Obituaries

She loved “animals, writing, and telling dirty jokes,” Susan Jane Bell’s brother, Peter Pyatt Bell, recalled this week of his sister, who died on Jan. 20 at the Hamptons Center for Rehabilitation and Nursing in Southampton. “She just told the silliest jokes you could imagine,” Mr. Bell said.

Genevieve Frances Keyser of East Hampton, who had a long career as the head of communications for Winthrop Hospital in Mineola, died of heart disease on Monday. She was 88 and had been ill for about a year and a half.     

William Somerville, a former resident of Montauk, died of heart failure on Jan. 7 in Southampton at the age of 59.   

Cynthia Leigh Silverman, a longtime summer resident of Amagansett who was studying for a joint degree in law and international affairs at the City University of New York, died in New York City on Dec. 14. She was 29.

Geraldine Boxer died at home in East Hampton last Thursday after receiving an unexpected diagnosis of Stage 4 esophageal cancer in mid-December.

Loretta A. Goetz, who was well-known for her knitting and her service to East Hampton Meals on Wheels, died at home in East Hampton on Dec. 20 of cardiac arrest after having a stroke.

Udell M. Cullum, a self-taught architect and builder who helped construct the Art Barge and several houses in the Beach Hampton section of Amagansett, died of congestive heart failure on Jan. 1 at home in Springs. He was 94 and had been ill for eight years.

Through his company Harbor Electronic Publishing, James F. Monaco put out such titles of local interest as “Oh, That’s Another Story: Images and Tales of Sag Harbor,” “On Montauk” and “Sag Harbor Is,” both subtitled “A Literary Celebration,” and, most recently, “True Stories of Old Sag Harbor,” a collection of Sag Harbor Express columns by Jim Marquardt.   

Eleanor L. Ecker, a former librarian at East Hampton High School, died on Saturday at Peconic Bay Medical Center in Riverhead with members of her family present. She was 90 and had had a brief illness.     

Paul H. Harry of East Hampton, a former manager at the Sperry Corporation, a developer of aviation instruments, died of complications from a broken leg on Dec. 9 at Quiogue’s Kanas Center for Hospice Care.

Marjorie F. Cowen, a former administrator at Tulane University, died on Dec. 16 in New Orleans of complications from a fall. The East Hampton summer resident was 77.

Steven M. Jacobson, a playwright, attorney, art collector, and dedicated supporter of arts, died of heart failure on Dec. 8 at New York-Presbyterian Hospital.

Michael Bye, an East Hampton native who left Riverhead for Florida on his 35-foot powerboat in late October, went missing off the Carolina coast on Nov. 21 and is presumed dead, his family said this week.

Alberto Herszage, the owner of a fine foods import business in Hawaii, died of renal failure on Dec. 6 at home in Springs. He was 81 and had been ill for five years.     

Marcia F. Gowen, a former managing director of the Center for Specialty Care, a medical group practice in Manhattan, died of cancer on Dec. 14 at home nearby on East 76th Street. The East Hampton summer resident was 83 and had been ill for nearly five years.     

Michelle J. Sucsy, who had cancer for almost 12 years, died peacefully at home in Springs on Oct. 3. She was attended in her final days by her husband of 34 years, Mark C. Sucsy, her younger daughter, Kestral Anne Sucsy, and her longtime friend Mary Ellen Von Anken of Greenport and Manhattan.

Philip J. Priolo, a summer resident of East Hampton who worked as a trainer of racehorses, died at home with his family in Howard Beach, Queens, on Dec. 5.  

Betty L. Cobb, an 11th-generation native of East Hampton, died on Dec. 4 at the Springs house of her daughter, Diane Goncalves, following a lengthy illness. She was 89.

John Arnold de Sousa Sr., an Air Force veteran, retired plumbing contractor from Montauk, and former member of the East Hampton Republican Committee, died on Dec. 2. He was 85.

John M. Wood Jr. of Springs, a retired East Hampton Town Highway Department crewman who loved his job operating heavy machinery, died at home on Dec. 2.

Mary Margaret Hostetter Sherrill, an artist and preservationist who was descended from a long-established East Hampton family, died on Oct. 14 at her home in Mount Pleasant, S.C., surrounded by family, of metastatic lung cancer.

Bernard Stoll, a former advertising executive who in 1968 built one of the first houses in the dunes on Marine Boulevard, died on Nov. 7 in New York City. He was 98.

Beverly Shilhan Deichert, a member of the Ladies Village Improvement Society of East Hampton for many years, died of cardiac arrest at home in Bronxville, N.Y., on Nov. 19. She was less than a week shy of her 81st birthday.

Visiting hours for John A. de Sousa Sr. of Montauk will be tomorrow from 4 to 7 p.m. at the Yardley and Pino Funeral Home in East Hampton. Mr. de Sousa, who was 85, died on Tuesday.

Michael Thomas Hinkemeyer of East Hampton, an author of suspense, mystery, and historical romance novels, died of cardiopulmonary arrest last Thursday at Stony Brook Southampton Hospital. He was 79 and had been in declining health for more than a year.

Gloria Isabelle Schuerlein, who devoted her life to her large family and to her church, died on Nov. 7 at home in Farmingville. The former East Hampton resident, who was 89, had been in declining health and was in hospice care.

Mary Margaret McCaffrey of Wainscott, who served the Wainscott School for 19 years as secretary and district clerk, died on Nov. 18 at Southampton Hospital surrounded by family. She was 56 and had been diagnosed five months ago with metastatic lung cancer.

Maurice Richard Blowe, who grew up in East Hampton and attended East Hampton High School, died at home in Phoenix on Nov. 14. He had been ill for about 15 years with various ailments, his family said.

Owain Gardner Collingwood Hughes of Water Mill, an author and entrepreneur, died on Nov. 19.

Stewart Miller Cullum, who grew up in East Hampton, died on Nov. 9 at Good Shepherd Hospice in Port Jefferson. He was 78 and had been ill with cancer for three years.