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DUI crash kills MADD officer’s stepson
The Army private was thrown from a pickup whose driver was drunk, say N.C. police.
In an ironic twist of fate, the 22-year-old stepson of Pima County’s representative to the state board of Mothers Against Drunk Driving has been killed in what has been termed an alcohol-related crash in North Carolina.
Army Pvt. David Robertson, son of Mark Robertson and stepson of Mary Robertson, died Saturday afternoon after being thrown from the bed of a pickup truck in Lillington, N.C., near Fort Bragg. He had been stationed at the fort since November.
”The reason I joined MADD was because I believe in it. I just never thought it would become a part of my life,” said Mary Robertson.
”I just want people to be aware that this is just more than a personal loss to us,” she added. ”He never had an enemy. Everyone who knew this boy loved him. He was never in trouble. You could see the love in his eyes.”
Mary Robertson recently was named the county’s representative to the state MADD board. The couple have homes in Marana and Tucson and run an antique shop in Tucson.
Pvt. Robertson was a Marana High School graduate.
The victim’s father said the investigating officer said the driver of the truck was cited for driving under the influence of alcohol.
Holly Robles, a victim advocate with the Tucson branch of Mothers Against Drunk Driving, said the driver was identified as Julian Teddleton III, a sergeant also assigned at Fort Bragg.
She said the younger Robertson and his girlfriend had been driven to a barbecue, then requested a ride from Teddleton, an acquaintance assigned to the same unit as the victim.
Robles said the two were in the back of Teddleton’s pickup when the driver tried to pass another vehicle on a two-lane road and crashed into a third vehicle.
Pvt. Robertson and his girlfriend, who was not identified, were thrown from the back of the truck. He struck a tree and was killed instantly.
The girlfriend and four others were injured, three of them seriously.
”It’s not something you expect, or know what to do about when it happens,” said Mark Robertson. ”He took a six-year enlistment to get the training he wanted, and had been in the Army since November.
”He was a private, but they put him into an E-6 (higher-ranking) slot. His job was in computer setup, and he was doing an excellent job.
”He had it all in front of him.”
A viewing is scheduled at 9 a.m. tomorrow at Mountain View Mortuary in Mesa, with a military funeral to follow at 10 a.m.
Survivors include his parents; his mother and stepfather, Velma and Rick Burr of Mesa; two brothers, Markie Robertson of Marana and Alton Bostwick of Mesa; two sisters, Alicia Robertson of Colorado Springs, Colo., and Tanya Kim Beeson of Bullhead City; and grandparents Bruce and Marion Robertson of Safford and Jack and Betty Grubb of Wichita, Kan.
(Dated Aug 28, 1997)
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‘Mike’ Levkowitz had heart for ‘the little guy’
Milton ”Mike” Levkowitz, a Tucson businessman who frequently made headlines as an advocate for ”the little guy,” is dead at age 76.
Mr. Levkowitz owned and operated Sun Lighting Co. in Tucson from 1953 until his son, Danny, took over the business in 1992.
He was born in Tucson April 6, 1921, after his family moved here from Chicago. He attended Safford elementary and junior high schools, Tucson High School and University of Arizona, from which he was graduated with a degree in business administration.
Mr. Levkowitz served as a navigator in the Army Air Corps during World War II. He met his wife, Barbara, at UA, and the two were married in 1947.
During the past several decades, Mr. Levkowitz frequently was involved in legal battles with ”big business,” local utilities and the Arizona Corporation Commission – for which was a candidate in 1980.
His son, Danny, said, ”He was a consumer advocate, always battling against unfair business practices.”
He added, ”He was a devoted, loving husband, father and grandfather, and a wonderful friend to all who knew him.”
Mr. Levkowitz was a lifelong member of Congregation Anshei Israel and a supporter of Tucson Hebrew Academy.
Survivors include his wife, Barbara; two sons, Hal Levkowitz of New Orleans and Danny Levkowitz of Tucson; a daughter, Laurie Levkowitz of Los Angeles; three brothers, Phil, Joe and Jack Levkowitz, all of Tucson; a sister, Goldie Brown of Santa Monica, Calif.; and five grandsons.
Funeral services are scheduled at 9 a.m. tomorrow at Congregation Anshei Israel, 5550 E. Fifth St. Interment will follow at Evergreen Cemetery.
The family suggests donations to Congregation Anshei Israel, Tucson Hebrew Academy or The Alzheimers Association.
(Dated Aug 30, 1997)
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Services Saturday for Isabel Fathauer
A memorial service Saturday will honor Isabel Shattuck Fathauer, a civic leader who served as treasurer of the Tucson Regional Plan in the 1970s and played numerous roles with the local Republican Party.
She died Monday at age 88.
The daughter of pioneer Bisbee businessman Lem Shattuck, whose biography she wrote, Mrs. Fathauer moved to Tucson with her husband, Walter, in 1946 and bought the former home of author Erskine Caldwell.
In 1956, she was named president of the Pima County Republican Women and in the 1960s, she served two years as secretary for the Arizona Republican Committee.
Mrs. Fathauer also was president of the Tucson Symphony Women in 1957, president of the St. Luke’s Board of Visitors in 1966 and was Tucson’s first historic sites chairman, a post given her by former Mayor Lew Davis.
She also was second vice president of the Tucson Festival Society in 1970 and second vice president of St. Luke’s in the Desert in 1974.
In addition to the biography of her father, ”A Little Mining, A Little Banking and A Little Beer,” Mrs. Fathauer co-wrote ”Tucson – From Pithouse to Skyscraper” with anthropologist Emil Haury and penned a brochure for Tucson’s bicentennial in 1975.
In 1983, Mrs. Fathauer was presented the University of Arizona Alumni Association’s Distinguished Citizen Award by the College of Business and Public Administration.
The memorial service is scheduled for 2 p.m. Saturday at Grace St. Paul Episcopal Church, 2331 E. Adams St.
Mrs. Fathauer was the wife of Walter Fathauer, the mother of Mari Martin and Dorothy Arnaud, and the sister of Lemuel Shattuck Jr., all of Tucson. She had five grandchildren and six great-grandchildren.
(Dated Sep 04, 1997)
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Water concerns motivated Barr in incorporation drive
A memorial service for George W. Barr Jr., a prominent retired Tucson civil engineer and co-founder of Cella Barr Associates Inc. of Arizona, is scheduled for tomorrow afternoon.
Barr, who helped start the drive for a Catalina Foothills city northwest of Tucson and was a well-known local water conservation activist, died Tuesday after a brief illness. He was 70.
The service is set for 3 p.m. tomorrow at Trinity Presbyterian Church, 400 E. University Blvd.
”He was a very congenial and dedicated individual. He was a consummate engineer,” said Jim Godwin, who took over as chief executive officer and president of Cella Barr Associates when Barr stepped down in the early 1980s.
Barr and his longtime friend Paul Cella founded the company in 1960. Though the company started with the two men as its sole employees, it has since grown to become one of the largest engineering firms in the state.
The Tucson-based firm has about 165 employees and offices in Phoenix, Las Vegas and Sacramento, Calif.
”He was an incredible person who spent the most precious commodity anyone has – time – to service to the community,” said Sally Slosser, who along with Barr helped found the movement to incorporate the community of Catalina Foothills.
”He will be terribly missed,” added Slosser, who was one of Barr’s neighbors and friends.
Barr was a 20-year member of the Central Arizona Water Conservation District and in 1984 was elected its first-ever Tucson president. The board governs the Central Arizona Project administrative agency. Its members are from Maricopa, Pinal and Pima counties.
When he first ran for the CAWCD board in 1976, Barr said he was against the CAP from an economic and engineering standpoint, but since it was already under construction, ”about all we can do is make the best of it.”
”I don’t want to stop the project. I want to make it serve the people,” he said at the time.
Since the early 1970s, Barr had preached for using CAP water for agriculture and industry, and not for Tucson households. City officials, however, did not take notice of his idea until the early ’90s, after several thousand households complained of rust-colored CAP water that was delivered to their homes.
He was also a founding member of the Southern Arizona Water Resources Association – a non-profit group of water users – and editor and publisher of the CAP Alternative Newsletter.
Born in Berkeley, Calif. June 30, 1927, Barr attended Tucson public schools and graduated from the University of Arizona in 1950 with a bachelor of science in mechanical engineering.
His father, the late George W. Barr Sr., was an agricultural economist at UA, while his mother, Margaret James Barr, is a retired elementary school teacher.
Barr’s friends and co-workers say though his demeanor was reserved, he was nonetheless effective at getting his point across.
”If he believed in something, he would certainly do what he could contribute to make it successful,” Godwin. ”He was very dedicated to the community.”
In addition to his work on local water problems in Tucson, Barr for the past 33 years was a member of Rotary International.
His friends and family say Barr’s more recent efforts to incorporate the foothills area into its own city had become an important project.
”He felt passionately that the 52,000 people in Catalina Foothills, if organized, might finally have a voice with Tucson Water,” Slosser said. ”That was his driving rationale for seeing that this city be formed.”
Barr is survived by his mother, wife, Martha Rief Barr, four sons, two brothers, seven grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.
(Dated Sep 06, 1997)
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Retiree Skills founder Robert Rheinhart
Robert C. Rheinhart, a Tucsonan who founded a temporary service agency to keep retired people- including himself – active through employment, died Tuesday of chronic lung disease. He was 76.
Mr. Rheinhart founded Retiree Skills Inc. in 1978, after moving to Tucson from Dayton, Ohio, where he was vice president of Columbia Securities Inc., an investment underwriting company.
After six months of retirement here, he grew restless and decided to start a business, said his daughter, Linda Albee of Tucson.
”He said, ‘You can only play so much golf,’ ” Albee said. ”He believed if people stayed active, they would be happier and live longer.”
Temporary service agencies, much less one geared toward people older than 50, were in their infancy in the late 1970s, so his idea was quite an innovation, she said.
Mr. Rheinhart strapped an orange rocking chair, the symbol of the immobile senior citizen, to the roof of his car. The slogan painted on it was ”From Inactivity to Activity.”
Through television and newspaper advertisements, the business drew in retirees who could apply for positions based on their previous employment.
In a 1989 interview, Mr. Rheinhart said, ”I don’t know how many age discrimination laws there are. Age is the main reason people over age 50 aren’t hired when they seek work.”
The job service offers workers in more than 200 job classifications, from secretaries and plumbers to engineers and chemists.
More than 300 companies have used the agency, and thousands of retirees have found employment.
”He was very committed to getting people jobs,” Albee said.
She said Mr. Rheinhart got requests from as far away as China, Australia and Russia to discuss his concept of a business for retired people.
He was quoted in the nationally published book ”People’s Ideas on Growing Older,” which came out in 1994, Albee said.
”He insisted, ‘I will not grow old, I will not become an old fogy,’ ” she said.
Mr. Rheinhart also started a life insurance company in 1948.
He was born Sept. 26, 1920, in Saratoga, Ind. He attended the International Business College in Fort Wayne, where he majored in accounting from 1938 to 1939. He also attended La Salle Extension and Ball State universities.
He worked for Columbia Securities Inc. from 1967 to 1975.
He was a member of the Tucson Chamber of Commerce and the Pima Council on Aging.
He celebrated his 50th wedding anniversary with his wife, Lucille, a retired cosmetologist, in 1991. She died in July.
In addition to Albee, Mr. Rheinhart is survived by another daughter, Terry Gootz of Tucson; two sons, Don of Bettendorf, Iowa, and Randy of Dayton, Ohio; and 10 grandchildren.
A memorial service will be held at 1 p.m. Saturday at Ina Road Church of Christ, 2425 W. Ina Road.
The family suggests donations to the Alzheimer’s Association of Southern Arizona, 2221 N. Rosemont Blvd., Tucson, Ariz. 85712.
(Dated Sep 18, 1997)
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