By Chuck Peek
[Formerly posted twice a year, now four times a year–the perils of growing older!]
Friends and Acquaintances
We are blessed
By marvels wearing ordinary clothes—
how easily we’re fooled by simple dress
(Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer)
Betty Bethel, former colleague at UNK, friend of many of our friends, partner with Frank Robinson who was one of the first people to greet us when we moved to Kearney in 1977.
Sharon Binfield Thompson, my first date in college, arranged by fraternity brother Marvin Cox, and in the ways of the first-year student I liked her . . . and never invited her out again. Go figure.
Ron Blessing, local owner of a company doing lots of large construction projects and generous supporter of UNK; killed when the bulldozer he had been driving ran over him.
Peter Hays, one of the founders of the Hemingway Society, on the boards for Wharton and Fitzgerald, after a lifetime teaching at U. Cal. Davis.
Beth Hemmer, parishioner at Saint Mark’s on the Campus, Lincoln; on my first Sunday there she came to me before the service and said “I’m the one who gets the gluten free wafer.” Epistle side, front, every Sunday!
Lori Gerih, with good memories of a long-time association at Kearney Community Theater and prayers for Jeff and Brad
Jesse Gross, wife of Fr. Robert Gross (St. Andrew’s Omaha), who died on Palm Sunday
Kent Maaske, long associated with what was once our “local” radio station but better known about town for his many roles for Kearney Community Theater, especially bringing Neil Simon to life on the stage; married to another KCT star, Dr. Terry Poorman.
Bobbie McKenzie, long-time “face” of the Journalism Department at UNK, who rose above the daily pain of her nearly life-long battle with disfiguring arthritis.
Charles N. “Tod” Oliver, for years edited the Hemingway Review until Jim Hinkle asked him one day why he didn’t put out a review on a “good author,” and thus the Faulkner Journal was born; he and his surviving spouse Helen were close friends of our close friends the Carothers, and we enjoyed their company at many conferences.
Vern Plambeck, long-time fixture in the KSC/UNK English Department, Editor of the Platte Valley Review (the first Nebraska journal to publish one of my poems), who taught sports literature as literature and not as sport, despite bringing to the subject nearly a life-time of sports officiating recognized in the Nebraska Sports Hall of Fame.
Brent Renaud, Time Inc. film maker, killed in Ukraine while making a film about the refugee crisis.
Shane Richey, son of Jenny (Barney) and Bob Richey, one of the youngsters around St. Luke’s when I was rector and later when he was in college called on me for some conversations.
David Sellmyer, parishioner at St. Mark’s on the Campus, Lincoln, and UNL Physics professor with a world-wide reputation, after a long battle with cancer.
Pat Sheldon, Deacon at St. Augustine’s Elkhorn, spiritual companion to many there and elsewhere since her ordination in 1990, including offering prayer services where she was in assisted living; God’s grace and Pat’s jolly soul were a great combination.
Marge Sneller, after just a short time in Hospice. She and Dr. Sneller were friends of my folks at St. Mark’s, Hastings, and Todd, one of her son’s was one of my Wardens the year I was an interim at St. Mark’s, Lincoln. His brother Jeff brought her to church—until Covid shut down public worship for a while, at least in parishes that took their neighbor’s well-being ahead of their own convenience. She was a wonderful, cheerful woman, and I was able to send her greetings just a week before she died.
Dennis Wilson, of Red Cloud and formerly from the McCook area; he and his wife Cheryl were our most gracious hosts in their home for many Cather Spring Conferences which, coming in the spring, usually came in good enough weather for Dennis to be on the golf course he lived next to in the home of his and Cheryl’s own design.
Those In the News
This awful gift
Of recognition
(Callie Siskel)
Madeleine Albright, first woman to be Secretary of State, who always wondered how a future Secretary could have studied with Madelaine’s father and not learned any more than she had.
Louie Anderson, a large man known for being light on his feet (Fred Astaire with a broken leg one comedian quipped); sometimes comedian, sometimes producer, sometimes writer, and often ill.
Robert Durst, Murder will out when you are out of real estate
Paul Farmer, where medical practice and liberation theology met and kissed; a great international figure whose wisdom and compassion were bent on benefitting global health.
Gilbert Gottfried, leaving us to wonder what call heaven has for kitsch or parrot voices.
Thich Nhat Hanh, champion of “engaged” Buddhism, peace activist, early opponent of the war in Vietnam, companion of MLK, Jr.!
Dwayne Haskins, died in an accident; formerly Ohio State, currently Pittsburg Steeler’s QB, known for being a hard-working, conscientious teammate on and off the field. 24 years old.
Howard Hesseman, who took having actually once been a DJ to a new fever pitch on WKRP.
Hot Lips Houlihan, aka Sally Kellerman, one of the two most important majors of the time, along with Major Major of Catch-22; if she could see the chaos and idiocy of the M.A.S.H. unit, she must surely have seen the similar discord and mindlessness of our politics today!
William Hurt, whose quirky and evocative film portrayals spanned nearly 50 years of his short life and won him an Academy Award.
Darren Krull, Elwood, Nebraska’s volunteer fire chief; killed in a vehicle crash during the fighting of a fire in nearby Edison when smoke covered the road and suddenly there was no visibility.
Ed Littler, sports reporter for Chanel 4 NBC affiliate. How often at basketball games or on the football sideline, I’d see him lugging a huge camera around, always friendly. I watched him help a sportscaster from a rival station whose equipment wasn’t working.
Fred Luebke, a belated notice of a death I wasn’t aware of for the last necrology: a fine historian at UNL where he was involved in the Center for Great Plains Studies, at one of whose conferences a number of us took dinner together at Billie’s and, as the salad was arriving, someone said, “Fred, what in your view is the essential difference between Kansas and Nebraska?” And Fred’s fascinating discourse finished about the time dessert was over.
Meatloaf. Well, now he’ll find out if he is or isn’t a bat out of hell!
Luc Montagnier, Nobel Prize winning discoverer of HIV–whose death will be honored by all those who died for lack of his discovery, for lack of our will to treat disease like disease rather than make politics of it, and who will be mmourned by all those living now because of his work.. But all cups spill over: he who found the virus that causes AIDS fell into a dispute over it and later turned bitter, taking an anti-vaccine stance during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Sidney Poitier, extolled by MLK, Jr. (Where Do We Go from Here?), the first African American actor to be awarded the Oscar for Best Performance in a starring role…that was 1964 … Hollywood waited over half a century to turn that corner! Watch any awards show today and you will see how many owe him a great debt.
Dan Reeves, think Cowboys, Broncos, Giants, Falcons. Think 3rd most appearances in Super Bowls of any NFL player/coach. Onto a new “ring of fame.”
Mimi Reinhardt, from the list she typed that saved thousands (Schindler’s) to her name written in the book of the Lamb!
Bob Saget, pretty sure he never met my mother and know for a fact he never showed the funniest home videos, because we never made any.
André Leon Talley—a fashion designer who grew up in the “Jim Crow” south and ended up in the great Paris fashion salons! Noting the presence of a Black Man in a “notoriously white and . . . elitist” field, The New Yorker credited his success to an “encyclopedic knowledge of fashion history.”
Louis Weil, one of the outstanding liturgical scholars of the American Church, my memory of him from where I sat in Nashota House’s “court of the gentiles” and where he sat just ahead of me side by side with Archbishop Michael Ramsay, Ramsay kneeling, Louis standing with hands upraised, an icon of one more battle that didn’t need to be fought.
Betty White, what can be said about a legend in her own time? The one-time sidekick to Allen Ludden whom now no one remembers while she made entertainment history. There should be a Betty White energizer bunny!
Posting these “In Memoriams” more frequently now since, in getting older myself, the deaths of contemporaries occur more frequently, and choosing (along with roughly New Years, Memorial Day, and my birthday) Holy Saturday because, as an English Bishop once remarked, this is the day Jesus went to hell to see if he could find his old friend Judas! See, too, this weekend our usual Eastertide Reflections.
capeek 