Richard Art
Richard Art, 89, of Holmes Beach, died May 2. He was born May 28, 1921, in Bridgeport, Conn. He and wife Margaret retired to Holmes Beach in September 1979.
He was a member of St. John’s Lodge in Stratford, Conn., Sahib Shriners in Sarasota and the Gulf Shrine Club, and a lifelong blood and platelet donor as well as an organ donor.
Mr. Art worked for the Singer Sewing Machine Co. in Bridgeport and Elizabeth, N.J., as manager of the screw machine department.
He served in the U.S. Navy aboard the USS Rushmore in the South Pacific theater during three invasions.
A celebration of his life was held May 6. Memorial donations may be made to Tidewell Hospice, 3355 26th St., Bradenton FL 34204, or the Shriner Hospitals for Children, 12502 N. Pine Drive, Tampa FL 33612-9499.
Mr. Art is survived by his wife of 64 years, Margaret; three sons, William and wife Norah and James and wife Robin, all of Bradenton, and Donald Art Whitman and wife Ann of Vermont; grandchildren John, Frances, Brian, Jason and Aaron of Bradenton and David and Katherine of Vermont; great-granddaughter, Kilee; sisters Arlene Mills of Connecticut and Lillian Offenberg of Gulfport, Fla., brother Alfred of Bradenton; and a number of nieces and nephews.
Miriam ‘Cap’ Goolsby
Miriam “Cap” Goolsby, 83, has died. She came to Holmes Beach in 1969 from Albuquerque, N.M. She was born March 3, 1928, in Chelsea, Mass.
Mrs. Goolsby earned an associate’s degree at Northeastern University in Boston and a bachelor’s degree in personnel management at Indiana University in 1957. She retired a lieutenant colonel in management engineering with the U.S. Air Force. Her 20-year career included duty at the WAF Training Center, Lackland Air Force Base, squadron commander at James Connally at Waco, Texas, recruiting officer in Chicago and for 12 years as manpower officer at various locations in Georgia, California, England and Germany. Her last assignment was as chief for the management engineering team at Kirtland Air Force Base in Albuquerque, where she retired July 31, 1969.
Mrs. Goolsby’s decorations included the Meritorious Service Medal and Air Force Commendation Medal and two Oak Leaf Clusters. She was married to Lt. Col. George S. Goolsby, who preceded her in death.
A memorial Service was held May 9 at Lakeside South Clubhouse, Bradenton, and graveside services with Military Honors were held May 10 at Sarasota National Cemetery, Sarasota. Memorial donations may be made to Congregation Ner Tamid, P.O. Box 10261, Bradenton Florida 34282.
Mrs. Goolsby is survived by daughters Diane Goolsby of Leesville, S.C., and Margaret Derrick of Irmo, S.C.; 16 nieces and nephews; several great-nieces and great-nephews; brother Paul and wife Phyllis Blyer of Boca Raton, Fla.; and sisters-in-law Dorothy Blair of Bradenton and Sylvia Blair of Spring Hill, Fla.
Susan G. Lathrop
Susan G. Lathrop died April 30. Sue was born April 12, 1947, in Abington, Pa. Her family moved while she was young to Fort Lauderdale, where she grew up and attended Ft. Lauderdale High School. She continued her education at Florida State University where she graduated with honors.
She enjoyed working with the Manatee Chamber of Commerce Economic Development Council.
A memorial service will be held at noon Sunday, May 15, at Roser Memorial Community Church, 512 Pine Ave., Anna Maria with a reception to follow.
Memorial contributions may be made to Roser Memorial Community Church, P.O. Box 247, Anna Maria FL 34216 or to Tidewell Hospice & Palliative Care, 5955 Rand Blvd., Sarasota FL 34238.
Survivors include her husband of 42 years, Jim; sons Jim and wife Deirdra of St. Petersburg and Stephen and wife Jennifer of Atlanta; grandchildren Ben, Nathan and Ryan; brothers Russell Graves, Jack Graves, and Dick Graves; and sister Joanna Kenyon.
Richard C. ‘Dick’ Maher
Richard C. “Dick” Maher, 84, of Holmes Beach, died May 3. He was born in Buffalo, N.Y., on St. Patrick’s Day 1927 into an Irish Catholic family. Throughout his life and wherever he made his home, he and his family marked his birthday with St. Patrick’s Day celebrations.
Mr. Maher was a 1950 graduate of the Rochester Institute of Technology, Rochester N.Y. He served in the U.S. Navy. He began his professional career in his father’s haberdashery and men’s fine clothing store. He continued in retail sales, as a representative for women’s wear for 25 years.
Mr. Maher and wife Ann moved in 1980 to Anna Maria Island where he became an award-winning real estate agent with Neal and Neal, and later at A. Paradise Realtors. He was known as a “born salesman, ” who put his talents to use promoting the charms of Anna Maria Island to prospective residents, making good friends along the way, many of them at Westbay Point & Moorings in Holmes Beach, where he left his mark and served many years in the association and on the board. He was a long-time member of the Anna Maria Island Moose Lodge #2188. Services will be private. Memorial donations may be made to the Anna Maria Island Community Center, P.O. Box 253, Anna Maria FL 34216.
Mr. Maher is survived by daughters Suzanne Reed and Marianne Breed, both of Colorado, Kathy Bergan of Florida, and Patsy Maher of Ohio; sons Michael Maher of Ohio and Christopher Maher of Colorado; five grandchildren; a great-grandson, his companion Betty Mills and caregiver Kathy Wallace.
Washington journalist James H. McCartney dead at 85; award-winning reporter and columnist specialized in national security policy.
Award-winning journalist McCartney died May 6 James H. McCartney, 85, an award-winning Washington correspondent and columnist who specialized in foreign affairs and defense policy for the Knight Ridder newspaper chain, died May 6 at his home in Holmes Beach following a brief battle with cancer.
A reception and service will be held from 2:30 p.m. to 4:30 p.m. Thursday, May 19, at the Sandbar Restaurant Pavilion, 100 Spring Ave., Anna Maria. A second service, including a reception and light lunch, will be held from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. Saturday, June 4, at the National Press Club in Washington D.C. In addition, a guest book website has been established at: http://www.legacy.com/guestbook/bradenton/guestbook.aspx?n=james-mccartney& pid=150917399& cid=view.
Memorial donations may be made to either WETA Public Television in Washington, D.C., to support the NewsHour online at www.weta.org, (click “ Support WETA,” then “ More Ways to Give,” then “ Tribute and Memorial Gifts;” the Missouri School of Journalism, Committee of Concerned Journalists, National Press Building, suite 425, 14th and F Streets N.W., Washington DC 20045; or mcarter@concernedjournalists.org, phone 202-662-7155.
In 33 years as a Washington journalist, McCartney wrote extensively about nuclear weapons policy, the Israeli-Arab conflict and the Vietnam War, among other issues. As senior national security reporter for Knight Ridder, then the nation’ s second-largest newspaper chain, McCartney’ s coverage was read in 31 papers, including the Philadelphia Inquirer, Miami Herald and Detroit Free Press.
McCartney’ s career included trips to cover the Paris Peace Talks (1968-1973), the historic 1977 speech by Egyptian President Anwar Sadat before the Israeli parliament and the1986 Reykjavik summit between President Ronald Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev. His stories were datelined from more than 30 countries. He also wrote regularly about national politics and presidential campaigns, and covered presidents from Eisenhower to Clinton.
In 1989, McCartney received the Edward Weintal Award for Diplomatic Reporting from Georgetown University’ s School of Foreign Service. He was a longtime member and past president of the Gridiron Club, where he was celebrated for his gyrating “ witch doctor” dance in a humorous skit at one of the club’ s annual dinners.
McCartney often said his interest in issues of war and peace was driven in part by his horrific experiences as a teenaged front-line infantryman in France and Germany during World War II. He was wounded in combat shortly before the end of the war.
Soon after he arrived in Washington as a reporter for the now-defunct Chicago Daily News, McCartney became one of the first journalists to focus on the rise of the military-industrial complex. He did so after covering President Dwight Eisenhower’ s famous farewell address on the subject in 1961, an assignment he got because the bureau’ s senior reporters preferred to cover president-elect John F. Kennedy.
McCartney’ s follow-up series on the military-industrial complex helped him win a 1963-64 Nieman Fellowship for journalists at Harvard University.
McCartney remained active in journalism in his retirement, giving speeches to local groups and writing a monthly column for the Bradenton Herald. His final column, published March 27, stated current U.S. policy in the Middle East was sacrificing America’ s democratic ideals because of the country’ s need for oil.
McCartney was known for his relentless, skeptical questioning at White House, State Department and Pentagon press conferences. One of the officials with whom he tangled, former State Department spokesman Hodding Carter, said of McCartney, “ You knew, if you were a government spokesman, that you’ d better have it straight and you’ d better have the facts, because he’ d keep coming at you. He could be the belligerent antagonist when he knew he was being lied to.” Carter also said of McCartney: “ He was not there to enhance the government. He was there to inform the people. I didn’ t know anyone I respected more than Jim.” McCartney was born July 20, 1925, in St. Paul, Minn., and grew up in Detroit and East Lansing, Mich. After receiving an honorable discharge from the Army with rank of corporal, he attended Michigan State University on the GI bill. He graduated in 1949 with a degree in political science after spending most of his time working on the college newspaper, where he rose to be editor.
After graduation, he worked for the South Bend (Ind.) Tribune, obtained a master’ s degree in journalism from the Medill School at Northwestern University and then joined the Chicago Daily News as a reporter.
McCartney moved to Washington as a correspondent in 1959 and worked there in the newspaper’ s bureau until returning to Chicago as city editor in 1965.
In 1968, McCartney joined Knight Ridder and returned to Washington. From then until his retirement, he devoted his work to probing underlying issues affecting American foreign policy. He was particularly interested in the roles of the Defense Department and the armaments industry, and liked to say that the Pentagon had more influence on American diplomacy than the State Department.
Another of his themes was the failure of arms control negotiations before the collapse of the Soviet Union to actually shrink U.S. and Soviet nuclear arsenals.
McCartney retired as a reporter in 1990 but continued writing his column, distributed by Knight Ridder, until 1995.
He was an adjunct professor at Georgetown University for 13 years, where he taught courses in the media and foreign policy, and the media and politics. He enjoyed golf, travel, chess and was an avid baseball fan.
McCartney is survived by his wife of 26 years, Molly Sinclair; twin sister Kathryn Boucher of East Lansing,Mich.; son Robert of Bethesda, Md.; daughter Sharon Allexsaht of Minneapolis; step-daughter Kathleen Muckleroy of Baytown, Texas; and four grandchildren.
James McCartney shakes hands with President Barack Obama at the most recent Gridiron Dinner.