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VIX, MAURICE ‘MOE' JOHN
March 26, 2002
Maurice "Moe" John Vix, a district manager for Pernod Ricard USA, died Friday of cancer at his home. He was 44. Mr. Vix was born in Metairie and lived in Mandeville for the past four years. He graduated from Archbishop Rummel High School and received a degree in business from the University of New Orleans. He was a member of Wines Unlimited and The Nobles band. He was inducted into the Louisiana Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, coached soccer for the Lafreniere and Mandeville soccer clubs, and coached basketball for the Amateur Athletic Union girls' biddy basketball team. He was a past Grand Knight of the St. Christopher Parish Knights of Columbus and a member of Father Peter Boerding Council No. 6357. Survivors include his fiancee, Sheryl B. Cross; two daughters, Ashley L. and Emily C. Vix; his father, Clifford A. Vix Jr.; two brothers, Clifford A. "Skip" Vix III and Ronald P. Vix; and a grandchild. A Mass was said Monday at Our Lady of Perpetual Help Catholic Church, Belle Chasse. Burial was in the church cemetery. Mothe Funeral Home handled arrangements.
VERRET, MYRTICE
March 26, 2002
Myrtice Verret, a retired nurses' aide at Charity Hospital, died Sunday at Riverland Healthcare Center in Lutcher. She was 78. Miss Verret was born in New Orleans and lived in LaPlace. Survivors include a son, Roy Verret Sr.; a daughter, Marie Juanita Varnado of Avondale; four sisters, Joyce Harrison of New Orleans, Bernita Tollison of Houston, Lois Devall and Norma Triche of Syracuse, N.Y.; 10 grandchildren; and 19 great-grandchildren. A Mass will be said Wednesday at 11 a.m. at Our Lady of Grace Catholic Church in Reserve. Visitation will begin at 9 a.m. Burial will be in Mount Olivet cemetery. Robottom Mortuary is in charge of the arrangements.
George Effinger, 55, science-fiction author
April 30, 2002
George Alec Effinger, a science-fiction writer who won top awards in his literary field, died Friday of undetermined causes at his New Orleans home. He was 55.
A Cleveland native who had lived most of the past 30 years in New Orleans, Mr. Effinger wrote hundreds of short stories and more than 20 books, including mysteries and crime novels in addition to science fiction. He also created several computer role-playing games.
He is perhaps best known for "Schrodinger's Kitten, " the novelette that won both the Hugo in 1988 and the Nebula in 1989, science fiction's most prestigious awards. His other well-known works were a trilogy of futuristic stories, influenced by Raymond Chandler and based on the recurring character of detective Marid Audran: "When Gravity Fails, " "A Fire in the Sun" and "The Exile Kiss, " in which the French Quarter is transformed into a futuristic Arabic city called the Budayeen.
Other works include the novel "What Entropy Means to Me" and the award-winning short story "The Aliens Who Knew, I Mean, Everything." But Mr. Effinger's work, filled with fine characterization and dark humor, transcended genre.
Mr. Effinger originally intended to become a surgeon but dropped out of Yale University to live in New York. He returned to Yale, but soon it became clear that writing would be his chosen profession.
His first wife, whom he met while she was browsing in the science-fiction section of the New York bookstore where he worked, introduced him to Damon Knight and Kate Wilhelm, two of the best-known science-fiction writers in the country, who became important mentors to Mr. Effinger.
He said that his writing career really began with a summer writing workshop in Pennsylvania in 1970: "I wrote my first story, sold my first novel, and I never looked back."
Mr. Effinger moved to New Orleans after attending a writing workshop at Tulane University in 1971, and, finding the city an inspiration, he entered his most productive writing period. In addition to writing, he taught a popular creative-writing class at the University of New Orleans Metropolitan College, and many of his students went on to become friends, meeting with Mr. Effinger in a monthly writing group. He was a frequent guest at science-fiction conventions throughout the country and a collector of Depression glass, which played an important part in his novel "Heroics."
His favorite word, he once said, was "terrific." "I have my characters say it under any possible circumstances. It means whatever it means at the moment, from tremendous praise to tremendous put-down."
When Mr. Effinger married
his third wife, novelist Barbara Hambly, in 1998, he moved to Los Angeles. "We were co-guests of honor at a science-fiction convention, and it was love at first sight, " Hambly said. "We were married
in November of 1998."
Mr. Effinger returned to New Orleans in the spring of 2000 after he and Hambly divorced. "He had talent to burn, and he burned it, " Hambly said. "One of the most frustrating things about him was seeing what he could have done. We were in touch daily. Since the divorce and since he moved back to New Orleans, we spoke daily. We were best friends."
Mr. Effinger's life was complicated by recurring illness and addictions to painkillers and alcohol, Hambly said. "In the last four years of his life, he went through rehab twice, he was in 12-step programs. The last five months of his life he was completely clean and sober. He was working again, he has two short stories in anthologies coming out in the next couple of months, and he had a good shot at getting his life back together and starting his career again. He put up a hell of a fight."
Mr. Effinger, long appreciated worldwide in science fiction circles, regretted not having a higher profile in his adopted hometown. "I'm to Japan what Jerry Lewis is to France. They love me over there, " he once said.
Mr. Effinger is survived by Hambly, who is his literary executor.
A memorial may be planned later.
Norma M. Hynes, N.O. humanitarian
December 1, 2001
Norma Monnin Hynes, a New Orleans activist who helped people, especially poor children, throughout the city through organizations she established, died Friday at her Slidell home. She was 86.
"There wasn't an undertaking she wouldn't try to get involved in if someone needed help, " said Caroline Kitchen, a longtime friend. "She was one hell of a woman."
No need seemed too large or too small for the Gentilly native, friends said. While she pushed to include girls in Catholic Youth Organization activities, founded the Touro-Shakspeare Guild and the Louise Day Nursery Guild, and set up the Friends of the House of Bread to feed and clothe poor children, Mrs. Hynes also bought shoes for children in public housing every year, beginning in 1955.
"When she was growing up, she always got new shoes for Christmas and Easter, and it really distressed her to think that there were children who might have to go without them, " said Pat Henican, another friend.
Mrs. Hynes arranged for an insurance policy to set up a fund to continue the shoe-buying tradition after her death, said Susan Schoen, a friend.
Mrs. Hynes worked with many other initiatives involving children. Working through Variety Club, she raised money to buy medicine for poor youngsters, and she started the group's project of taking care of poor families at Christmas.
But she also operated on her own. After hearing that a Gentilly family's clothes had been destroyed one night in a fire, she gathered up a bundle of clothing and went there to do what she could, Schoen said.
"When she heard there was a need, she acted, " Schoen said.
In recognition of her activities, Mrs. Hynes received a long list of honors, including certificates of merit from four New Orleans mayors and The Times-Picayune Loving Cup for 1973.
"Her concern . . . has been a genuine humanitarian effort, aimed selflessly toward the goal of helping those who cannot help themselves, " the Loving Cup Committee wrote in its citation. "Through her generosity, thousands of frowns have been turned to smiles, tears to gladness, grief to thanksgiving."
She also received an honorary doctorate from Our Lady of Holy Cross College and was honored by a host of organizations, including the Catholic Church, the Institute for Human Understanding, Sertoma International, the Little Sisters of the Poor, the St. Vincent Infant and Maternity Guild and the Sophie L. Gumbel Guild.
"I'm very glad that I lived and that God used me, " Mrs. Hynes said late in her life. "I wish I could have done more."
Although she had devoted most of her waking hours to charitable work since 1937, Mrs. Hynes became a businesswoman in 1969 when she assumed the presidency of T. Milton Hynes Finance Co. on the death of her husband, for whom the company was named.
Mrs. Hynes felt she had no choice, Kitchens said, adding that her friend gave this explanation for her action: "There are people who need help, and I'll be damned if I let this go to the winds."
She is survived by nieces and nephews.
Visitation will be Monday from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. at St. Dominic Church, 775 Harrison Ave. A Mass will be said there at 1 p.m. Burial will be in Lake Lawn Park. Jacob Schoen & Son Funeral Home is in charge of arrangements.
Beau Holton, 73, top tennis player
October 1, 2002
William Alexander "Beau" Holton, a top tennis player with a lifelong passion for all aspects of the game, died Monday at Memorial Medical Center of complications from hepatitis C, contracted through a blood transfusion. He was 73.
Mr. Holton, captain of the 1952 Louisiana State University tennis team, went on to become Southern district champ and maintained high state and regional rankings for the rest of his life. He was No. 1 in 65 singles in the state from 1994 until 1997 and was ranked in the top tier for the South many of those years. He was No. 1 in the state 70 singles and doubles in 2000. He also officiated at matches and trained people around the state to be certified umpires and referees.
"His enthusiasm for the sport was second to none, " said Charles Turner, a longtime friend and occasional doubles partner. "He loved the game of tennis, and he loved to promote tennis and see it grow."
Mr. Holton was inducted into the Louisiana Tennis Hall of Fame in 1999. That year he also was named Official of the Year by the Louisiana Tennis Association.
A native of Chicago who moved to New Orleans in 1947, Mr. Holton graduated from Louisiana State University with a degree in business.
After college, where he was president of his fraternity, Sigma Chi, Mr. Holton served as a helicopter pilot with the 6th Fleet in the Mediterranean and retired as a captain after 20 years in the Naval Reserve.
Mr. Holton worked as a stockbroker and certified financial planner before founding Holton Brokerage Co., a wholesale meat distributorship. He was on the New Orleans Sewerage & Water Board for 20 years and served for a time as president pro-tem.
But tennis was his passion, friends said.
"He could remember every point that he ever played, " said Martin "Catfish" Jones, a friend since college who was Mr. Holton's longtime doubles partner. "I kid you not. You could remind him of a year and a tournament, and he could tell you what happened and who hit what. His memory was amazing."
Throughout his playing career, which lasted until he became ill, Mr. Holton held top rankings as a singles and a doubles player, Jones said, and he had not lost a tournament match to a Louisianian since 1987.
But that was only half of his tennis life. In 1952, the same year in which he led LSU's tennis team, Mr. Holton and his teammates were asked to officiate at the state high school tennis championship.
It was, he said later, a time when umpires and referees didn't need to be certified to work a tournament.
The experience piqued Mr. Holton's interest in that aspect of the sport. He became a referee for U.S. Tennis Association tournaments, the Sugar Bowl tennis tourney and the New Orleans Lawn Tennis Club Senior Invitational. He was a member of the New Orleans Lawn Tennis Club.
Mr. Holton also was a volunteer and deputy director for New Orleans Recreation Department tennis tournaments, and he conducted workshops and seminars for people seeking certification as tennis officials.
In 2000, Mr. Holton was named the tennis association's Official of the Year for this part of the country, and he was declared Louisiana Official of the Year.
Survivors include his wife, Bess Godchaux Holton; two sons, Mark B. Holton of Greenwich, Conn., and Christopher W. Holton; a stepson, Christopher J. Roos; two stepdaughters, Marilyn R. White of Greenwich and Gretchen R. Zito of Jackson, Miss.; a sister, Betsy H. Lunn of Shreveport; and 12 grandchildren.
A memorial service will be held Wednesday at noon at Bultman Funeral Home, 3338 St. Charles Ave. Visitation begins at 11 a.m.
E. Henry Heaton, ex-assessor in Orleans
December 21, 2001
Former New Orleans Assessor Edwin Henry Heaton, a member of a Carrollton family that has played a prominent role in New Orleans politics since the early 20th century, died Thursday of complications from heart surgery at NorthShore Regional Medical Center in Slidell. He was 68.
Mr. Heaton was first elected assessor of the 7th Municipal District in May 1958. The district includes Carrollton and parts of Lakeview. He retired in March 1985. His son, Henry F. Heaton, has held the post since then.
While in office, Mr. Heaton championed the cause of the homeowner against the city's $100 property service charge, taking the issue to the Louisiana Supreme Court in 1981, his family said.
Mr. Heaton was the nephew of another Henry Heaton, who was a state representative before he was appointed 7th District assessor in 1936. Mr. Heaton succeeded his uncle as assessor in 1958.
Three of Mr. Heaton's children also went into politics. Besides Assessor Henry F. Heaton, another son, Alex, is a state representative. A third son, Edwin H. "Eddie" Heaton Jr., who died in 1997, served two terms in the 1980s as a state representative from New Orleans' 95th District, now represented by Alex Heaton.
Mr. Heaton graduated from Fortier High School and Tulane University, where he earned a degree in business administration.
He was a founder of the Carrollton/Hollygrove Community Center and a member of the Knights of Columbus.
Besides his sons Henry and Alex, survivors include his wife, Janet Kramer Heaton; two daughters, Bridget Heaton Schommer and Rebecca Heaton McGuire; a sister, Edwina Heaton Lopez; 14 grandchildren; and two great-grandchildren.
A Mass will be said Saturday at noon at Incarnate Word Catholic Church, 8316 Apricot St. Visitation will be today from 7 to 9 p.m. and Saturday from 10 a.m. to noon. Burial will be in Metairie cemetery. Lake Lawn Metairie Funeral Home is in charge of arrangements.
HATFIELD, CHARLES J.
June 15, 2002
Charles J. Hatfield, civil rights pioneer
Charles J. Hatfield, who inadvertently helped create Southern University Law Center in Baton Rouge when he sued in 1946 to integrate Louisiana State University's law school, died Friday of complications from pancreatic cancer at Memorial Medical Center's Mercy campus. He was 87.
In response to Mr. Hatfield's litigation, the state appropriated $40, 000 to establish Southern's law school, the first in the state for African-Americans. His attorneys, including A.P. Tureaud of New Orleans and Thurgood Marshall of the NAACP, had earned their degrees at Howard University in Washington, D.C.
But Mr. Hatfield, a Xavier University graduate, wound up not studying law at all. Before Southern's center opened in 1947, he moved to Atlanta because Tureaud feared for his client's safety. He earned a master's degree in sociology at Atlanta University (now Clark Atlanta University) in 1948 and returned to New Orleans, his hometown, to acquire a master's degree in education at Xavier in 1950.
Mr. Hatfield, who spent his career teaching in two New Orleans high schools, was a founding member of United Teachers of New Orleans, the teachers' union.
Southern honored him twice: on the law center's 50th anniversary in 1997 and at its commencement last month, when it gave him its first-ever honorary law degree.
The university hailed him "for exhibiting courage, foresight and determination in securing for African-Americans the right to study law in the state of Louisiana."
Mr. Hatfield was humble about such praise. "Although I never anticipated great acclaim for the things I have done to further the cause of our people, it does make one feel warm inside to be reminded of some benefits mankind has derived, " he said in an interview in The Louisiana Education Association Journal.
Mr. Hatfield sued LSU because its law dean, Paul M. Hebert, told him in a letter that "Louisiana State University does not accept colored students."
Similar petitions were filed in 1946 in Oklahoma, Texas and South Carolina. Mr. Hatfield's suit was unique because he filed on his own without being recruited to do so, said Evelyn Wilson, a professor at Southern University Law Center who is writing a history of Mr. Hatfield and his family.
Defendants were Hebert, LSU President William Bass Hatcher and LSU's Board of Supervisors. Before they could respond to Mr. Hatfield's suit, the state Board of Education in December 1946 started the process of establishing a law school at Southern that would be open for the 1947-48 term. A month later, the Board of Liquidation of State Debt appropriated $40, 000 for that purpose.
Even though Mr. Hatfield never enrolled there, his litigation was hardly in vain, Wilson said.
"Because of the suit, Southern University has a law center, " she said. "If nobody had brought any litigation, there probably wouldn't have been a law center."
Mr. Hatfield, who also had worked as a postal clerk, taught Spanish, English and social studies at Joseph S. Clark and George Washington Carver high schools.
From 1954 to 1972, Mr. Hatfield was active in the black teachers' union and held several offices, including secretary-treasurer, vice president and lobbyist. In 1966, he helped organize the city's first teachers' strike.
When United Teachers of New Orleans was formed in 1972 with the merger of the black and white teachers' unions, Mr. Hatfield was a charter member, and he helped create its credit union. When he retired in 1979, he received UTNO's Pioneer Award in recognition of his union work.
"Charles was a strong union person, " said Nat Lacour, former longtime UTNO president. "We could count on him to be straightforward. He was very interested in the union's work to improve salaries and working conditions. He was very strong in his view about teachers' having a greater voice in decision-making in the school district and their schools."
As a member of UTNO's executive board, "Charles was my strong right arm, " said Lacour, executive vice president of the union's parent organization, the American Federation of Teachers.
Mr. Hatfield also was a founder of the Gentilly Heights Civic Association. A veteran of World War II, he was a member of the Louisiana Education Association and Alpha Kappa Delta, a sociology honor society.
Survivors include his wife, Beulah Ozenne Hatfield; two sons, Charles Joseph Hatfield Jr. and Elliott Jude Hatfield; a daughter, Andrea Marie Hatfield of Lake Charles; a brother, Raymond Hatfield of Philadelphia; and two grandchildren.
A Mass will be said Wednesday at 10 a.m. at Corpus Christi Catholic Church, 2022 St. Bernard Ave. Visitation will begin at 8:30 a.m.
Burial will be in Mount Olivet Mausoleum. Boissiere-Arceneaux-Labat Funeral Home is in charge of arrangements.
HARMON, JOHNNY P.
September 28, 2002
Johnny Harmon, 90, lived with leprosy
Johnny P. Harmon, a longtime leprosy patient at Carville who devoted his life to shattering misunderstandings about the disease, died Wednesday in Baton Rouge. He was 90.
Mr. Harmon, who had lived in and near the 340-acre Gillis W. Long Hansen's Disease Center since 1935, built a photography business in nearby Vacherie, married
a fellow patient and had two children, neither of whom contracted the disease.
Since Mr. Harmon's arrival at the center, leprosy has become known as Hansen's disease, and drugs developed at the center allow treatment on an outpatient basis. These medicines thwart the bacterial infection, but they do not reverse its effects, which can include lesions, loss of feeling in the affected area, paralysis and blindness.
"They changed the name, but we haven't changed the disease, " Mr. Harmon said in an interview. "People are still afraid of us. . . . I want them to know that it's not contagious, and people are not lepers, they're people."
A native of Hankamer, Texas, Mr. Harmon first came to Carville in 1934, accompanying his brother Elmo who was going to Carville because he had leprosy; they traveled to the center from the Harmons' east Texas home.
One year later, Johnny Harmon returned as a patient at the former plantation about 60 miles upriver from New Orleans. At that time, most patients' relatives abandoned them because of the disgrace associated with leprosy.
"It was scary when you walked down the walk, " Mr. Harmon said. "The first man I saw had his face and his arms and his legs all wrapped up. He was blind. . . . You'd see people with no noses, only holes in their heads."
Except for a clawlike left hand, the result of muscle atrophy, Mr. Harmon escaped disfigurement because he volunteered to test an experimental machine that killed the bacilli in his system.
He was declared disease-free and allowed to return in 1938 to his job as an engineer with the Texas Highway Department. His brother Elmo eventually died and was sent home in a coffin that had been soldered shut.
In 1942, Johnny Harmon's disease reappeared, and he returned to Carville. Because he responded well to treatment, he was offered his Texas job again, but he decided to stay in Louisiana because he had begun to put down roots. He and his wife, Anne, moved into a home in Vacherie and lived there until 1993, when they took an apartment at the center for easy access to treatment for Hansen's disease's lingering effects.
Mr. Harmon wrote "King of the Microbes, " a book about the disease, and appeared in a documentary, "Secret People, " about the country's only residential Hansen's disease center.
Despite the disease's effects and lingering stigmas, Mr. Harmon remained upbeat.
"God's been good to me, in spite of the disease, " he said. "You may think I'm crazy, but I think I've lived a fuller life because I've had the disease, because I've met all kinds of people that I wouldn't have met before."
Survivors include a son, Johnny C. Harmon; a daughter, Anne H. Brett; and five grandchildren.
A Mass will be said today at 11 a.m. at Our Lady of Peace Catholic Church in Vacherie. Visitation will begin at 9 a.m. Burial will be in the church cemetery.
