Saturday, February 21, 2009
Walter E. 'Jug' Megaw Jr. Cartographer
Walter Edward "Jug" Megaw Jr., 84, a World War II glider pilot and retired geodesist and cartographer with the Army Map Service, died Jan. 28 of sepsis at Virginia Hospital Center. He was a longtime Falls Church resident.
Mr. Megaw was born in the District and graduated from Eastern High School in 1942. Enlisting in the Army Air Forces that same year, he learned to fly before he learned to drive. Commissioned as a warrant officer, he became a glider pilot in Europe.
After his discharge, he returned to the Washington area and took a job at the Army Map Service -- now the National Geospatial Intelligence Agency -- as a geodesist and cartographer. Throughout his career, he worked with digital information that became the foundation some years after his retirement for cruise missile navigation.
Mr. Megaw retired in the early 1980s, and for a few years drove a school bus for the Congressional Schools of Virginia in Falls Church. He also was active in an Eastern High School reunion committee and was a Mason for more than 60 years. He was one of the top duckpin bowlers in the mid-Atlantic region.
His wife, Jeanette "Jay" Megaw, died in 2008.
Survivors include two sons, George Megaw of Fort Lauderdale, Fla., and Stuart Megaw of Fairfax County; and two grandsons.
-- Joe Holley
Ronald A. Miller Sr. D.C. Public School Administrator
Ronald A. Miller Sr., 62, who retired in 1998 as the assistant principal at Patricia R. Harris Education Center in Washington, died Feb. 11 at Bradford Oaks Nursing and Rehabilitation Center in Clinton. He had esophageal cancer.
Mr. Miller joined the District's public school system in 1968 as a social studies teacher at Shaw Junior High School, where he also was an assistant basketball coach. In the 1970s, he became an assistant principal, first at Jefferson Junior High School and then at Coolidge High School, Paul Public Charter School and Ballou High School, among others.
Ronald Arthur Miller, a Washington native, graduated from McKinley Technical High School in 1964 and received a bachelor's degree in education from the old D.C. Teachers College in 1968.
He helped develop several mentoring programs in the public school system, including a Saturday school program for boys and girls and a reading program. He was also involved with the Concerned Black Men of Washington, a community-action group. From 1998 until 2001, he was a Maryland probation officer in Prince Georges County.
Survivors include his wife of 37 years, Velmar Graham Miller of Temple Hills; and two children, Dr. Robyn R. Miller of Hershey, Pa., and Ronald A. Miller Jr. of Bowie.
-- Lauren Wiseman
Jon R. Morris CIA Scientist
Jon R. Morris, 68, who had been a senior scientist with the CIA since 1998, died Jan. 31 at Capital Hospice in Arlington. He had pancreatic cancer.
Dr. Morris, a Fairfax City resident, was a mathematician with conglomerate Martin Marietta from 1984 to 1987 and the consulting firm Booz Allen Hamilton from 1987 to 1998.
Jon Russell Morris was born in Rushville, Ill., and received a bachelor's degree in mathematics in 1961 from Illinois Wesleyan University in Bloomington.
He received a master's degree from the University of Denver in 1964 and a doctorate from the University of Colorado at Boulder in 1971, both in mathematics. From 1972 to 1984 he was a research design professor at the University of Minnesota.
He was a member of the American Statistical Association.
Survivors include his wife of 45 years, Sidney Connelly Morris of Fairfax City; two children, Jon L. Morris of Arlington and Kara Lawrence of Fairfax County; a sister; and three grandchildren.
-- Lauren Wiseman
Solveig M. Salvino Librarian
Solveig M. Salvino, 93, a volunteer librarian at what is now known as Lincoln Middle School in Washington during the 1970s, died Feb. 9 at the Casey House hospice in Rockville of viral encephalitis.
Mrs. Salvino started her career in the late 1930s as a hospital librarian in Westchester County, N.Y. During World War II, she worked as a hospital librarian at Camp Pendleton, Calif.
Solveig Marie Callerstrom was a native of Northwood, N.D., and a 1937 library science graduate of the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis.
She subsequently lived in Washington State, Alaska and Arizona. She was a rockhound, or a mineral collector. At an Arizona state fair during the 1960s she won a blue ribbon for her mineral collection. She had lived in Kensington since 1967.
During the 1970s and 1980s, she was a volunteer at the Smithsonian Institution and at Cedar Lane Unitarian Universalist Church in Bethesda. She also was a member of the American Chestnut Foundation, a group dedicated to the restoration of the American chestnut tree.
Her husband of 60 years, Joseph N. Salvino, died in 2005.
Survivors include two children, Jeanine Delutri of St. Paul, Minn., and William Salvino of Kensington; a grandson; and two great-granddaughters.
-- Lauren Wiseman
C. Russell Scoville Transportation Dept. Employee
C. Russell Scoville, 70, a program manager for the Transportation Department's Urban Mass Transit Administration from 1971 until his retirement in 2001, died Feb. 16 at his home in Flint Hill, Va. He had multiple myeloma.
During his tenure with the Transportation Department, Mr. Scoville spent a year in Puerto Rico as a special adviser to Puerto Rico's transportation secretary. During the 1970s, he led a team that determined the federal funding allocation for the Washington area's Metro system.
Clyde Russell Scoville was a native of Salt Lake City and a 1961 geography graduate of the University of Utah. He received a master's degree in business administration from the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton business school in 1970.
From 1962 to 1965, he was a Peace Corps volunteer in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, and from 1966 to 1968 was an associate director for the Peace Corps in Asmara, Eritrea. He was fluent in Amharic, a Semitic language that is an official language of Ethiopia.
He was an Alexandria resident from 1970 until 2001, when he moved to Rappahannock County. Interested in sustainable agriculture, he raised dairy goats on his mini-farm in Alexandria and practiced organic farming at his home in Flint Hill.
He was a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Front Royal, Va.
Survivors include his wife of 42 years, Polly Rightmire Scoville of Flint Hill; four children, Becky Timothy of Bristow, Jen Babcock of Alexandria, Chris Scoville of Flint Hill and Ben Scoville of Indio, Calif.; four brothers; two sisters; and 13 grandchildren.
-- Lauren Wiseman
Evan J. Parker Jr. CIA Officer
Evan James Parker Jr., 89, a retired senior operations officer with the Central Intelligence Agency, died Feb. 9 at Carriage Hill of Bethesda retirement facility. He had a stroke.
Mr. Parker, who was born in Amesbury, Mass., joined the Army after graduating from Cornell University in 1942. He was assigned to the Office of Strategic Services, the wartime forerunner of the CIA, and served in China and Burma during World War II. His decorations included the Bronze Star Medal and the Air Medal.
After a short time as a salesman, he joined the CIA in 1949. He was involved in clandestine operations in Vietnam but spent most of his career at the agency's Langley headquarters until his retirement in 1976.
Mr. Parker received a master's degree in ancient history from American University in 1979. He also learned to speak Welsh as an adult and was a member of St. David's Welsh American Society, a group that promotes Welsh culture.
His wife of 27 years, Barbara Wilson Parker, died in 1981.
Survivors include two children, Evan J. Parker III of Potomac and Deborah Ann Parker of Lexington, Ky.
-- Matt Schudel