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ESSENTIAL DESTINATIONS

MONTH: December 2006

Human obituaries

 

Peter Roberts, 82, died on November 15, 2006. "His concern for animals started when after World War II service, he settled down with his wife Anna to dairy farming in Hampshire," recalled Compassion In World Farming ambassador and former chief executive Joyce D'Silva. "Peter began to take his old, barren cows to the slaughterhouse and stayed with them to the end. The couple refused to send their surplus calves to market, fearing they might be bought for the live export trade and end up in veal crates in France or Holland." Appalled by the introduction of factory farming, first with poultry, later with other species, "Peter wrote a strong letter to the press and it generated a huge response," D'Silva continued. "Realizing that there was a groundswell of feeling against intensive farming, he approached the major animal welfare societies, urging them to campaign against battery cages. They declined. Peter despaired to a solicitor friend, who said: "Peter, you'll just have to do it yourself. Come to my office and we'll set up a trust. Compassion in World Farming was born," initially called the Athene Trust. At first, the Ministry of Agriculture Fisheries and Food treated Peter with what he charitably referred to as 'benign amusement.' But Peter had touched a chord with the public, whose awareness had been raised by the publication of Ruth Harrison's seminal book Animal Machines in 1964. Now Peter provided an organised outlet for people's horror at keeping hens in cages and confining calves and breeding sows in narrow crates, unable to turn around. Peter stopped farming, and in 1978, he opened the Bran Tub in Petersfield," an independent health food shop. "He also set up Direct Foods," Silva recalled, "marketing textured vegetable protein. He himself had become a vegetarian. For all the years that Peter put in as director of CIWF," D'Silva added, "he managed never to draw a salary." CIWF won a British ban on veal crates in 1990, and a ban on sow gestation crates in 1999. "However, to Peter's regret," D'Silva said, "he never managed to achieve a permanent ban on the export of live animals. In 2001, Peter, by then retired due to the onset of Parkinson's disease, received the first ever BBC TV award for his outstanding contribution to animal welfare." In 2002 he was made a member of the Order of the British Empire.

Donald H. Anthony, 80, died on October 7, 2006 in St. Louis. Named general manager of the Humane Society of Missouri in 1963, Anthony established a reputation as an innovator of programs now ubiquitous by opening adoption facilities separate from the holding kennels and cages in 1965, introducing obedience training in 1968, starting a fundraising auxiliary and in-house pet supply store in 1975, beginning a "visiting pets" program to take pets to hospitals and nursing homes in 1979, and in 1983 encouraging director of education Sue Gassner and KMOX radio personality Jack Carney to start a program pairing older pets with senior citizens that the St. Louis-based Ralston Purina Co. took national as "Pets for People." Further innovations included opening the 165-acre George H. Packwood Animal Sanctuary & Longmeadow Farm in 1988, to handle hooved animals, and starting a Cinderella Fund in 1989 to provide veterinary care for recoverable and potentially adoptable sick or injured animals. Anthony also lobbied for stronger legislation against puppy mills, pet theft, and dogfighting, and won the 1983 passage of a Missouri law authorizing humane societies to obtain search and seizure warrants. Anthony retired after leading rescue efforts during the severe St. Louis floods of 1993.

Carl Slaughter, 72, died on November 20, 2006 in Lawrenceville, Georgia. As a young U.S. Marine, he was among 25,000 U.S. troops who held back 320,000 Chinese invaders during a 60-mile retreat at the 1950 start of the Korean War. After the war, recalled his longtime friend Mike McCrosky, "He worked for the Arkansas Gazette as an illustrator against segregation. In the 1960s he formed the Albert Schweitzer Memorial Fund to benefit neglected and abused companion animals. He was active in that endeavor to his end. During the 1980s, he supported the rescue of the burros at China Lake from a proposed military slaughter. A known 'hard-edge' artist, he painted and sold his work widely. Most of the proceeds were given to animal causes. Carl was a tireless worker," McCrosky continued, "who stood throughout the late 1980s and early 1990s protesting the careless, inhumane and brutal destruction of primates by both the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Yerkes Regional Primate Research Center at Emory University. Carl asked that the ashes of his Yorkshire terrier be mixed with his own, then spread by the Navy at sea," McCrosky said. "Carl's last words to me before he died were 'Semper Fidelis,' the Marine Corps motto, meaning 'Always Faithful.'"

Phyllis Shulman, 80, died on November 18, 2006, in Saratoga Springs, New York. A member of the Saratoga County Animal Welfare League from 1973 to 1996, and president of the organization 1986-1996, Shulman raised money to buy property in Gansevoort and build a no-kill animal shelter. The group housed as many as 24 cats and dogs," recalled Margarita Raycheva of The Saratogian. "Soon after Shulman retired from the organization, the group fell apart. She had been the only animal officer in the group," which at peak had 80 members, "and despite her efforts to train others, it just didn't work out." The Saratoga County Animal Welfare League is now defunct.

Becca Bingham, 39, her 4-year-old daughter, and her 2-year-old son were killed on November 10, 2006 by alleged hit-and-run drunk driver Lawrence Trujillo, who was jailed. Bingham volunteered at the Denver Dumb Friends League shelter from 1997 to 2001, then became a Homes With Hearts Foster Care program volunteer in 2003.

Robert Wagner, 25, of Port St. Lucie, Florida, on November 12, 2006 "died after being pulled into a stump grinder at a Lake Wales hunting camp," wrote Palm Beach Post staff writer Allyson Bird. "Wagner was trying to save his friend John Santilli's Weimaraner after the dog's leash was caught in the grinder. As they ground palmetto stumps, Wagner saw Maggie, Santilli's 6-month-old puppy, headed for the grinder. He grabbed Maggie's collar. The grinder pulled them both in."

Marianne Schmid, 67, of Tottenham, Ontario, was found dead in the woods near her home on November 6, 2006 by her husband Walter Schmid and their two-year-old grandson, allegedly killed by an errant shot from hunter Frederick Paul Thomas, 60, who was charged with criminal negligence causing death and careless use of a firearm. An avid hiker and wildlife-watcher, Marianne Schmid had called the Ontario Provincial Police a week earlier, Walter Schmid said, "because she had a scare with someone shooting." Both Schmids were born in Germany. Walter emigrated to Canada in 1958; Marianne followed a year later to marry him.

Christopher Bergman, 57, director of the San Francisco SPCA animal-assisted therapy program, died of cancer on November 2, 2006. "Bergman and his volunteers brought dogs, cats, chinchillas and even a bearded dragon to convalescent homes, pediatric hospitals, Alzheimer's centers and mental health clinics," recalled San Francisco Chronicle staff writer Ilene Lelchuk. "They visited a record 27,565 people in nearly 100 health care facilities" in 2005.