MENC is notified of deaths of members throughout the year through state music educators associations, family members and other sources. The list is updated as association staff learns of member deaths. MENC acknowledges the following members for their years of service to the profession of music education.
Hazel O. Carver, 91, of Russellville, Kentucky, died in May 2009. She was a music educator with Russellville schools for 35 years and a 54-year member of MENC. She served the Kentucky Music Educators Association in numerous way, including as editor of Bluegrass Music News from 1977 to 2003.
A. Theodore Tellstrom, 90, died in September, 2009, in Sarasota, Florida. From 1976-1979 Tellstrom was executive director of MENC. He was also director of music and art for the State Education Department in Albany, New York and advisor to the president of the New York State School Music Association. He was author of the college textbook, Music in American Education: Past and Present.
Eunice L. Boardman, a member of the Music Educators Hall of Fame and a former chair of MENC’s Society for Music Teacher Education, died in May. She was author of a series of music education books for the elementary grades, as well as text books at the Masters level.
As a music educator, she was respected nationally for her work in the field of music teacher education. She graduated from Cornell College in New York. She received her Masters Degree from Columbia University in New York City, and a doctorate from the University of Illinois.
Boardman taught music in the elementary schools in Postville and Maquoketa, Iowa, then taught at Grinnell College in Iowa, and at Wichita State University in Kansas. Later she was director of the music department at the University of Wisconsin, and director of the music education at the University of Illinois. She was inducted into the Music Educators Hall of Fame in 2004.
David Wells, a 43-year-MENC member who was named an MENC Lowell Mason Fellow in 2006, died in May in Boise, Idaho.
He retired recently from Boise State University after 23 years of service as director of the Keith Stein Blue Thunder Marching Band, associate professor of music, Kappa Kappa Psi faculty advisor, and adjunct professor for VanderCook College of Music in Chicago, Illinois.
He also directed marching bands at Murray State University in Kentucky. Earlier he was supervisor of music and taught instrumental music in Lexington Public Schools in Ohio and began his teaching career in Cuyahoga Heights, Ohio High School and Hillsdale Consolidated Schools. Wells served as a guest conductor, performer, adjudicator and producer of many national events.
Bradford Stewart Schoener was the recipient of many awards, including the 2007 Mr. Holland’s Opus Foundation Teacher of the Year award and from the 2008 Butler-Cooley Excellence in Teaching Award by the Turnaround Management Association, which recognizes teachers who have changed the lives of students and communities where they teach.
Schoener, who was known around Philadelphia as the “Upper Darby Music Man,” was the father of Brad Schoener, a member of the 2009 U.S. Army All-American Marching Band.
MENC acknowledges the recent deaths of other MENC members.
Arizona
- Alva C. Wilson Jr., Phoenix, life member, 41 year member
California
- Robert Alexander, Tehachapi, 57 years
- Gerald Anderson, Palm Desert, 33 years
- William D. Brackman, Escondido, life member, 44 years
- Paul Dorsam, San Francisco, life member, 67 years
- John Cox, Oceanside, 47 years
- Arthur Dougherty, Danville, 57 years
- F. John Pylman, Fresno, 58 years
Florida
- Briana Foley, Palm Harbor, 14 years
Indiana
- Sue Pietrus, St. Mary of the Woods, 19 years
- Ruth Ann Teague, Crown Point, 41 years
Kansas
- Presley Herndon, Dighton, 45 years
Massachusetts
- Mark Baszak, West Springfield, 4 years
- Dennis Wrenn, North Grafton, 28 years
Michigan
- Robert T. Ralston, Midland, 58 years
Minnesota
- Myron R. Falck, St. Peter, life member, 53 years
Mississippi
- William Frank McArthur, Cleveland, 51 years
Missouri
- Norman Burmont, St. Joseph, 22 years
- Gilbert Fisher, St. Louis, 25 years
Nevada
- Matthew T. Cox, Henderson, two years
New Jersey
- Susan Iatesta, Flanders, three years
- Kathryn R. Moser, Madison, 21 years
New York
- Daniel St. Amour, Altamont, 23 years
- Donald Coley, Fairport, 44 years
- Charles A. Fleming, Binghamton, life member, 68 years
- Charles Gouse, Sag Harbor, nine years
- Donald Howard, Riverhead, 51 years
- Rose Marie Koch, Saratoga Springs, 17 years
- Burton E. Stanley, president of the New York State School Music Association (NYSSMA) from 1952-1955, 69 years
- Camille Taylor, New York City, New York
North Carolina
- Robert Hancock Ellis, High Point, 51 years
Ohio
- J. Edmund Spreng, Toledo, 40 years
Pennsylvania
- James R. Smith, Dalton, 25 years
South Carolina
- Jerrie Lucktenberg, Spartanburg, 45 years
- Robert O’Brien, Columbia, 15 years
- Margaret A. Thornton, Columbia, two years
Washington
- Heather DeHart, Redmond, nine years
- Holly Donald Bertran, Oak Harbor, 36 years
—Roz Fehr, October 7, 2009. © MENC: The National Association for Music Education
