Michael Varese, who lived with his wife, Elizabeth, for more than 35 years on Osborne Lane in East Hampton, died at home on Monday in Lantana, Fla. He was 91. His ashes will be spread in Henley-on-Thames, England, and Springfield, Mo. An obituary will appear in a future issue.
Anthony DeVivio, who ran the East Hampton office of Halstead Property, died on Sunday at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in Manhattan. He was 63 and had been diagnosed with cancer six months ago.
Mr. DeVivio started his career as a broker at Thomson McKinnon Securities in Manhattan before moving on to take managerial roles at Prudential Securities and Dreyfus Investment Services. In 2005, he left Wall Street for a career in real estate, beginning as a broker for the Corcoran Group on the South Fork before moving on to Halstead.
Mr. DeVivio lived for 10 years on Cooper Lane in East Hampton, moving there full time in 2013. He was on the board of directors of East Hampton Meals on Wheels.
“Not only was he ambitious in his career,” his family wrote, “Anthony was even more dedicated to the love and support of his family. He enjoyed spending time with his children, whether it be skiing, fishing, bowling, golfing, or watching his beloved New York Rangers.”
Mr. DeVivio was born in the Bronx on June 4, 1953, one of the six children of Livio DeVivio and the former Clara Aranow. He grew up in Far Rockaway, attending Far Rockaway High School. In 1980 he graduated from Whittier College in Southern California, where he studied economics and theater and played baseball.
Mr. DeVivio was married to the former Kathryn Geoghegan of New Jersey, who survives. The marriage ended in divorce. He is survived by their children, Lauren DeVivio, Ashley DeVivio, Andrew DeVivio, and Kristin DeVivio, all of New Jersey. He is also survived by a sister, Barbara Cibirka of Seaford, and a brother, John DeVivio of Belle Harbor, Queens.
Three of his brothers, Thomas, Robert, and Richard DeVivio, died before him.
He was the favorite uncle of a dozen surviving nieces and nephews, said his partner of 20 years, Carmen Mantione, who also survives him.
Mr. DeVivio was cremated. A funeral Mass will be celebrated on Saturday at 11 a.m. at Most Holy Trinity Catholic Church in East Hampton. There will be a private burial at Cedar Lawn Cemetery in East Hampton.
The family has suggested memorial donations to Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, 1275 York Avenue, New York 10065, or to Meals on Wheels, 33 Newtown Lane, Suite 205, East Hampton 11937.
Capt. Clifford Lewis Bekkedahl, a retired naval officer, Arctic explorer, and editor of The Polar Times, died of congestive heart failure at his New York City residence on Sunday, with his family by his side. He was 86 and had been in declining health for the last few years.
Captain Bekkedahl’s first naval post, a month before graduating from Miami University, where he was in the Reserve Officers Training Corps, was as a lieutenant junior grade and navigator on the U.S.S. Arneb, a deep-draft, amphibious cargo assault ship assigned to Operation Deep Freeze I in Antarctica in the mid-1950s. After leaving New Zealand for Antarctica, the ship’s commander, Capt. Lawrence Smythe, summoned the junior officers to say he had become blind. None had had more than six weeks’ experience in a polar region, but they rose to the occasion and were able to complete the exploratory mission, crossing both the Antarctic and Arctic Circles within a year. Capt. Bekkedahl was commissioned as a lieutenant at the conclusion of the operation.
At different times during his naval career, Capt. Bekkedahl was in command of three ships and a destroyer squadron, and had posts at the Pentagon and the Naval Academy in Annapolis. He also had worked with Japanese and Korean naval officers. He retired in 1979 after 26 years of service.
Clifford Lewis Bekkedahl was born on Dec. 11, 1930, in Cleveland, the older of two sons of Donovan Bekkedahl and the former Mildred Halsall. He grew up in Kirtland, Ohio, and graduated from Collinwood High School in 1949. He worked his way through Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, graduating in 1953 and later earned a master’s degree in international relations at the American University School of International Service in Washington, D.C. As a naval officer, he also had a certificate from the National War College.
Capt. Bekkedahl and the former Victoria Becce, whom he had known in Ohio and who survives, were married in Brooklyn in 1957. Their daughters, all of whom survive, are Barbara Bekkedahl and Carolyn Bekkedahl of New York City, Alison Bekkedahl Gallart of Maplewood, N.J., and MaryAnn Bekkedahl-Parent of Pelham, N.Y. A brother, Doug Bekkedahl of San Diego, and eight grandchildren also survive him.
After retiring from active duty, Capt. Bekkedahl joined ABB Lummus Global, a power and automation technology firm. He later became the editor in chief of The Polar Times, the magazine of the American Polar Society. As a boy, Captain Bekkedahl had been inspired by the 15-minute radio show “Don Winslow of the Navy” and by the career of Admiral Richard E. Byrd, his family said. He was a passionate seaman, officer, and an inspiration to many in the Navy, they said, but was proudest of the children he and his wife reared and the grandchildren who gave him joy until the end of his life.
Captain and Mrs. Bekkedahl, who were married for 60 years, moved to the East End about 15 years ago, living on Manor Lane South in Springs until a month ago, when he moved back to New York. He was a member of the Kiwanis Club, Habitat for Humanity, and the East Hampton Trails Preservation Society. He also was an enthusiastic gardener, biker, woodworker, and a cook who enjoyed inventing recipes. He read fiction and often wrote about his travels.
Ms. Bekkedahl-Parent said her father was working before he died on a book about his time on the U.S.S. Arneb. It may be completed by a nephew, she said, and eventually published.
The family will receive visitors to a celebration of Captain Bekkedahl’s life on Saturday at 1 p.m. at the Yardley and Pino Funeral Home in East Hampton. A funeral and burial will take place later this year at Arlington National Cemetery.
Arnold T. Rosenberg, who had an extensive career as a food photographer, with work in magazines and newspapers such as Gourmet, Food and Wine, Martha Stewart Living, as well as with columns in The New York Times and cookbooks by Craig Claiborne and Pierre Franey, died at Southampton Hospital on March 21 at the age of 85. According to Rochelle Rosenberg, his wife of 57 years, he died peacefully after a long period of deteriorating health following a stroke. The couple were full-time residents of Inkberry Street in East Hampton for the past 15 years.
Mr. Rosenberg was an identical twin, born in Philadelphia on Nov. 29, 1931. He graduated from Penn State University and in the late 1950s moved to New York City, where he landed a job as an assistant for the fashion and portrait photographer Irving Penn. While working in Mr. Penn’s studio, Mr. Rosenberg became friends of notable figures in the arts, including the architect Marcel Breuer, the painter Marcel Duchamp, and the Manhattan graphic designer Milton Glaser.
Launching his own photography career, Mr. Rosenberg soon found fame with a photograph taken in 1958 of Marcel Duchamp playing chess, shot through a glass tabletop. Today, the photograph is in the permanent collection of the National Portrait Gallery at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C.
In 1961, Mr. Rosenberg opened a photography studio in Manhattan and began working on commercial shoots for advertising agencies. He was credited with having a knack for making food look appetizing, which was thought to be difficult. In 1969, Mr. Rosenberg and his wife purchased property on Georgica Pond and built a house designed by Marcel Breuer and his partner, Herbert Beckhard. Mr. Rosenberg owned over a dozen vintage Jaguars, some dating to the 1930s and some of which he restored himself. A garage was built for them next to his house.
In 1979, he was among the first American artists invited to visit the People’s Republic of China, and was asked by the director of Metropolitan Museum of Art, Philippe de Montebello, to photograph a Ming Dynasty-style scholar’s garden. The photographs were used by the Met to construct an exact replica called Astor Court, which is part of its permanent collection.
Mr. Rosenberg is survived by his wife. His twin brother, Allen Rosenberg, who died in 2013, had been a champion rower and part of the team that won a gold medal at the 1955 Pan American Games. He had developed a technique known as the “Rosenberg style,” still used by rowing crews around the world.
A service was held on Sunday at the Jewish Center of the Hamptons in East Hampton.
Cathy Matus, who grew up walking to the beach in Port Jefferson and rediscovered her love of the beach and nature in Amagansett died at home in Amagansett on March 21. She was 69 and had had cancer for many years.
Before she became a registered nurse, Mrs. Matus reared two children with her husband, Michael Matus, whom she had known since sixth grade. They had married in Vermont and moved to Caldwell, N.J., after his graduation from college. In Caldwell, she volunteered with the West Essex First Aid Squad, the Police Athletic League, the Girl Scouts, and other athletic groups for children. After her children were adolescents, Mrs. Matus earned a degree as a registered nurse at the Clara Maass Memorial Hospital School of Nursing in Belleville, N.J., and worked in the neonatal intensive care unit at St. Joseph’s Hospital in Paterson, N.J. Her husband said she “provided essential and compassionate support to those who struggled to live.”
Before she and her husband moved part time to Amagansett, in 1995, Mrs. Matus went to New York University, earning a bachelor of science degree in nursing, summa cum laude. Because of her illness, however, she and her husband retired to Amagansett. The trips to Memorial Sloan Kettering that cancer necessitated made it possible for her to enjoy meals at impressive city restaurants with her son, her husband said. She also enjoyed reading and attending concerts at Lincoln Center and Carnegie Hall, as well as going to the Museum of Modern Art and the Frick Collection.
Cathy De Wall Matus was born in Glen Cove on Oct. 13, 1947, one of the two daughters of William C. De Wall and the former Catherine Maile. Her son, Mike Matus of Fairfield, N.J., a daughter, Lisa Lisowski of Kingston, Mass., and five grandchildren survive, as does a sister, Flora Garsten of Shoreham.
Mr. Matus said his wife “was most tranquil in the serenity of calm water, sea grass, and cormorants while pursuing her favorite sport: clamming.” He “was the happy beneficiary of her never coming home with an empty basket,” he said. As a trained nurse, he said she “gave her heart to those in need,” caring for her favorite aunt, Flora Maile, and his favorite aunt, Nina Vanaria, as well as her parents. She had a dachshund she loved for 18 years and a turtle, which will turn 21 soon.
Mrs. Matus was a deacon of the Amagansett Presbyterian Church, where a funeral service was held on March 29, the Rev. Steven E. Howarth presiding. She was cremated and her ashes will be spread after a memorial service sometime this summer.
David Patrick O’Shea of Kingston, N.Y., a former resident of East Hampton, died on March 22 of an opiate overdose. He was 36 and had been dealing with the effects of a broken back.
Mr. O’Shea was a carpenter, and had also worked as a greens keeper at the Maidstone Club in East Hampton. He was a student in an online medical record management program through Independence University. He loved ocean sports, including surfing.
Born in Limerick, Ireland, on Sept. 23, 1980, a son of Michael Joseph O’Shea and the former Ann Maria O’Dwyer, Mr. O’Shea grew up in Tipperary, Ireland, and in East Hampton, where he attended East Hampton High School. A marriage to Haley Ryan ended in divorce.
Mr. O’Shea is survived by his father, who lives in Livingston Manor, N.Y., by his mother, of Chelsea, London, and by three brothers, Michael O’Shea of Newcastle, Greystones, Wicklow, in Ireland, John O’Shea of Manhattan, and Mark O’Shea of Panama.
Mr. O’Shea was cremated. A private memorial service will be held at the St. Joseph Leahy Funeral Home in Kingston, followed by a service at Most Holy Trinity Catholic Church in East Hampton on Saturday at 11 a.m., led by Msgr. Donald Hanson. In Kingston, Mr. O’Shea was a member of St. Mary’s Catholic Church.
A funeral Mass for Mr. O’Shea will be said at St. Michael’s Church in Tipperary Town in Ireland, where his ashes will be placed in a family grave at St. Michael’s Cemetery.
Memorial contributions have been suggested to St. Joseph’s Addiction Treatment and Recovery Centers, P.O. Box 470, Saranac Lake, N.Y. 12983.
Gregory Luke Armstrong, known by his friends as Greg, died unexpectedly on Saturday at his house on Oakview Highway in East Hampton. He had a massive heart attack and, even though he was resuscitated briefly in the ambulance on the way to Southampton Hospital, he did not recover. Mr. Armstrong was 63.
Mr. Armstrong was born on March 10, 1954, in Freeport, one of the two children of Harry Armstrong and the former Margaret Shea. He was brought up in East Marion and graduated from Elmont Memorial High School. After that he earned an undergraduate degree in fine arts at Southampton College, and eventually moved to East Hampton.
After he settled in East Hampton, Mr. Armstrong became a caretaker and estate manager, working for Lorne Michaels’s three properties in Amagansett for 20 years. He worked also for eight years at Hren’s Nursery in East Hampton for Charlene and Joseph Hren. His nursery work included several years at Spielberg Nursery and Garden Shop, also in East Hampton, and C. Whitmore Gardens in Amagansett, which last year became Charlie and Sons Landscapes, where he was working at the time of his death.
Jeff Huettner, Mr. Armstrong’s life partner of 32 years, who survives, said that he preferred digging and planting more than anything: “His thing was to dig in the dirt.”
He also was a freelance house watcher and gardener, working for clients in Amagansett, East Hampton, and Sag Harbor. When not outside in nature, surrounded by plants, Mr. Armstrong enjoyed painting garden scenes and animals in oil; he donated much of his artwork to the Doris Day Animal Foundation, which has been suggested for memorial donations, online at dorisdayanimalfoundation.org.
In addition to Mr. Huettner, Mr. Armstrong is survived by his sister, Patricia Collins of West Islip, three nieces, two great-nieces, and seven great-nephews. He considered his and Mr. Huettner’s golden retrievers, Fritz and Coco, to be his children, as well as his cat, Surf.
The family will receive visitors at the Yardley and Pino Funeral Home in East Hampton tomorrow from 7 to 9 p.m. There will be a graveside burial service on Saturday morning at 11 at St. Andrew’s Cemetery in Sag Harbor; Father Peter Devaraj will say a memorial Mass. Mr. Huettner will welcome friends at his house in East Hampton after the service.
Karl William Horlitz died on Saturday at Southampton Hospital, to which he had been admitted after a fall at his East Hampton house. According to his son, Karl Steven Horlitz, his father, who was 95, was still “the same old spicy guy on Friday and died peacefully a week later.” The younger Mr. Horlitz recalled that “two weeks ago he was reciting the Gettysburg Address, which he knew by heart.”
He was born in Crossen an der Oder, then part of Germany, on Nov. 6, 1921. The town was renamed Krosno Odrzanskie at the end of World War II and is now part of Poland. When he was 3, he moved to the United States with his parents, Wilhelm Frederick Horlitz and the former Anna Seidel, and two sisters who died before him. They were Hilda Harris of Alexandria, Va., and Angelica A. Pennecke of Valley Stream. The family settled in the Yorkville section of Manhattan.
Mr. Horlitz graduated from the Straubenmuller Textile High School in Manhattan and then took courses at Pratt Institute in manufacturing and engineering. He received a New York State license as an engineer, and worked for many years as a plant manager for John Hassall Inc., manufacturers of specialty rivets and screws, based in Westbury. He retired in 1984.
On Dec. 25, 1942, he married Friedel Basler of Germany on her parents’ 25th wedding anniversary. The couple were accomplished skiers. Mr. Horlitz served in the Army from 1944 to 1946, after which he and his wife moved to Queens Village. In 1981, they bought a house in East Hampton, becoming full-time residents. She died before him.
An active community member, Mr. Horlitz belonged to the American Legion, the East End Ski Club, the National Ski Patrol, the Appalachian Mountain Club, the Nature Conservancy, the East Hampton Trails Preservation Society, and the Settlers Landing Property Owners Association. He frequently wrote letters to editor of The East Hampton Star about politics and conservation. He also loved writing poetry and in August of 2015 was invited to read his poem “The Senior Center of East Hampton” at an East Hampton Town Board meeting.
Mr. Horlitz is survived by three children, Susan Friedel Vujnovich of Bayside, Queens, Janice Marie Stanley of Massapequa, and Karl Steven Horlitz of Concord, Mass. Five grandchildren and five great-grandchildren also survive, as do six nieces and nephews.
Visiting hours will be held at the Yardley and Pino Funeral Home in East Hampton on Monday from 2 to 4 and 7 to 9 p.m. A funeral service will take place at Incarnation Lutheran Church in Water Mill on Tuesday at 9:30 a.m., with burial to follow at Calverton National Cemetery. Memorial donations have been suggested to the Nature Conservancy, online at nature.org, or by mail to the Center for Conservation, P.O. Box 5125, East Hampton 11937.
Michael John Hegarty, a former president and chief executive officer of Flushing Savings Bank who had houses in Montauk and Glen Head, died on Jan. 29 at home in Glen Head. He was 77 and had Parkinson’s disease, his family said.
He had first come to Montauk in the 1970s as a certified public accountant for the Deep Sea Club. Because of a love of fishing, he and his wife took to the area right away, his family said, first staying with friends.
By the late 1970s he and his wife, the late Mary Ellen Hegarty, bought a house on North Farragut Road in Montauk. The place was always filled with family, friends, holiday parties, and amazing fishing stories, his daughter, Ellen McDonald of East Hampton, said.
Mr. Hegarty was born on May 27, 1939, in the Bronx to Michael John Hegarty and the former Katherine Costello. He attended Manhattan Prep high school.
His was a grassroots success story, Ms. McDonald said. As a boy he made deliveries for a dry-cleaner and later worked as a clerk at a Peter Reeves grocery store.
He sold hot dogs, ice cream, and beer at Yankee Stadium, was a night porter for The New York Daily News, and made deliveries for a Coca-Cola distributor. With savings from these jobs and others, he was able to pay his own way through Manhattan College. His first job after graduation was at Peat, Marwick, Mitchell, and Co. in New York City.
From the Deep Sea Club and Peat, Marwick, Mr. Hegarty moved on to EDO Corporation, a defense contractor in College Point, Queens, where he held posts including vice president of finance, corporate secretary, treasurer, and chairman of the audit committee. He went on to join Flushing Savings Bank, working as an executive vice president, corporate secretary, and chief operating officer before becoming its president and C.E.O. He retired in 2005.
He married the former Mary Ellen Duggan on Jan. 23, 1963. Ms. Hegarty died in 2015.
Mr. Hegarty spent six seasons as a Little League coach, and later was president of the Glen Head-Glenwood Landing Little League. He was a committee chairman of the Glenwood Landing Boy Scouts and was a president of the Boy Scouts of America’s Nassau County Chapter. He received the Scouts’ Theodore Roosevelt Award and its Silver Beaver Award, among the organization’s highest honors.
In addition to Ms. McDonald, he is survived by two sons, Michael Hegarty of Westbury and Brian Hegarty of Goldens Bridge, N.Y., and 10 grandchildren. Two brothers, William Hegarty of Troy, N.Y., and John Hegarty of Scarsdale, N.Y., survive as well.
He attended services at St. Therese of Lisieux Catholic Church in Montauk and St. Boniface Martyr Church in Sea Cliff, where a Mass for Mr. Hegarty was celebrated on Jan. 31. He was buried at Locust Valley Cemetery.
Memorial donations have been suggested to gofundme.com/savesullyslifeplease, for Sully Forbes, a 7-month-old boy with a rare cancer whose father, Frank Forbes, was a family friend who grew up in Montauk and Glen Head, or to the National Parkinson Foundation, 200 Southeast First Street, Suite 800, Miami 33131, also at parkinson.org.
Ms. McDonald said that her father’s many stories and one-liner jokes will never be forgotten.
Sally McGraw-Silverstone, a Montauk resident for three decades who was known as Pooch, died on March 13 at Stony Brook University Hospital after a short illness. She was 88 and had pneumonia. She was a longtime supporter of the Montauk Library, where a gathering in her honor will be held today from 2 to 4 p.m.
“She was the best companion I know,” said a niece, Dani Dolence of Tyler, Tex., adding that “there were too many best friends to mention,” her mother among them.
Ms. McGraw-Silverstone loved painting, and was an amateur watercolorist. She had taken piano lessons as a child, and continued to enjoy music. With her husband, she attended recitals at the library and outdoor summer jazz concerts. She was an avid reader as well and became an accomplished baker after moving to Montauk, tackling complicated pie and Christmas cookie recipes. She also enjoyed planning healthy meals to serve to others.
The youngest daughter of immigrant Serbian parents, Damian Prodnick and the former Anna Skaljac, she was born on Nov. 23, 1929, in Girard, Ohio. She attended Kent State University in Ohio and Hunter College in New York City, where she lived for two decades beginning in the 1960s.
Her niece said she had enjoyed being a working woman and got a job at NBC, becoming its director of communications, where she met some of its stars, such as Johnny Carson, and found herself able to go to such first-class restaurants as Le Pavillon. She met her husband, Bob Silverstone, who survives, while working in the city.
After she retired, the couple moved to Montauk, where she and her husband volunteered for several organizations, with the Friends of the Montauk Library at the top of the list. Ms. McGraw-Silverstone also volunteered at the Animal Rescue Fund of the Hamptons thrift shop. Her association with ARF had another impact, Ms. Dolence said. “Gradually the house filled with members of the feline persuasion.”
Two previous marriages ended in divorce. Besides Mr. Silverstone, to whom she had been married for 35 years, Ms. McGaw-Silverstone is survived by three stepchildren, Sara Silverstone, David Silverstone, and James Silverstone. Four step-grandchildren also survive.
Ms. McGraw-Silverstone was cremated. Memorial contributions have been suggested to the Montauk Public Library, 871 Montauk Highway, Montauk11954, or the Animal Rescue Fund of the Hamptons, P.O. Box 901, Wainscott 11975.