northern Virginia, volunteering with the Red Cross at Quantico, serving as a member of the Altar Guild of St. Andrew's Episcopal Church in Arlington County and driving for Meals on Wheels.
Her husband, retired Brig. Gen. Custis Burton Jr., died in 1991.
Survivors include two daughters, Sherrill Davis Burton of Whangaparaoa, New Zealand, and Suzanne Leslie Burton of Denver.
Betty SnyderReal Estate AgentBetty Snyder, 81, a former fashion model and an Arlington County real estate agent, died Dec. 26 at Powhatan Nursing Home in Arlington. She had lived in Arlington since 1977.
Mrs. Snyder was born in Waltham, Mass., where she finished high school and began a course in medical technology at what is now Brandeis University. Fashion became her "real vocation," she explained in a memoir she wrote for her family. She worked as a model in Boston in the late 1940s and early 1950s and for Jelleff's department store in Washington in the 1950s and 1960s.
Married to a Navy officer, she lived for extended periods in Argentina and Puerto Rico, where she became fluent in Spanish. From 1970 until 1988, she was a real estate agent with Better Homes Realty and Coldwell Banker in Arlington.
Mrs. Snyder enjoyed travel, particularly extended trips as a passenger on her husband's motorcycle.
With her Spanish fluency, she assisted immigrants who had recently moved to the Washington area.
Her marriage to Robert Casey ended in divorce.
Survivors include her husband of 30 years, John Snyder of Arlington; five children from her first marriage, Catherine Casey-Flavin of Eliot, Maine, Robert Casey of Glen Allen, Va., Christopher Casey of Atlantic Beach, Fla., James Casey of Crofton and Edmund Casey of Alexandria; a sister; and nine grandchildren.
Emanuel 'Bud' Lehman Jr.Credit ManagerEmanuel "Bud" Lehman Jr., 88, a longtime district credit manager with a Falls Church plumbing and heating supply company and a former president of the National Association of Credit Management, died Dec. 18 at Inova Fairfax Hospital of head injuries suffered in a fall at his home in Fairfax City.
Mr. Lehman was born in Richmond. After high school, he worked as a cost accountant for the Southern Biscuit Co. During World War II, he served with the Army in five European battle campaigns and received the Bronze Star.
In 1947, he became a district credit manager for Noland Co. Inc., a plumbing and heating supply company in Falls Church. He also served as Noland's assistant secretary for the Maryland, D.C. and Northern Virginia branches. He retired in 1983.
In 1968-69, Mr. Lehman served as president of the Credit Management Association of Greater Washington and from 1976 to 1978 as vice president of the eastern division of the National Association of Credit Management. In 1979, he was the international president of NACM and traveled more than 125,000 miles worldwide during his tenure.
Mr. Lehman served two terms as president of the Country Club of Fairfax. He was a longtime member of the Kiwanis Club of Arlington, serving as president in 1971-72 and as lieutenant governor of the 20th Division, Capitol District Kiwanis in 1985-86. He also served on the advisory board of the Salvation Army and was a member of Knox Presbyterian Church in Falls Church.
His first wife, Elizabeth Smith Lehman, died in 1973.
Survivors include his wife of 30 years, Caroline Lehman of Fairfax City; a son from his first marriage, Richard W. Lehman of Seattle; three stepchildren, Don Gibson and Gary Gibson, both of Fairfax City, and Linda Matter of Burke; and six grandchildren.
Nelia Badilla ForestProgram AssistantNelia Badilla Forest, 50, a program assistant at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, died Nov. 28 at her family home in Salinas, Calif. She had a rare form of peritoneal-abdominal cancer.
Ms. Forest, a Silver Spring resident, worked in the center's environmental change and security program from 2003 until February. Previously, she was a teaching assistant at the University of California Washington Center. She came to Washington in 2000 for a National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration sea grant fellowship.
She was born into a military family in Sendai, Japan, where her father, a sergeant in the Army, was stationed. She lived at times in Germany, Hawaii, Colorado, Georgia and Salinas.
She received a bachelor's degree in 1989 and a master's degree in 1995, both in landscape architectural from the University of California-Berkeley.
Ms. Forest, who was passionate about coral reef ecosystems and coastal resource management, was nearing completion of her doctorate in geography at the time of her diagnosis. She received a master's degree in geography from UC-Berkeley in 2004.
She learned to speak Spanish and Indonesian while preparing for research projects in Mexico, the Philippines, Honduras and Costa Rica and for a U.S. Agency for International Development coastal resources management project in Sulawesi, Indonesia. From 1989 until 2000, she was a coastal development analyst for the California Coastal Conservancy.
Her marriage to Steven Forest ended in divorce.
Survivors include her partner, Andrew Eisenberg of Baltimore; two sons, Brian J. Forest of Berkeley and Aaron C. Forest of Hayward, Calif.; a sister; and three brothers.
Nelson T. Snyder IIIArmy Captain, Business OwnerNelson Taylor Snyder III, 82, a retired Army captain and owner of Pest Proof Inc., an extermination business in Fairfax County, died Dec. 25 at his home in the Alexandria part of Fairfax County. He had lung cancer.
Capt. Snyder was an Alexandria native and attended George Washington High School and what is now Longwood University in Farmville, Va.
He served in the Army infantry during World War II in North Africa, Sicily and Europe. He participated in the D-Day invasion and the Battle of the Bulge. He later served in the artillery during the Korean War. His final active-duty assignment, in 1966, was at Fort Sill, Okla.
Afterward, he settled in the Washington area in 1966 and worked for Orkin pest control before starting his own business about 1970. He retired in 1986.
His military decorations included the Bronze Star. He was a former commander of American Legion Post 24 in Alexandria.
His avocations included gardening and bridge.
His marriage to Jane Turner Snyder ended in divorce.
Survivors include his wife of 46 years, Rotraut Rinneberg Snyder of Fairfax; two children from his second marriage, Gwendolyn Smuts of Richmond and N. Kurt Snyder of Burke; and four grandchildren.
Margaret S. 'Missy' MooneyAdministrative AssistantMargaret Schreier "Missy" Mooney, 68, who for the past seven years had been an administrative assistant for Edward N. Bodurian, a Chevy Chase-based cardiologist, died Dec. 26 at her home in Rockville. She had lung cancer.
Mrs. Mooney was a member of St. Patrick's Catholic Church in Rockville and did volunteer work for Meals on Wheels and St. Ann's Infant and Maternity Home in Hyattsville.
She was born in Washington and raised in Chevy Chase. She was a 1956 graduate of Stone Ridge School of the Sacred Heart in Bethesda and a 1960 graduate of Rosemont College in Pennsylvania. As a young woman, she excelled in horse-show exhibition jumping.
Her husband, William A. Mooney, whom she married in 1961, died in 2001.
Survivors include four children, William M. "Buzz" Mooney of Frederick, Maura E. Mooney of Rockville and Margaret "Magee" Mooney and Kathleen "Casey" Mooney, both of Berkeley, Calif.; two sisters, Mary Anne O'Donnell of Chevy Chase and Thomasine Schreier of Bethany Beach, Del.; a brother, Edwin P. "Ned" Schreier Jr. of Annapolis; and three grandchildren.
Carlos OrtegaAgriculture Department OfficerCarlos Juan Ortega, 87, who retired in 1984 as a top Agriculture Department administrator with the Food for Peace program in Eastern Europe and the Middle East, died Dec. 27 at his daughter's home in Maplewood, Minn. He had complications from a chronic subdural hematoma.
Mr. Ortega joined the Agriculture Department in 1946 and spent most of his career in the Foreign Agricultural Service. He was an agricultural attache in Ecuador, Venezuela and Peru before settling in the Washington area in 1975. He moved to Minnesota from Burke in 2003.
Mr. Ortega was born in Las Vegas, N.M. He attended New Mexico Highlands University and was a rural schoolteacher in Northern New Mexico. He served in the New Mexico National Guard. He did intelligence work for the Army Air Forces in Europe during World War II.
He received a bachelor's degree from George Washington University in 1975.
He was a former president of the USDA-Washington, D.C., chapter of the Hispanic American Culture Effort.
Survivors include his wife, Betty James Ortega of Maplewood, whom he married in 1944; three children, Elizabeth Aleman of Springfield, Amelia Ortega of St. Paul, Minn., and Dr. Richard Ortega of Columbia; a sister; a brother; four grandchildren; and a great-grandson.
Carroll T. RobinsonNSA Senior ExecutiveCarroll Thaddeus Robinson, 82, an electrical engineer who became a senior executive at the National Security Agency, died Dec. 22 at Providence Hospital. He had emphysema.
Starting in the late 1940s, Mr. Robinson worked for an Army Department predecessor of the NSA.
According to the NSA Web site, Mr. Robinson was the first black engineer at the agency and was assigned to the research and development directorate. He worked on a team that built an early digital computer and retired in 1978 as an office chief in research and development.
Mr. Robinson, a native Washingtonian, was a 1942 graduate of Armstrong High School and a 1948 electrical engineering graduate of Howard University. He served in the Army in Europe during World War II.
A boater and fisherman, he was corresponding secretary of the Seafarers Yacht Club in Annapolis. He also was a former member of the board of directors of the Arc of D.C., which helps people with mental disabilities.
His other memberships included the Suaves social club and the Oyster Harbor Community Association. He lived in Washington and had a beach home in the Oyster Harbor neighborhood in Annapolis.
Survivors include his wife of 59 years, Jean Young Robinson of Washington; two children, Bonnie McKenzie and Marc Robinson, both of Washington; five sisters, Gloria Featherstone of Accokeek, Sheila Barnett of Clinton, Alicia Porter of Glenn Dale and Terita Gregory and Colette Proctor, both of Washington; two brothers, Leo Robinson of Philadelphia and Andre Robinson of Washington; six grandchildren; and three great-grandchildren.
Donald Blake PetersonElectrical EngineerDonald Blake Peterson, 72, a retired vice president and senior engineer with E.K. Fox & Associates, a consulting engineering firm in Fairfax, died Dec. 14 at the Gainesville Health & Rehabilitation Center in Gainesville. He had emphysema and congestive heart failure.
Mr. Peterson, an electrical engineer, joined E.K. Fox when it was formed in 1980 and worked there full time until 1999. He retired but continued as a consultant until his death.
During his career there, he worked on the firm's contracts with the State Department, which included field site investigation work, system studies, facility design and supervision of hundreds of overseas buildings operations projects.
Before 1980, Mr. Peterson worked for other private engineering firms as well as the Federal Aviation Administration and the Army Corps of Engineers. Some of his work experience included construction field supervision of large commercial and government projects with oversight of electrical power generating systems.
Mr. Peterson, who lived in Gainesville, was a native of Granville, N.D. He served in the Air Force in the 1950s and studied electrical engineering at the Columbia Technical Institute in Arlington.
He was a member of the Illuminating Engineering Society, the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers and the International Association of Electrical Inspectors.
His marriage to Mary H. Peterson ended in divorce.
Survivors include two daughters, Donna Hasty of Nokesville, Va., and Kim Ryman of Mount Jackson, Va.; five sisters; a brother; and three grandchildren.
Julie Ana HamiltonGraphic Designer
Julie Ana Hamilton, 55, a graphic designer with the U.S. Department of Labor, died of cancer Dec. 23 at her home in Upper Marlboro.
Ms. Hamilton was born in Steubenville, Ohio, and grew up in the District, graduating from McKinley Tech High School in 1968.
She held a variety of positions in graphic design, most of them in the Washington area. From 1989 until 2000, she was a senior desktop publications specialist at the Association of Trial Lawyers of America. From 2000 until 2004, she was a senior graphic designer at the American Association of University Women. She joined the Department of Labor in 2005 as a senior graphic designer.
Ms. Hamilton was a talented painter and had sold several of her works over the years. She also enjoyed the martial arts and achieved a third-degree black belt in kung fu.
Survivors include three daughters, Elise Dori Hamilton of Anaheim, Calif., Denis Lori Williams of Lanham and Nina Marie Schultz of Upper Marlboro; her stepfather, Clarence Willis of Gaithersburg; a sister, Stefanie Gina Bradley of Randallstown, Md.; a brother, Otto Gregory of Gaithersburg; and three grandchildren.