Sunday, September 16, 2007
Mary Corbett MoranPsychologist
Mary Corbett Moran, 85, a retired clinical psychologist who practiced for 18 years in Cumberland, Md., died Sept. 6 of cancer at Howard County General Hospital. She had lived for the past two years in Ellicott City.
Mrs. Moran was born in Beloit, Wis., and came to Washington as a seventh-grader. She graduated from the old Sacred Heart Academy and, in 1943, from Trinity University in Washington.
During World War II , she worked with the Red Cross as a displaced persons specialist, helping to resettle war refugees. She received a master's degree in clinical psychology from Catholic University in the late 1940s and did additional graduate work at the university.
Mrs. Moran lived with her family in the Midwest in the 1960s and 1970s. During that time, she taught psychology and philosophy at Clarke College in Dubuque, Iowa, and worked as a psychologist for a rehabilitation hospital in Ohio.
In 1976, she settled in Cumberland, where she was a psychologist with the Allegany County Health Department. She retired in 1994.
Ms. Moran was an advocate for people with disabilities and was on the board of directors of Friends Aware, a group providing assistance to disabled people in Cumberland.
Her interests included writing, reading, sewing and current events.
Her husband of 34 years, Lawrence Moran, died in 1985. A son, Gregory Moran, died in 1990.
Survivors include five children, David Moran of River Ridge, La., Lucy Moran of Ellicott City, Joann Moran of Austin, Martha Rollins of Cumberland and Liz Capone of Burtonsville; two sisters, Helen Owens of Bethesda and Anne Mann of Washington; and eight grandchildren.
-- Matt Schudel
George L. West Jr.Foreign Service Officer
George Lybrook West Jr., 97, who retired from the Foreign Service and the U.S. Information Agency, died Sept. 4 at his home in Maplewood Park Place in Bethesda, where he had lived since 1996. He had chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.
He was born in Seattle and was a 1933 philosophy graduate of Stanford University. He then worked for Standard Oil in California for about four years.
In 1938, he joined the Foreign Service and served as vice consul in posts in Canada, Greenland, Sweden and Finland. He was in Washington at the State Department from 1945 to 1948 and then served as consul in Luxembourg, Bonn and Frankfurt.
In the mid-1950s, he worked at the State Department as desk officer for French and Iberian Affairs and deputy director of the Office of European Affairs. He served as charg? and counselor in Paris from 1957 to 1960.
He retired from the State Department in 1962 and from then until 1972 he was a cultural affairs officer with the USIA. He traveled around the world with such entertainers as the Alvin Ailey dance troupe, actress Celeste Holm and the Duquesne University Tamburitzans, an Eastern European music and dance group.
He was a member of DACOR, or Diplomatic and Consular Officers Retired.
His marriage to Patricia Roscicni West ended in divorce. His second wife, Jacqueline Chadbourn West, whom he married in 1970, died in 1996.
Survivors include a daughter from his first marriage, Geraldine W. Boswell of Olney; three stepchildren, Cynthia James of Overland, Kan., and Claudia Chadbourn and Zan Benham, both of Sarasota, Fla.; and a granddaughter.
-- Yvonne Shinhoster Lamb
Mary-Turley DevineCommerce Program Manager
Mary-Turley Lemon Coulter Devine, 85, who headed an award program in the Commerce Department's Office of Economic Development, died Sept. 6 at the Fountains at Washington House in Alexandria, where she lived. She had Alzheimer's disease.
Mrs. Devine was born in Hannibal, Mo., and moved to Arlington with her family during the Depression. She graduated from Roosevelt High School in the District and attended Strayer College.
She joined the War Department during World War II, and after the war, she was sent to Nuremberg, Germany, as a secretary for the war crime trials. After returning to the Washington area, she joined the Commerce Department. She retired in 1978.
After retiring from the government, she worked for the Daughters of the American Revolution in the registrar's office for about 10 years. She continued to volunteer for DAR after she left her paid job and was active in the docent program.
She was a member of the Colonial Dames and the Washington Assembly.
Her marriages to Robert William Coulter and Paul Salembier Devine ended in divorce.
Survivors include a daughter from her first marriage, Laura E. Coulter Thomas of Warrenton, and a grandson.
-- Patricia Sullivan
Cynthia Eileen BennettCIA Secretary
Cynthia Eileen Bennett, 63, a former Fairfax City resident who worked at the CIA for 21 years, died Aug. 22 of injuries from an automobile accident in Bonita Springs, Fla. She lived in Naples, Fla.
Ms. Bennett's car was hit head-on on Old Route 41 in Bonita Springs when she was returning to Naples from volunteer work in Bonita Springs, her son said.
She was born in Washington and grew up in Virginia Beach, Staunton, Va., Roanoke and Northern Virginia. She graduated from Shenandoah College in Winchester, Va.
Ms. Bennett did secretarial work at the CIA before retiring in 1997.
While living in Fairfax City, she volunteered for many years as a big sister. She was a member of Lord of Life Lutheran Church in Fairfax.
After retiring, she moved from Fairfax City to Naples, where she worked part time at a branch of the Collier County Public Library. She also volunteered one morning a week in Bonita Springs at the Cafe of Life, which provides food and other support for the working poor.
An adoptee, she located her birth family later in life and made a great effort to get to know her birth siblings.
Ms. Bennett enjoyed walking and collecting shells on Naples beaches. She recently took up ballroom dancing and discovered a natural talent that gave her great pleasure. She treasured many family heirlooms that had been handed down from previous generations.
Her marriages to Edward M. Gantt and John Leibermann ended in divorce.
Survivors include her son from her first marriage, Erik Gantt of Fort Collins, Colo.; and a brother.
-- Yvonne Shinhoster Lamb