If you live to be in your 60s and 70s (like many of us have) and you’re a newspaper reader (like some of us still are), mandatory stops in the Sunday Star are the “Final Chapters” segment and the “Remembrances,” better known as the obituaries.
It can be touching, satisfying or sad — or all of those — reading about people who are just a few steps ahead of us as we hurtle toward our ultimate mark on the horizon.
Here’s a sample of some of those who made the “Final Chapters” and “Remembrances” columns today…
Charles Van Doren
He was a college professor who got on the old TV quiz show “Twenty-One” and allowed himself to be talked into cheating his way to winning a then-record $129,000. He confessed before a congressional committee in 1959 and then lived much of the rest of his life in something self-banishment, refusing to grant interviews and even leaving the country for several weeks when the firm “Quiz Show,” about the rigged game, was released in 1994.
On Saturday’s Op-Ed page in The New York Times, columnist Bret Stephens tipped his hat to Van Doren for never trying to capitalize in any way on his name recognition. What a contrast, Stephens said, to the way many people deal now with cheating and lying after being exposed — and how differently society treats them.
As Stephens observed…
“Had Van Doren come along a few decades later, there would have been no big scandal in fabricating reality and no great shame in participating in it. The lines between fame and infamy would have blurred, and both could be monetized.”
Stephens’ closed with these sentences: “Van Doren died redeemed. Rest in peace.”
He died April 9 in Canaan, CT, and was 93.
Marilynn Smith
She was a Topeka native who went on to become national golf champion at the University of Kansas and one of 13 founders of the LPGA Tour. She won 21 tournaments as a pro, including two majors. Smith’s obituary in The Times said that when the LPGA was founded in the 1950s, “the women also lacked the funds to fly, so they traveled to tournaments in caravans of four or five automobiles when the interstate highway system was in its infancy.”
Marilynn Smith at a 1965 tournament in New Jersey
The Times described Smith as “an exuberant woman who seemed just right for publicizing the tour” and quoted her as saying…
“We would go to major league ball parks, St. Louis, Cincinnati, Washington, D.C., and hit golf balls from home plate out to center field, with a 9 or an 8 iron, and then we’d get on the microphone and ask those baseball fans to come out and see the LPGA play.”
Last year, the LPGA sponsored 32 events in 13 countries and awarded $65.35 million in prize money.
Smith died Tuesday in Goodyear, AZ; she was 89.
Salvatore A. Belfonte
From the nationally known, we move to local people…
Everyone in Kansas City recognizes the Belfonte name, and most have probably purchased Belfonte milk, cottage cheese or ice cream.
Belfonte
Sal Belfonte is the guy who got that dairy business started. Quoting the obit…
“Sal’s career in the dairy business began in 1957 with Sealtest Dairy where he delivered milk door to door. In 1967 Sal went into business for himself when he purchased a small dairy distributor selling Meadow Gold dairy products…The young company, rooted in family values, was run by members of the Belfonte family. Sal’s wife handled accounting and his children loaded trucks and answered phones.”
When I go to Price Chopper or Brookside Market and need milk, I always pull a carton of Belfonte from the cooler.
Sal Belfonte died April 11 at age 84.
Michael Thomason
I have no connection with Thomason and had never heard of him. But his obit caught my eye partly because he was only 42 when he died.
The first paragraph of the obit said Thomason grew up in Raytown and graduated from Raytown South. He was employed by the Kiewit Engineering Group and liked to fish and play golf and was a Royals’ and Chiefs’ fan.
The second paragraph took a sharp turn…
“After a lifetime of struggling, he was finally overwhelmed by the pain and despair of chronic major depression. His family is heartbroken…”
Thomason
I can’t remember an obit that took on the issue of depression, and, by extension, suicide, so directly.
It took a lot of courage for the family to write that obit that way. My heart goes out to them, and I applaud them.
Michael died April 10. Survivors include his parents and a son and a daughter.
JimmyCsays: At the juncture of journalism and daily life in KC 
Depression is so frightening because it is so completely irrational. John Uhlmann is the perfect example. He had a wonderful family who adored him and he them. He had wealth and was always the epitome of what a gentleman should be. One looks in vain in his life for anything that would cause one to become so deeply depressed to the point of taking their own life and yet he did, leaving friends and family stunned and without answers. I talked to his closest friend and he was as stunned as anyone.
How do you predict and intercede in an illness with no symptoms? Absolutely hearbreaking.
I always read the obits!
Everyone interested in journalism should watch “Joseph Pulitzer” on PBS’s American Masters!
To put things in perspective, the Consumer Price Index calculator says Charles Van Doren’s winnings of $129,000 would have the purchasing power of $1,223,584.25. today. Other ways of computing inflation put the dollar value at more than $2 million. Regardless, both are more than a contestant could win on “Who Wants to be a Millionaire” or “Deal or No Deal.”
Mr. Van Doren took the high road in admitting his guilt, and I believe the man was sincerely contrite. Here is a link to a transcript of his 1959 testimony to a congressional committee: http://historymatters.gmu.edu/d/6566/