Loise Sullivan; Social Worker, Political Activist

Loise Angela Mary Zanzucchi Sullivan, 76, a clinical social worker who was executive director of the Rosemount Center in Washington, died of complications from cardiac surgery April 25 at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore.

Mrs. Sullivan, a Silver Spring resident for 42 years, was assistant director of the House of Mercy, a home for unwed mothers in the District, starting in the early 1970s. As the needs of the community changed, the organization became a bilingual day-care center, the Rosemount Center, and Mrs. Sullivan became its director. She retired in 1982.

A lifelong political activist, Mrs. Sullivan joined the 1963 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, where Martin Luther King Jr. delivered his historic "I Have a Dream" speech. Mrs. Sullivan then worked in the anti-war movement and volunteered for anti-poverty campaigns.

She joined the board of Shepherd's Table, a group that feeds the homeless. She later helped found Community Vision, an employment training and outreach program. After retiring from the Rosemount Center, she joined the Silver Spring Interfaith Housing Coalition and helped plan, establish and name Progress Place, a self-help center for the homeless in downtown Silver Spring. The center helped move homeless people from the streets and shelters to rental apartments; some even bought homes.

"It's really gratifying work because you do see progress," Mrs. Sullivan said when she won the 2001 Path of Achievement advocacy award from Montgomery County.

She was born in Syracuse, N.Y., and graduated from LeMoyne College in Syracuse. She also received two master's degrees, one in social work from Boston College in 1955 and one in the mid-1970s from Washington's Antioch College in early childhood education.

She also volunteered for the National Organization for Women, the League of Women Voters, the Montgomery County Coalition for the Homeless, Women's Strike for Peace, Altrusa Club, U.S.-China People's Friendship Association and the Silver Spring Garden Club. She was also a member of St. John the Baptist Catholic Church in Silver Spring.

In 2001, she and her husband retired to Surfside Beach, S.C., and Newburyport, Mass.

Survivors include her husband of 50 years, Eugene Joseph Sullivan of Surfside Beach; four children, John J. Sullivan of Saratoga Springs, N.Y., Dr. Gregory B. Sullivan of York, Pa., Andrea Loise Turner of Popes Creek and Dr. Eugene Jeffrey Sullivan of Olney; and 11 grandchildren.

-- Patricia Sullivan