Lillian Barazza
Hilda V. Amalfitano, 82, of Rocky Hill, died suddenly January 11 at Merwick Rehab Hospital and Skilled Nursing Facility.
Born in Star Tannery, Va., she had lived in Rocky Hill for the past 60 years.
She was retired from 5th Dimension in Montgomery Township.
She was a member of 76ers Seniors of Rocky Hill, Montgomery Senior Citizens, and the Rocky Hill Fire Company Ladies Auxiliary.
Wife of the late Louis V. Amalfitano, she is survived by two sons, Dennis of Tampa, Fla. and David of Rocky Hill; and a granddaughter.
The funeral service was January 14 at the First Reformed Church of Rocky Hill. The Rev. William Schutter, Pastor, officiated. Interment was in Rocky Hill Cemetery.
Memorial contributions may be made to the Rocky Hill First Aid & Rescue Squad; or to the Rocky Hill Fire Company.
Arrangements were by The Kimble Funeral Home.
Nancy A. Baker, 71, of Ewing Township, died January 8 at home.
Born in South Bend, Ind., she lived in Montgomery Township for 20 years before moving to Ewing 15 years ago.
In 1955 she received a B.A. from Purdue University, where she was a member of the Delta Gamma sorority.
She was employed at Educational Testing Service for 20 years.
She was a volunteer at the Ewing Branch of Mercer Library, Friends of the Library, the Library for the Blind, and the Ewing Senior Center.
She is survived by a son, Scott, of Trinity, N.C.; a daughter, Karen Baker Varieur of Wilmington, N.C.; and two grandchildren.
A memorial service will be held on Saturday, February 4 at 11 a.m. at The Kimble Funeral Home, 1 Hamilton Avenue. Friends may call from 10:30 a.m. until the time of service at the funeral home. Interment will be private.
In lieu of flowers, memorial donations may be made to the Ewing Branch of Mercer County Library, Friends of the Library, 61 Scotch Road, Ewing 08628.
Lillian Barraza, 85, of Princeton, died January 14 at home.
Born in Amsterdam, N.Y., she moved to New York City as a young adult to attend Cooper Union Art Institute on a scholarship program. There she met her husband, Mario von Chrismar Barraza, a Chilean who had come to the U.S. on a scholarship to Rensselaer Polytechnic University. They married in 1948, then lived in East Orange, Lynchburg, Va., Newport, R.I., and Providence, R.I. Their last residence was in Princeton.
Mrs. Barraza was a prolific artist who actively participated in art classes until shortly before her death. Her work was shown in art exhibits at the Suzanne Patterson Senior Center, and last year two of her paintings were donated to Stuart Country Day School for auctioning at its annual fund-raiser.
She started her career in fashion design in New York City. She worked for Butterick and Simplicity Pattern companies as a fashion illustrator and maintained a lifelong interest in fashion. She later worked for American Mathematical Society in Providence for many years before moving to Princeton to be closer to her children. In Princeton, she worked at the Public Library until she retired at the age of 80, after which she continued to serve as a library volunteer.
Predeceased by her husband 15 years ago, she is survived by three daughters, Suzanne Barraza of New York City, Maria Barraza of New York and Stonington, Conn., and Monica Keim of Princeton; and one granddaughter.
The funeral will be Friday, January 20 at 10 a.m. at The Mather Hodge Funeral Home, 40 Vandeventer Avenue. A Mass of Christian Burial will follow at 11 a.m. at St. Paul's Church, 214 Nassau Street. Burial will be in Princeton Cemetery.
Calling hours will be 7 to 9 p.m. this Thursday at the funeral home.
Barbara Catherine Manning Bastedo, 82, of Hendersonville, N.C., formerly of Princeton, died January 4 at home of natural causes.
Born and raised in Washington, D.C., she was a 1941 graduate of Roosevelt High School where she was considered the "outstanding player" on the girls' basketball team. She was a 1945 graduate of Wilson Teachers College in D.C.
During World War II, she worked for the Navy as what was called a "computer," doing calculations for classified cryptography projects.
In 1946 she married Walter Bastedo Jr., a Princeton native and University alumnus. They lived in Princeton until he finished his graduate studies, while she worked for the University administration. The couple later moved to accommodate his jobs in the aircraft industry, in 1947 to Levittown, Long Island, and in 1951 to Stony Brook, N.Y.
In Stony Brook, she was active in the Stony Brook Community United Methodist Church. She went back to teaching and worked for the New York Board of Cooperative Educational Services in special education, teaching emotionally disturbed children. She also became an elected, unpaid, union representative for the New York State United Teachers and the American Federation of Teachers. She went back to school and received a master's degree in special education from Adelphi University in 1974.
The Bastedos retired on the same day in 1985. They moved to Hendersonville, where they enjoyed 13 years of retired life and traveling together, frequently revisiting Princeton until Mr. Bastedo died in 1998.
A member of the Etowah United Methodist Church, Mrs. Bastedo was also active there in the American Association of University Women, WNC Quilters, Gleaners, the Red Hat Club, and the Rambling Ridge Book and Bridge clubs.
She is survived by two sons, Wayne and Ralph, both of Hendersonville; a daughter, Christine Brunner of Olympia, Wash.; two sisters, Mary Rose Weber of Miami, Fla. and Louise Lee of Columbia, Md.; a brother, David Manning of Mount Rainer, Md.; and a granddaughter.
A memorial service was held in Etowah, N.C. on January 8. Burial was January 11 beside her husband in the cemetery of the Princeton Baptist Church at Penns Neck.
Memorial gifts may be made to the Etowah United Methodist Church, Brickyard Road, Etowah, N.C. 28782.
Funeral arrangements were by Thomas Shepherd & Son, Inc., Hendersonville.
Phoebe Taylor Biddle, 76, of Princeton and St. Barths, died January 14.
Born in Philadelphia, the daughter of C. Newbold Taylor and Anne Miers Taylor, she had lived in Princeton since 1958.
A graduate of the Westover School, she attended Briar-cliff College and The Moore Institute of Art. Her great loves were horticulture, reading, painting, and travel.
Predeceased by her husband, Charles Biddle, in 2003, she is survived by two sons, Charles J. of North Salem, N.Y. and Willing L. of South Salem, N.Y.; and four grandchildren.
A memorial service will be held at 4 p.m. this Friday, January 20 at the Princeton University Chapel.
In lieu of flowers, memorial donations may be sent to North Country School, Box 187, Lake Placid, N.Y. 12946-0187.
Arrangements are by the Alloway Funeral Home, Merchantsville.
James Howard Mills, 94, of Princeton, died January 11 at The Pavilions at Forrestal Health and Rehab Center.
Born in Norfolk, Va., he had been a resident of Deerfield Beach, Fla. before moving to Princeton in 2002 to live with his son Donald.
A graduate of Pine Bush High School in Pine Bush, N.Y., his first job was working for the telephone company in Middletown, New York. He later moved to New York City and worked as a short-order cook in a luncheonette, where he learned culinary skills that he used all his life. He was an entrepreneur who started several businesses in the electronics field; at the time of his retirement in the 1970s he was president of Rotating Components in Bayshore, Long Island.
As a teenager he bought broken-down items and fixed them up for resale. In his post-retirement years he worked in the home renovation and TV repair businesses. Admired for his drive, tenacity, ingenuity, and sense of adventure, he was known to his family and friends as a man for whom no project or problem was too large to handle.
An amateur radio operator since the 1930s, he was a member of the Valley Stream, Long Island Masonic Lodge, and a member of the Rotary Club in Bayshore, Long Island. He was also an avid boater and motored from Florida to Canada.
He married the late Sally Leifer Mills in 1939, and the late Marion Kajkowski Mills in 1966. He was predeceased also by two sisters, Catherine Oswald and Helen Lundblom; a brother, Edward Mills; and a son, Carl. He is survived by two sons, Donald and David; three daughters, Dorothy Highland, Debbie Jones, and Susan Kaplan; a sister, Marion McBride; eight grand-children; and a great-granddaughter.
The funeral service was January 15 at the Blackwell Memorial Home, Pennington. Interment was at Princeton Cemetery.
Memorial contributions may be made to Chandler Hall Health Services/ADHP, 99 Barclay Street, Newtown, Pa. 18940; or to Princeton HealthCare System Foundation, 253 Witherspoon Street, Princeton 08540; or to a charity of the donor's choice.
Francis J. O'Connell, 97, of Princeton, died January 12 at Acorn Glen.
A native of Philadelphia, he graduated from West Philadelphia Catholic High School for Boys and earned a diploma in municipal engineering from Drexel Institute of Technology, now Drexel University.
He served as a Lieutenant in the U.S. Army from 1942 to 1945 with the 29th Division, participating in the Normandy invasion in 1944. He was awarded the Bronze Star for bravery.
Prior to his retirement, he was a highway engineer with the District of Columbia Department of Highways and Traffic.
He moved to Pennington in 1997 to be closer to his children and their families. He was a member of St. James Church in Pennington.
Predeceased in 2003 by his wife of 53 years, Genevieve Finzel O'Connell, he is survived by a daughter, Sarah Jane Militello of Belmont, Calif.; a son, Daniel of Princeton; and five grandchildren.
A Mass of Christian Burial was celebrated January 16 at St. John the Evangelist Church, Forest Glen, Md. Burial was in the church cemetery.