Leonard Amoroso, of bread fame
Leonard Amoroso Sr., 84, formerly of Wynnewood and retired co-owner of Amoroso Baking Co., died at Bryn Mawr Terrace Saturday of complications from a fall.
( By Sally A. Downey, Inquirer Staff Writer, 12/08/2004 03:01 AM EST)

Maurice Petrosky | Clothier, sailor, 88
Maurice Petrosky, 88, formerly of Rosemont, a retired clothing manufacturer and sailor, died Dec. 1 at the Life Care Center in Sarasota, Fla., of complications from a fall.
( 12/08/2004 03:01 AM EST)

F. William Johnson III | Officer, mechanic, 60
F. William Johnson III, 60, of Broomall, a retired Marple Township police officer and skilled auto mechanic, died of cancer Sunday at home.
( 12/08/2004 03:01 AM EST)

George C. Werner | Engineer, 81
George C. Werner, 81, of Newtown Square, a retired engineer, died of cancer Nov. 30 at home. Mr. Werner graduated from West Philadelphia High School and earned a bachelor's degree in engineering from Lehigh University in Bethlehem. During World War II, he was a Navy pilot in the States, patrolling the Atlantic and Pacific coasts. After the war, he served in the Naval Reserve with the Naval Aviation Antisubmarine Warfare Squadron at Willow Grove Naval Air Station. He retired from the reserve in 1967...
( 12/08/2004 03:01 AM EST)

Services set for Obra Kernodle 3d
A memorial service for Obra S. Kernodle 3d, 56, a Philadelphia lawyer and political player who drowned last week while attending his daughter's wedding in Cancun, Mexico, will be held at 10:30 a.m. Monday at Bright Hope Baptist Church, 12th Street and Cecil B. Moore Avenue.
( 12/08/2004 03:01 AM EST)

Sister Peter Claver Fahy, 105
After spending more than half a century as a missionary working in the South and along the Eastern Seaboard, Sister Peter Claver Fahy came to Philadelphia in 1979 to retire. Her time here, however, was spent ministering to prisoners, marching for poor people, and working in soup kitchens and shelters. Sister Peter, 105, died Friday in the Missionary Servants of the Most Blessed Trinity Motherhouse in Northeast Philadelphia.
( By Gayle Ronan Sims, Inquirer Staff Writer, 12/07/2004 03:01 AM EST)

Cheston H. Hall | Purchasing agent, POW, 80
Cheston H. Hall, 80, of Havertown, a retired purchasing agent and World War II prisoner of war, died of cancer Friday at the Bryn Mawr Terrace rehabilitation center.
( 12/07/2004 03:01 AM EST)

Mildred L. Gehring | Teacher, 97
Mildred Loughrey Gehring, 97, of Lansdale, a Philadelphia schoolteacher for 37 years, died Friday at New Seasons, an assisted-living facility in Chalfont.
( 12/07/2004 03:01 AM EST)

Walter S. Thomas Jr. | Engineer, inventor, 86
Walter S. Thomas Jr., 86, of Drexel Hill, an engineer and inventor, died of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease Friday at home. Mr. Thomas graduated from Northeast Catholic High School. While working for SKF Ball Bearings in Philadelphia, he earned an engineering degree at night from Drexel Institute of Technology (now Drexel University).
( 12/07/2004 03:01 AM EST)

Neal M. Welsh | Radio personality, 49
Neal M. Welsh, 49, known as DJ Neal Newman on local radio shows and operations manager at WIP-AM (610) sports radio, died of cardiac arrest Thursday at Mercy Suburban Hospital in Norristown. The Jeffersonville resident had just finished a karate class at Plymouth Meeting Action Karate with his wife and two sons when he collapsed.
( 12/07/2004 03:01 AM EST)

Obituaries
Joseph Hansen, 81, a mystery novelist known for crisp, lean prose and for creating one of his genre's first gay protagonists in the character of Dave Brandstetter, died Nov. 24 of heart failure in Laguna Beach, Calif.
( 12/07/2004 03:01 AM EST)

Bernard Saffran, 68, Swarthmore professor
Bernard Saffran, 68, of Swarthmore, a professor of economics at Swarthmore College who advised government leaders, died of a heart attack Nov. 29 while visiting his daughter in Montreal.
( By Sally A. Downey, Inquirer Staff Writer, 12/07/2004 03:01 AM EST)

Frances Chaney, 89, once-blacklisted star
Frances Chaney, 89, a radio star whose budding film career was stifled after she and her husband, Ring Lardner Jr., were placed on a Hollywood blacklist, died of Alzheimer's disease on Nov. 23 at her home in Manhattan.
( By Jennifer Bayot, New York Times News Service, 12/06/2004 03:01 AM EST)

Verona Johnston, 114; was the oldest person in America
America's oldest person, a 114-year-old woman who had voted in every election since women won the right in 1920, died Wednesday at her home here.
( Associated Press, 12/06/2004 03:01 AM EST)

Willoughby Hatton Jr. | Sun Oil employee, 81
Willoughby "Will" S. Hatton Jr., 81, of Springfield, Delaware County, a retired Sun Oil Co. employee and bowling enthusiast, died of cancer Nov. 30 at Harlee Manor Nursing Home in Springfield.
( 12/06/2004 03:01 AM EST)

Essie M. Crosby Brock | Retired secretary, 88
Essie M. Crosby Brock, 88, of Berwyn, who was a secretary to a prominent lawyer, a federal judge, and a church leader, died of a stroke Monday at Paoli Hospital.
( 12/06/2004 03:01 AM EST)

Obituaries
Mona Van Duyn, 83, the first female U.S. poet laureate and a Pulitzer Prize winner, died Thursday at her home in University City, Mo.
( 12/06/2004 03:01 AM EST)

Thomas S. Elliot | Cabinetmaker, 72
Thomas S. Elliot, 72, of Arcola, a cabinetmaker and Boy Scout volunteer, died of emphysema Nov. 24 at Lankenau Hospital in Wynnewood.
( 12/05/2004 03:01 AM EST)

Bernice C. Hebson, 72, letter carrier
Bernice C. Hebson, 72, of Bristol, regarded by the National Association of Letter Carriers as the first woman in the Philadelphia region to deliver mail, died Wednesday of complications of hepatitis C at her daughter's home in Langhorne.
( By Gayle Ronan Sims, Inquirer Staff Writer, 12/04/2004 03:01 AM EST)

Victor Kremens, 86, pioneering radiologist
Victor Kremens, 86, of Wyncote, a retired radiologist who helped develop X-rays to detect breast cancer, died Thursday of kidney failure at Abington Memorial Hospital.
( By Sally A. Downey, Inquirer Staff Writer, 12/04/2004 03:01 AM EST)

Margaret Piernikowski | Carpet stores co-owner, 70
Margaret "Pern" Simonian Piernikowski, 70, of Southwest Philadelphia, co-owner of Perns Carpeting stores in Philadelphia and West Chester, died of complications from diabetes Tuesday at Roxborough Memorial Hospital.
( 12/04/2004 03:01 AM EST)

Winston A. Ricketts | Counselor, 63
Winston A. Ricketts, 63, of Elkins Park, a substance-abuse counselor and church elder, died of cancer Wednesday while visiting family in Jamaica.
( 12/04/2004 03:01 AM EST)

Sr. Mary E. Esmonde | Professor, 83
Sister Mary Elizabeth Esmonde, 83, of Merion, professor emerita at Gwynedd-Mercy College, died of renal failure Tuesday at McCauley Convent.
( 12/04/2004 03:01 AM EST)

Obituaries
Brother Timothy Diener, 94, who helped shape the California wine industry as longtime cellarmaster for the Christian Brothers' wines and brandies, died Tuesday at the order's Mont La Salle novitiate.
( 12/03/2004 03:01 AM EST)

J. Foster, 68, police officer, bodybuilder
Former Philadelphia Police Officer John G. Foster, 68, a Canine Unit trainer who after leaving the force turned his love of animals into a job heading the Women's Humane Society of Bensalem, died Nov. 25 of a heart attack at Frankford Hospital-Torresdale Campus. Mr. Foster, who was born in Weatherly, Pa., a small upstate town, lived most of his life in the Pennypack Woods section of the Northeast.
( By Gayle Ronan Sims, Inquirer Staff Writer, 12/03/2004 03:01 AM EST)

Harold H. Morris, 87, pioneering psychiatrist
Harold H. Morris Jr., 87, of West Chester, a psychiatrist who pioneered outpatient treatment for the mentally ill, died of heart failure Nov. 13 at Barclay Friends, a nursing facility in West Chester.
( By Sally A. Downey, Inquirer Staff Writer, 12/03/2004 03:01 AM EST)

David Bailey, 71, soap-opera star
Television soap-opera star David Bailey, 71, whose last role was the ruthless Alistair Crane on NBC's Passions, drowned Nov. 25 in his Los Angeles swimming pool.
( By Gayle Ronan Sims, Inquirer Staff Writer, 12/03/2004 03:01 AM EST)

Barbara G. Morgan | Nurse, 77
Barbara Gerberich Morgan, 77, of West Whiteland, a nurse in a West Chester family practice for 25 years, died of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease Tuesday at Park Lane at Bellingham, a nursing facility in West Chester.
( 12/03/2004 03:01 AM EST)

Jerry D. Lee | Engineer, volunteer, 48
Jerry Don Lee, 48, of West Chester, an engineer and church volunteer, died of an apparent heart attack Sunday while leading a Bible studies class at Grove United Methodist Church in West Chester.
( 12/03/2004 03:01 AM EST)

Williabell Clayton Church pianist, 94
Williabell Clayton, 94, of East Mount Airy, mother of Constance E. Clayton, retired superintendent of the School District of Philadelphia, died Saturday of congestive heart failure at Chestnut Hill Hospital.
( 12/03/2004 03:01 AM EST)

June B. Blackman | Teacher, 83
June Bramble Blackman, 83, of Springfield, Delaware County, a retired high school teacher, died Saturday of a heart attack at home.
( 12/03/2004 03:01 AM EST)

Margot D. Richter | Singer, educator, 72
Margot Denithorne Richter, 72, of Collegeville, a singer, music educator, and wife of Richard P. Richter, president emeritus of Ursinus College, died Nov. 25 of lung cancer at Phoenixville Hospital.
( 12/03/2004 03:01 AM EST)