Here are just some of the coronavirus pandemic’s many victims: who they were, and the lives they touched.
Anthony Mason profilestelevision host Sonny Fox, nurse Iris Meda, musical director James Glica-Hernandez, Chicago basketball coach Donnie Kirksey and alumni coordinator Stephanie Smith. Sonny Fox, a legendary television host who captivated a generation of New York City children, died of COVID-19 complications on January 24 in his Los Angeles home. He was 95. Fox hosted the children’s television show “Wonderama” every Sunday morning on New York’s WNEW from 1959-1967. The four-hour kids show had no budget and mixed Fox’s charm with his guest and the kids themselves Fox would continue to make TV magic as a game show host, a producer, and a network executive. A pioneering broadcaster, Fox was not a comic like most kids show hosts. “For them, the kids were the audience,” he said. “For me, the kids were the show.” Mental health advocate and musical director James Glica-Hernandez died of COVID-19 complications on January 10. He was 61. A musical director at California’s Woodland Opera House for more than two decades, Glica-Hernandez once said the children were his favorite part of shows. “I love to be surprised, and the kids always surprise me,” he had said. His friend Amy Shuman said Glica-Hernandez had “so much pride in his family and his students.” “His life’s purpose was about building people up,” Shuman said. In December, during his battle with COVID-19, Glica-Hernandez posted several video updates from the hospital to Facebook. In one of those videos he said to his family and friends, “Your love and support make all the difference in the world.” He died a few weeks later, with his husband David by his side. Donny Kirksey, a staple in the Chicago basketball scene for four decades, died of COVID-19 complications on December 28,2020. He was 57. Kirksey coached at every level of the game and was a mentor as well as a father figure to hundreds of athletes — including former NBA player and Michigan Wolverines basketball coach Juwan Howard. “We lost a loved one, and a guy that had a huge imprint on my life, helped me to be the man I am today,” Howard told the Michigan Insider. The Chicago icon’s family remembered him as the “king of practical jokes,” but also a man of humility and integrity. “I was living every woman’s dreams,” his wife Dionne said. “He was the love of my life.” Arethia Tilford, a business owner and an attendance clerk at Lincoln Performing Arts Elementary School in Louisville, Kentucky, died of COVID-19 complications on November 28. She was 56. “Miss Arethia,” as the students called her, would greet everyone with “Good morning, sunshine.” The beloved school aide and mother had a knack for comforting children and calming parents. “The families trusted her,” assistant principal Michael Ice said. “She would fix kids’ hair, fix boo-boos — just make them feel whole again.” Tilford also owned a beauty salon in town. She loved gospel music, Hallmark movies and cooking family meals. Mark Tilford, her husband of 22 years, called her his “queen.” “She was so unselfish,” he said. “She just loved making people happy.” Brittany Palomo, an emergency room nurse in Texas, died of coronavirus complications on November 21 at the age of 27. Known as a bookworm, Palomo’s smile could “light up the whole room,” her stepfather Robert Salinas said. She was also a fan of the Chicago Cubs, and enjoyed a good brisket as well as spending time with her brothers and sisters. “She would take them everywhere,” Salinas said. Palomo finished nursing school in December 2019 and began her first job as an emergency room nurse this past spring. “She loved it, every day,” Salinas said, adding: “she gave it everything she had.” The young nurse had recently moved into her apartment and bought a new car in the fall, when she tested positive for COVID-19. She died less than a week later, and her parents learned she was pregnant. Stephanie Smith, an alumni coordinator at South Plains College, died of COVID-19 complications on November 18,2020 at the age of 29. “When you set your roots in good old Levelland, Texas, you know you have a solid foundation,” Smith once said glowingly of her hometown at a virtual event for South Plains College — which was also her alma mater. Smith had a photography business on the side, and volunteered for “Operation Baby Watch,” caring for hospitalized foster children. Her father Sunny said “she poured her heart and soul” into her work, and “her laugh was the loudest one in the house.” Because of the pandemic, Smith and her fiancé Jamie Bassett were planning a small November wedding. She posted on Facebook, “All that matters is that I get to marry my best friend, no matter how it looks or how it happens.” The week of their wedding, Smith tested positive for the coronavirus, She died five days after they were supposed to exchange vows. “The thing I loved about her is, any feeling a person would feel, she would feel ten times harder,” Bassett said. “She had a big heart.” Iris Meda, a registered nurse for more than three decades, died from complications of the coronavirus on November 14. She was 70 years old. Born in South Carolina, Meda grew up poor and practically raised her five siblings. She dropped out of high school, but later, inspired by her husband, earned her GED and pursued a nursing degree. Meda became the first person in her family to graduate from college. She graduated with honors. She loved dancing, sewing, true crime shows, and her grandkids. Meda stopped working as a nurse early last year but bravely came out of retirement during the pandemic to teach nursing students at a local college. “It created a fire in her,” her daughter Selene Meda-Schlamel said. “She fearlessly went to the front lines to do her part.” John Elliott, a bar owner and a stalwart of the Denver music scene, died from complications of the coronavirus on November 11. He was 51. As a kid, Elliott was an avid reader and a precocious student. After college, he joined “Teach For America,” where he met the love of his life, Mary Therese Anstey. Together, they traveled the world, living in Scotland and Australia before settling in Colorado. He was the co-owner of the “Streets of London Pub,” where he championed up-and-coming punk rock bands. Elliott was known for his outspokenness and his big heart. “He was definitely a fierce friend,” said Rob Rushing, founder of “Punk Rock Saves Lives,” a nonprofit Elliott was involved in. Elliott was battling pancreatic cancer and thought he had COVID-19 early last year. But when he caught the virus a second time in November, his body gave out. “He was always about the grand gesture, but he was also about the little things,” Anstey said. “That’s something I’m going to miss. Max Osceola Jr., a legendary leader for the Seminole Tribe of Florida, died on October 8 of coronavirus complications at the age of 70. Osceola is credited with helping to facilitate the Seminole’s landmark purchase of the Hard Rock international chain in 2006, ensuring prosperity for the once-impoverished tribe and vowing to “buy Manhattan back one hamburger at a time.” He was the second Seminole to graduate from college and was one of the tribe’s longest-serving politicians. Wanting every Seminole to receive the same educational opportunities, he started a program to make sure that every tribe member could attend college. His wife Marge described Osceola as a “brilliant man, who did what he was supposed to do in his lifetime.” The pair were married for more than four decades and raised four children together, including their son Max who said his father always “sacrificed and gave to his community.” Sundee Rutter, a mom of six and breast cancer survivor, died of complications from the coronavirus on March 16. She was 42. Rutter, from Everett, Washington, “went above and beyond” for her kids, her oldest daughter Alexis said. After their dad died in 2012, Rutter went to college, while working a job, and still ferried her children to sporting events and took them on special trips. Diagnosed with breast cancer last year, Rutter battled through chemotherapy, had a double mastectomy and was going to have reconstructive surgery this summer. “She never let things hold her back,” Alexis said. “Even though she had been through some crazy stuff she also showed us how to be positive.” Alexis called her mom “a light” and said she was “someone you don’t come in contact with much. A super empathetic and unique person.” Bryan Fonseca, a longtime producer and director on the Indianapolis theater scene, died of coronavirus complications on September 16. He was 65. Throughout his career, Fonseca was known for championing voices whose stories had not been told. A dramatic force in Indianapolis theater, he once said that good theater “helps us as a community understand what’s going on in the world around us.” Fonseca first started a storefront theater in his hometown of Gary, Indiana. In 1983, he co-founded the Phoenix Theatre Company in Indianapolis, which he then led for 35 years. He went on to start a new theater company in 2018, called the Fonseca Theatre, which was made up of 80% people of color. “He gave me a shot. He’s done that for countless artists,” Jordan Flores Schwartz, the theater’s current interim director, said. When Fonseca came down with COVID-19, he continued to hold staff meetings from the hospital until just days before he died. “He had a laugh that could fill a room,” Schwartz said. “It’s weird to think I’ll never hear that voice again.” Illinois clinical psychologist Andrea Mammen died of COVID-19 complications on September 12, at the age of 37. Her husband Matt described Mammen as “hands down the most beautiful soul I have ever met.” The pair had met in kindergarten before becoming close friends in high school, eventually marrying in 2013. Mammen worked for nine years to earn her psychology degree, and was devoted to her patients. “Ande was a very accepting person,” her mother Kathy Smith said. “She just wanted [people] to feel good about themselves and their differences.” She and Matt had bought their dream home in May so their 3-year-old son Russ had a big backyard to play in. When the whole family caught the coronavirus in August, Matt and Russ fought it off — but Andrea’s lingered. Just days after his wife died, Matt said Russ had called out to him one night to ask, “It’s just going to be you and me now, right?” “Yup,” Matt answered. “Just you and me.” Dr. John D. Marshall, a family doctor who ran his practice in South Georgia for more than 30 years, died of coronavirus complications on August 12. He was 74. “My uncle was a rock star in Americus, Georgia,” nephew Rasheed Marshall said. “He had his hand in every little thing… in that city.” Dr. Marshall — known as J.D. to his friends — headed the local NAACP chapter for 14 years. He also started the local newspaper, the Americus Sumter Observer, and served as editor-in-chief. Marshall was still running the paper and caring for his patients when he caught the coronavirus. He would spend 111 days on a ventilator. “He worked until he could not work anymore,” his niece Leslie Marshall said. “We truly lost an angel.” Trini Lopez, who scored a global smash with “If I Had a Hammer” in 1963, died of COVID-19 on August 11. He was 83. “If I Had a Hammer” went to #1 in 36 countries. The next year, in France, Lopez was given top billing with The Beatles. “I was in Paris with the Beatles at the Olympia Theatre,” Lopez told Dick Clark in 1964. “It was wild.” Lopez was born in the Little Mexico neighborhood of Dallas, but his first label wanted to hide his heritage and change his name. “He says Trini’s okay, but Lopez has gotta go. You see the prejudice,” Lopez said, in an upcoming documentary by The Ebersole Hughes Company called “My Name is Lopez.” He refused and was later signed by Frank Sinatra to his Reprise label, where he had his run of hits. He became a Las Vegas regular, starred in films like “The Dirty Dozen,” and also designed two guitars for Gibson that became collectors classics. Bill Mack, an overnight DJ in Texas who kept long-haul truckers company, died from coronavirus complications on July 31. He was 91. Mack, known on the radio as “the Midnight Cowboy,” also wrote songs. LeAnn Rimes’ recording of “Blue” in 1996 won Mack the Grammy for Best Country Song and the ACM Award for Song of the Year. “Thanks to LeAnn Rimes who took an old song and gave it new hope,” Mack said at the ACM Awards. Another Mack tune, “Drinking Champagne,” has become a country classic. Willie Nelson performed it with him in 2009. “The country music fans in my way of thinking, are the most devoted, allegiant, appreciative and encouraging people you’ll ever meet,” Mack told the Texas Heritage Songwriters’ Association in 2014. “I would like to be remembered by the fact that I appreciated those people. God bless ’em, what they did for me, by taking the time to listen.” Helen Jones Woods, a founding member of the International Sweethearts of Rhythm, a racially integrated all-female band that toured the world in the 1930s and 1940s, died of coronavirus complications on July 25. She was 96. Woods picked up the trombone at 13, telling a Smithsonian panel in 2011 that she had liked “watching the slide go up and down.” “Oh, I could go up and down too, so why the hell why don’t I play it, why don’t I play that instrument, you know?” Woods said. In 1944, Downbeat Magazine rated the Sweethearts America’s number one female band — but as Woods recalled in 2013, they were not always welcomed in the Jim Crow South. “Some places they would accept you, some places just didn’t have room for you. If we didn’t sleep on the bus, we wouldn’t have a place to stay,” she had said in the documentary, “The Girls in the Band.” The Sweethearts broke up in 1949 and Woods joined the Omaha Symphony, but was fired when the orchestra discovered she was Black. Woods went on to work as a nurse for 30 years and raise four children. Milla Handley, a pioneering woman in the world of wine, died from COVID-19 on July 25. She was 68. The founder of Handley Cellars in Anderson Valley, California, she was the first woman in the country to establish a vineyard in her own name. Handley produced her first vintage,250 cases of chardonnay, in the basement of her home in 1982. “She established her style and stuck to it,” said lead winemaker Randy Schock. “She didn’t follow trends.” Handley paved the way for other women, including her daughter, Lulu McClellan, now president of Handley Cellars, who said, “her shoes are impossibly big to fill.” Handley was an avid equestrian and loved the 1959 Mercedes she inherited from her mother. “Her favorite times,” Schock said, “were to pull the top down and take that car out and drive it out to the beach.” Adolfo Alvarado Jr., a chaplain in South Texas, died from complications of the coronavirus on July 25. He was 70. “Fito,” as he was known by family and friends, worked for 30 years as a technician with Southwestern Bell. In his youth, he was a gambler who loved the horses, but after an “encounter with God,” Fito became a pastor, devoted to his church and his family. In recent years, he had comforted the sick in hospice care, until he got sick himself this summer. “He was the kindest, easiest person to talk to,” said his daughter Amanda Vair. “It’s kind of hard to know the phone’s not going to ring, because my dad literally called me every single day.” Erica McAdoo, a senior detention officer with the Los Angeles Police Department, died from COVID-19 on July 3. She was 39. “She was always the peacemaker with the jail,” said McAdoo’s mom, Donna Royston. “When somebody came in very combative, she was always the go-to person to get these folks to calm down.” Royston and McAdoo also ran a catering service. McAdoo had just been promoted when she got sick. Her friends tried to rally her during her 97 days in intensive care and sent a video of them dancing to one of her favorite songs, “Suavemente,” for her to listen to. Upon her death, her co-workers held a celebration of her life at the beach. “We just wanted to do something that she loved,” said Catalina Alvarado. “She’s so missed,” her mom said. “It’s just not the same without her.” Jack Turnbull, a highly regarded acting coach and teacher in Los Angeles, died from complications of the coronavirus on June 14. He was 72. “Remember acting is a muscle. You have to work it out,” he told his students. He saw more than 100 clients find success in TV and film, including Hailee Steinfeld and Victoria Justice. On Actorsite, a business he founded, Turnbull rooted his students on with a “goofy” enthusiasm, said Kimberly Crandall, an actress and fellow teacher. “He made everybody feel their worth,” she said. Turnbull was raising three kids with his wife, Jessa, who he met in the Philippines in 2009. “I felt like I found my Mr. Right Guy,” Jessa said. “And that’s why I fell in love with him so quick…. He was so special to everyone and to me.” Mary J. Wilson, the first African American senior zookeeper at the Maryland Zoo in Baltimore, died from COVID-19 on May 21. She was 83. She started working at the zoo in 1961, with only a high school diploma and a love for animals. “She was just an extraordinarily brave woman,” said her daughter Sharron Wilson Jackson, adding that she was “a no-nonsense lady.” Wilson would walk through blizzards to get to work and fearlessly face loose animals, even catching escaped monkeys out of mid-air. “She was well noted for her bravery in the zoo,” Wilson Jackson said. “At times where it was a bit complicated or things could have gotten a bit hairy, she would just come in and take over. Take charge of the situation, and with the best interest of the animal.” Wilson spent her entire career in the zoo’s mammal house caring for the gorillas, elephants and big cats, before retiring in 1999. Wilson Roosevelt Jerman, a White House employee whose tenure saw 11 different presidents, died of coronavirus, on May 16, his granddaughter, Jamila Garrett, told Washington, D.C. station WTTC. He was 91. Jerman started his career as a White House cleaner under President Eisenhower in 1957, and retired as a butler during the Obama administration in 2012. “My grandfather was a family-loving, genuine man,” Garrett told WTTG reporter Shawn Yancy. “He was always about service. Service to others. It didn’t matter who you were or what you did or what you needed, whatever he could provide he did.” She said her grandfather’s friendship with Jackie Kennedy Onassis helped him get promoted to butler. “She was instrumental in ensuring that happened,” she said. Garrett also recounted her grandfather’s tenure under President George H.W. Bush, and said Jerman would often sit with a young George W. Bush when the latter had trouble sleeping while adapting to life at the White House. “He always taught us that there will always be obstacles in your life. Always. They won’t disappear. It doesn’t matter your status, it does not matter your role or what you do, there will always be obstacles. But you keep pushing forward,” she said. Leslie Lamar Parker, a tech support specialist for a Minneapolis school district, died of complications of the coronavirus on May 11 after a two-week battle with the illness. He was 31. Parker, a lifelong Minneapolis resident, met his wife Whitney Parker through mutual friends during college. They dated long-distance, married in 2012 and were raising two children together. “Their first giggles came from their dad,” Whitney said. “When I told Zuri her dad passed, she cried and then she said, ‘It’s OK because daddy is with all my favorite people and all my heroes. He’s with papa, Martin Luther King and Rosa Parks, and he wouldn’t want me to be sad.'” Whitney said Parker dreamed of being a published writer, and that it was the last wish on his bucket list. When the pandemic hit, he wrote an essay about how it brought his family closer. “I won’t recall how unforgiving the virus was to people like me. I won’t talk about how scared I was for my wife, who has severe asthma,” Parker wrote. “Instead, I’ll remember the conversations we had during our Sunday dinner.” Shortly after his death, Parker’s essay was published by the food journalism site, The Counter. “My husband gets to cross off that final bucket list item,” Whitney wrote to the editor. “I am so grateful. My heart is so full.” Charles “Rob” Roberts, a senior New Jersey police officer, died of COVID-19 complications on May 11. He was 45. Raised in Livingston, New Jersey, Roberts joined the Glen Ridge police force in 2000 and settled in the area with his wife and raised three children. He was called the “face” of his department, and a “shining example of an officer dedicated to serving the community.” “It was his lifelong dream” to be a police officer, his wife Alice said. “He was the cop everyone wanted to show up on the scene because he’d make a connection, make people feel like humans.” As a father, Alice said he was “always supportive” and volunteered as a local baseball and soccer coach. “The other kids and parents appreciated that he was never a yeller, never put kids down. He was always positive,” she said. The night before he collapsed during his battle with COVID-19, he had bought and assembled a hockey shooting game for his children. New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy said Roberts was “the officer most likely to be seen working with and reading with kids or raising money for one worthy cause or another.” His 10-year-old son, Gavin, led his mother and two sisters, ages 15 and 12, in Roberts’ funeral procession, while wearing his father’s police hat. Roberts was posthumously promoted and buried as Sergeant Roberts. Jimmy Glenn, owner of the famous New York City bar Jimmy’s Corner, died of complications related to the coronavirus on May 7. He was 89. Glenn, a former amateur boxer and a boxing trainer himself, opened Jimmy’s Corner in Times Square in 1971. The New York Times said he made it a “shrine to boxing,” filled with posters and photos of Glenn with Muhammed Ali, who was a friend. He opened a now-defunct boxing gym nearby just seven years later. The bar, however, survived through decades in which the neighborhood around it changed drastically. Thanks to cheap prices and friendly landlords, Glenn stayed in business and attracted boxing fans, promoters, athletes and celebrities for years. Upon news of Glenn’s death, tributes from in and out of the boxing world poured in. Comedian Amy Schumer posted a photo of herself with Glenn on Instagram, writing “Rest In Peace Jimmy. Covid took beloved boxing trainer and Jimmy’s corner owner Jimmy Glenn. I will miss seeing you and love you.” While Jimmy’s Corner was closed due to the coronavirus pandemic, his son, Adam Glenn, said it would reopen. Michael Halkias, the owner of an opulent catering hall in Brooklyn, New York, died of complications relating to the coronavirus on May 6. He was 82. Halkias’ “Grand Prospect Hall” was made famous for long-running commercials he starred in with his wife, Alice, which were spoofed by “Saturday Night Live” and comedian Jimmy Kimmel. The couple bought the venue in 1981 and spent two years renovating it before opening. “He wanted to fix it for everybody,” Alice said. A lover of Greek culture and his family, Halkias met his wife while managing a travel agency in 1966. He had sold her a ticket to Greece for a profit, and proposed to her when she returned. They had been married from 1967 until his recent death. “I was the most fortunate wife I could be,” Alice said. “He always told me several times a day that he loved me.” His daughter, Josephine Halkias-Tsarnas, confirmed the news of her father’s death on Facebook. “I never imagined my trip to Aruba in Feb. would be the last time I’m with my parents,” she wrote, adding that she had been her father’s secretary at age 14 and saw him as her idol. “I write this with an empty heart, a void which will never be filled.” Kevin Thomas Tarrant, former executive director of American Indians Community House NYC, died of complications of COVID-19 on May 4. He was 51. Born in New Jersey as a member of the Ho-Chunk Nation of Wisconsin and the Hopi Tribe of Arizona, Tarrant dedicated his life to preserving his Native American community, according to an online obituary. Tarrant was musically-inclined, and founded an internationally-known Native drum group called The SilverCloud Singers that has performed at notable venues such as Madison Square Garden and the Apollo Theater. As a solo performer, he performed with various a cappella groups and artists and was also a composer and percussionist for the Broadway production, “Ajijaack on Turtle Island.” In 2016, Tarrant sought to amplify Native American voices by founding Safe Harbors NYC along with his wife, playwright and director Murielle Borst-Tarrant. The arts initiative focuses on the development and production of Native Indigenous theater and performing arts. A friend said Tarrant and his wife met as teens when they both performed at pow wows, and the entire family performed to gather and “truly were intertwined in each other’s lives.” Tarrant is survived by his wife, daughter and father. Pastor Kendall Pierre, Sr., who preached at Mt. Zion Baptist church in Ama, Louisiana, died of coronavirus complications on May 2. He was 45. In addition to being a pastor, Pierre was a basketball coach for the Southeast Louisiana Warriors and ran a barber shop called Pierre’s Barber and Beauty Salon. “A lot of people got a lot of free counseling sitting in that barber chair,” his wife Sabrina Pierre said. The couple met working at McDonald’s, marrying in 1996 and raising three children together. “My husband was awesome,” she said. “He was everything — he had me and my children spoiled.” She called Pierre a “happy” and “purpose-driven man” who “spent all of his life serving others,” especially his children. “He was our handyman, cable man, jack all trades. He grew up without a father, so he poured everything. He made sure he was any every event they had,” she said. When the coronavirus pandemic hit, Pierre taught Bible study by video before he fell ill. “Today is a little bit different for me. I’m in the church and felt like I needed to come to the house of the Lord to give this particular presentation,” he can be heard saying in a video. More than 800 cars attended Pierre’s drive-through wake at Mt. Zion. Krist Angielen Castro Guzman, a Chicago nurse who gave birth to her third child in December 2019, died of COVID-19 complications on May 2. She was 35. As a nurse at the Meadowbrook Senior Facility, Guzman worked on the front lines of the coronavirus pandemic, doing everything she could to ensure her elderly patients were safe. Her cousin, Jeschlyn Pilar, said Guzman liked the excitement of her job and helping people. “She liked being considered a healthcare professional. She was proud of her job,” she said. With a father in the U.S. Navy, Guzman moved around the world while growing up, living in Japan, California and Iceland before meeting her husband, who also worked at Meadowbrook as a CNA, in Chicago. The two had three children together — Livvy, age 6, Xavi, age 5 and baby Leandro, who was born in December and named after Guzman’s uncle, a surgeon in the Philippines who also passed away from COVID-19 complications in March. “[Her kids] were her pride and joy,” her sister, Kayla Aleksei Clayton, said. “She loved her husband so much. They idolized each other.” Marion Welenz Hedrick, a great-grandmother and an Air Force veteran, died of complications from the coronavirus on April 30. She was 89. Hedrick served in the U.S. Air Force as an Airman Second Class before being appointed to work at the Pentagon in the 1950s. She then moved to the White House, where she was an assistant to President Dwight D. Eisenhower. As a member of the Oklahoma Women Veteran’s Organization, Hedrick designed the official emblem on the group’s flag. She married her late husband, Edward, in 1960, and the couple raised five children together. “They did pretty much everything together in their later years,” their daughter Catherine Armstrong said. “He would always tell her [she was] so beautiful.” She called Hedrick a “champion for her kids.” In addition to her impressive resumé, Hedrick was classically trained in piano and loved to sing and sew. She took an interest in art later in life, and earned awards for her paintings. Hedrick will be buried with military honors at Arlington National Cemetery in November. Johng Kuk Pyun, who lived the immigrant’s story of the American dream, died from the coronavirus on April 29. He was 82. Pyun worked as an interpreter for the American military in South Korea. In 1976, at age 39, he immigrated to the United States with his wife and four kids. “He sacrificed so much to give us a better life,” said his daughter SuJean Sackin. “He was just so tenacious.” Arriving with $500, Pyun built a thriving dry cleaning business in Los Angeles and mentored other South Korean immigrants, helping them learn how to operate their own businesses, Sackin said. “A lot of them in fact worked at the business for a few weeks or a couple months until they gained that knowledge and expertise to own their own businesses,” she said. “My dad was kind of like an unsung hero.” Dr. James A. Mahoney, an intensive care unit pulmonologist, died of complications of COVID-19 on April 27. He was 62. Mahoney, nicknamed “Charlie,” started as a student at SUNY Downstate Medical Center’s teaching college in 1982 before working there as a pulmonologist and professor. “He would bring the best out of you, and he would not give up on you,” said Dr. Julien Cavanagh, who was his former intern, resident and later colleague. “He had this ability to make you feel safe, to make you feel reassured.” Mahoney was a mentor for other minority doctors, colleagues said. The celebrated doctor had been contemplating retirement when the coronavirus pandemic hit, but instead continued to treat patients. Even after coming down with the illness, he would call patients to monitor them. Mahoney died at the same hospital where he had worked for nearly 40 years. Henri Kichka, one of Belgium’s last Holocaust survivors, died of coronavirus complications on April 25. He was 94. Kichka was born to a Polish Jewish family in 1926. In 1942, when Germany invaded Brussels, he and his father were sent to a slave labor camp while his mother and two sisters were sent to Auschwitz, where they were soon killed. In 1945, towards the end of World War II, his father died at the Buchenwald concentration camp, making Kichka the lone member of his family to survive. After years of silence, Kichka began sharing his experience in Belgian schools. He even accompanied school children on trips to Auschwitz, making it his mission to educate youth on the atrocities that happened during the war. He wrote a memoir about his experiences in 2005. Illustrator and cartoonist Michel Kichka, Henri Kichka’s son, posted on Facebook about his father’s death. “A small microscopic Coronavirus succeeded where the entire Nazi army had failed,” he wrote. “My father had survived the March of death. But today has ended his March of life.” Samantha Wissinger, a Michigan nurse, died of coronavirus complications on April 24 at age 29. Wissinger worked at Beaumont Hospital, where her husband Markus said she had a “cult following.” “Everyone there loves her,” he said. “Her final day in the hospital when she passed away — her unit has six, seven nurses. Half the nurses were allowed to take a break and come be with her. Even her boss came down.” A survivor of stage three breast cancer and stage four brain cancer, Wissinger met her husband on a dating site. Markus described her as forward, confident and brave. They were getting ready to celebrate their one year anniversary in June. Her good friend, Sam Baughman, said Wissinger was “very kind and compassionate” and a “great, caring person.” “We were best friends for over 20 years. More like sisters,” she said. Markus said the couple had been working on converting a bus into an RV when she got sick and passed away. “I’m still going to do that and make it a shrine to her,” he said. Valentina Blackhorse, who worked as a government administrator for the Navajo Nation, died from complications of the coronavirus on April 23. She was 28. Blackhorse dreamed of leading her people one day as Navajo Nation Council delegate or even president of the Navajo Nation. A former pageant queen, she was proud of her Native American heritage. “I want her to be remembered as a person who had goals, huge goals, a person who wanted to help out her community,” said Robby Jones, Blackhorse’s boyfriend and father of her 1-year-old daughter, Poet. “She wanted to improve the Navajo Nation as much as she could. She would do everything and anything for her family just to help them out.” The reservation, which sprawls across three Southwestern states, was hit hard by the coronavirus, with one of the country’s highest infection rates. When Jones got the virus, Blackhorse left Poet at her grandparents while she cared for him. Then she got sick herself. “She gave so much and never asked anything in return,” Blackhorse’s sister, Vanielle, said. “She was a giver.” Joyce Pacubas-Le Blanc, who worked as a nurse in Chicago for over 30 years, died of coronavirus complications on April 23. She was 53. A colleague and friend said Pacubas-Le Blanc, an ICU triage nurse at the University of Illinois hospital, was “nurturing to whoever needed it.
