B6 Sunday, June 17, 2012 OBITUARIES
Rev. William Hartman
The Rev. William R. Hartman Sr., 87, of Roswell, died peacefully at home on June 12, 2012. He is survived by his wife of 65 years Frances; his children, William Hartman Jr. (Polly), of Roswell, Julia Hartman, of Asheville, N.C., Margaret Abbott (Maurice Wheatley), of St. Thomas, Virgin Islands, and Paul Hartman (Diana), of Cheyenne, Wyo.; his sister Peggy Ratcliff, of Lilburn, Ga.; seven grandchildren, and six great-grandchildren. After serving in the Army in World War II, then graduating from Emory University and Lutheran Theological Southern Seminary, the Rev. Hartman was ordained in 1951. He served as a mission developer and pastor to churches in Alabama, Georgia and Kentucky before organizing St. Mark’s Lutheran Church in Roswell, where he served as pastor from 1958 to 1966. He later served churches in the U.S. Virgin Islands, Ohio, Georgia, Tennessee, Wyoming and Texas. He also was a licensed nursing home administrator and served in that capacity in North Carolina, New York and New Jersey, before retiring in Roswell in 1982, where he rejoined St. Mark’s and was named pastor emeritus in 1994. Bill enjoyed traveling with Frances and visited all 50 states, Canada, Latin America and the Caribbean. A memorial service will be held at St. Mark’s Lutheran Church, Thursday, June 21, 2012, at 10:30 a.m. Memorial contributions may be made to St. Mark’s Lutheran Church. Condolences may be offered online at lagronefuneralchapels.com. Arrangements are under the direction of LaGrone Funeral Chapel.
OBITUARIES O’Bannon. She was married to Edger Deen Wimberly for 30 years, then divorced. They raised three children while she worked as an office manager at TG &Y. She later retired from the Clovis Walmart. Mary will be remembered as a hard worker, a very generous person and a helping person who would give the shirt off her back to those who needed help. She loved arts and crafts, line and square dancing, and was a member of a jug band. Mary was a good and faithful servant to Christ, eternal do-gooder and a saint. She will be dearly missed. Mary was preceded in death by two daughters, Becky Kay Wimberly and Kathy Ferrell; her parents Claude and Myrtle O’Bannon; and boyfriend Weldon Odell. Those left to cherish Mary’s memory are son Dick Wimberly, of Crane, Texas; daughter Cheri Vogler, of Hitchcock, Texas; grandchildren, Shataia Garza, of Borger, Texas, Shane Franklin of Borger, Hugh Wimberly, of Los Angeles, and Nigel Wimberly, of Denver; great-grandchildren, Jalin, Isaiah and Janaia Garza, Isabella and Justin Franklin, Shane Franklin II and Mattie Smily; daughter, Desiree Smith, of Alamogordo; and Jackie Smily, Morgan Marie Smith, and Brandon Smith. She had many wonderful friends in life and church. A thank you goes out to all her loving friends and special ones who helped her through her later years: Weldon Odell, his son Robert and his wife Terry, and the rest of the Odell family; Sandra Moore, Jessica and Joe Lopez, and Tina Lanbing, a good friend and neighbor. Please take a moment to share your thoughts and memories in the online register book at andersonbethany.com. Arrangements are under the direction of AndersonBethany Funeral Home and Crematory.
Walter F. Knapp
Mary Wood
Mary Wimberly Wood, loving mother, grandmother and friend, passed away peacefully on Saturday, June 9, 2012, at her home in Roswell. She was 73. Memorial services will be held at 10:30 am, Tuesday, June 19, 2012, at Washington Avenue Fellowship Church with the Rev. Randy Reeves and Dick and Blaine Wimberly officiating. Mary Louise O’Bannon was born Sept. 3, 1938, in Dallas Center, Iowa, to Claude and Myrtle (Burton)
Former Roswell resident Walter F. Knapp Jr. passed away on June 10, 2012, at his home in Mandeville, La. Walter was born Dec. 17, 1928, in West Point, Va., to Walter F. and Mary Elizabeth Knapp, who preceded him in death. Walter and Ida Mae Godby were married on April 5, 1957, in Lovington. She survives him along with their children, Walter (Debra) Knapp, of Cut Of f, La., Judy Van Norman (Dave) Yates, of Mobile, Ala., Jeanne (Joe) Montana, of Saucier, Miss., Elizabeth (David) Garland, of Mandeville, La., and Molly Crego, of Grapevine,Texas. Also surviving are one brother Alfred Knapp, of Richmond, Va.; 10 grandchilden, eight great-grandchildren and many nieces and nephews. Walter joined the Air Force and was stationed at Walker AFB, where he
G e t C l a s s i fi e d
found his home. He went to work for Harry James at what was then Roswell Laundry before it was sold to American Linen. He was transferred to Gulfport, Miss., and retired from American Linen in 1987. Walter was well-known for his involvement and love for sports, having played professional baseball for the Philadephia Phillies and worked as a scout for the Cleveland Indians. He coached American Legion Baseball in both Roswell and Gulfport. He also was an official for football, basketball and baseball at both the high school and college levels. He was inducted into the New Mexico Officials Association Hall of Fame in 2005, which he considered one of his greatest honors. Walter was an active member of the Catholic Church and a 4th Degree member of the Knights of Columbus. Services were held on June 14, 2012, in Covington, La., with interment at Biloxi National Cemetery. In lieu of flowers the family requests contributions in memory of Mr. Knapp be made to Chaves County CASA, 500 N. Main, Roswell, NM 88201, or Assurance Home, 1000 E. 18th St., Roswell, NM 88201.
John Rhodes
A funeral service is scheduled for 9:30 a.m., Wednesday, June 20, 2012, at First Presbyterian Church in Hagerman, for John “MJ” Rhodes, 86, of Hager man, who passed away June 13, 2012. The Rev. Stephen Deutsch of First Presbyterian Church will officiate, with interment to follow in Hagerman Cemetery. Honors will be provided by the Masons and the Veterans Honor Guard. MJ was born June 18, 1925, in Hager man. He married Bertha Lawing on Sept. 11, 1948, in Hagerman. She survives him at the family home. Other survivors include a daughter Paula Dor n Blaser and her husband, of Roswell; granddaughter Amy Mathews and a greatgranddaughter, Molly Mathews. MJ was a far mer. He served his country in the United States Navy in World War II. He was a drag racer, a member of the Hagerman Car Club, Felix Masonic Lodge No. 29, of Hagerman, York Rite, Order of Easter n Star No. 8, Shriners and Little Hookers, and drove the Model-T Fire T ruck during the parades. He was a fiddler and participated in contests. He was also the chairman of the Eastern New Mexico State Fair Fiddler Contest. Pallbearers will be the Masons. Friends may pay respects online at lagronefuneralchapels.com. Arrangements are under the direction of LaGrone Funeral Chapel.
Roswell Daily Record
Saudi Crown Prince Nayef dies RIYADH, Saudi Arabia (AP) — Crown Prince Nayef bin Abdul-Aziz, the hard-line interior minister who spearheaded Saudi Arabia’s fierce crackdown al-Qaida’s crushing branch in the country after the 9/11 attacks and then rose to become next in line to the throne, has died. He was in his late 70s. Nayef’s death unexpectedly reopens the question of succession in this crucial U.S. ally and oil powerhouse for the second time in less than a year. The 88-year -old King Abdullah has now outlived two designated successors, despite ailments of his own. Now a new crown prince must be chosen from among his brothers and half-brothers, all the sons of Saudi Arabia’s founder, AbdulAziz. The figure believed most likely to be tapped as the new heir is Prince Salman, the current defense minister who previously served for decades in the powerful post of governor of Riyadh, the capital. The crown prince will be chosen by the Allegiance Council, an assembly of Abdul-Aziz’s sons and some of his grandchildren. It also opens the possibility of moving a member of the so-called “third generation” — the grandchildren of the country’s founding monarch — one step closer to taking the leadership of one of the West’s most crucial Arab allies. A statement by the royal family said Nayef died Saturday in a hospital abroad. Saudi-funded pan-Arab TV station AlArabiya later confirmed he died in Geneva. Nayef had been out of the country since late May, when he went on a trip that was described as a “personal vacation” that would include medical tests. He traveled abroad frequently in recent years for tests but authorities never reported what ailments he may have been suffering from. Nayef had a reputation for being a hard-liner and a conservative. He was believed to be closer than many of his brothers to the power ful Wahhabi religious establishment that gives legitimacy to the royal family, and he at times worked to give a freer hand to the religious police who enforce strict social rules. His elevation to crown prince in November 2011, after the death of his brother Sultan, had raised worries among liberals in the kingdom that, if he ever became king, he would halt or even roll back reforms that Abdullah had enacted. Soon after becoming crown prince, Nayef vowed at a conference of clerics that Saudi Arabia would “never sway from and never compromise on” its adherence to the puritanical, ultraconservative Wahhabi doctrine. The ideology, he proclaimed “is the source of the kingdom’s pride, success and progress.” Nayef had expressed some reservations about some of the reforms by Abdullah, who made incremental steps to bring more democracy to the country and increase women’s rights. Nayef said he saw no need for
elections in the kingdom or for women to sit on the Shura Council, an unelected advisory body to the king that is the closest thing to a parliament. His top concer n was security in the kingdom and maintaining a fierce bulwark against Shiite powerhouse, Iran, according to U.S. Embassy assessments. “A firm authoritarian at heart,” was the description of Nayef in a 2009 Embassy report on him, leaked by the whistleblower site WikiLeaks. “He harbors anti-Shia biases and his worldview is colored by deep suspicion of Iran,” it said. “Nayef promotes a vision for Saudi society under the slogan of ‘intellectual security,’ which he advocates as needed to ‘purge aberrant ideas”’ and combat extremism, it added, noting that his was in contrast to Abdullah’s strategy emphasizing “dialogue, tolerance of differences, and knowledgebased education that is objectionable to many conservatives.” Nayef, who was interior minister in charge of internal security forces since 1975, built up his power in the kingdom though his fierce crackdown against al-Qaida’s branch in the country following the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks in the United States and a broader campaign to prevent the growth of Islamic militancy among Saudis. The 9/11 attacks at first strained ties between the two allies. For months, the kingdom refused to acknowledge any of its citizens were involved in the suicide airline bombings, until finally Nayef became the first Saudi official to publicly confirm that 15 of the 19 hijackers were Saudis, in a February 2002 interview with The Associated Press. In November 2002, Nayef told the Arabic-language Kuwaiti daily Assyasah that Jews were behind the Sept. 11 attacks because they have benefited from subsequent criticism of Islam and Arabs. Nayef came under heavy criticism in the U.S., especially because he was the man in charge of Saudi investigations into the attack. Criticism grew in the United States that the Saudis were not doing enough to stem extremism in their country or combat alQaida. In mid-2003, Islamic militants struck inside the kingdom, targeting three residential expatriate compounds — the first of a string of assaults that later hit government buildings, the U.S. consulate in Jiddah and the perimeter of the world’s largest oil processing facility in Abqaiq. AlQaida’s branch in the country announced its aim to overthrow Al Saud royal family. The attacks galvanized the government into serious action against the militants, an effort spearheaded by Nayef. Over the next years, dozens of attacks were foiled, hundreds of militants were rounded up and killed. By 2008, it was believed that al-Qaida’s branch was largely broken in the country. Militant leaders who survived or were not jailed largely
AP Photo
Saudi Crown Prince - Interior minister Nayef bin Abdul-Aziz at the Gulf Cooperation Council summit in Riyadh, May 14.
fled to Yemen, where they joined Yemeni militants in reviving al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula. Nayef took a leading role in combatting the branch in Yemen as well. In 2009, al-Qaida militants attempted to assassinate his son, Prince Muhammad, who is deputy interior minister and the commander of counterterrorism operations: A suicide bomber posing as a repentant militant blew himself up in the same room as the prince but failed to kill him. The cooperation against al-Qaida both in the kingdom and in Yemen significantly boosted ties with the United States. The anti-militant campaign also boosted Nayef’s ties to the religious establishment, which he saw as a major tool in keeping stability and preventing the spread of violent alQaida-style “jihadi” theology. Nayef’s Interior Ministry allied with clerics in a “rehabilitation” program for detained militants, who went through intensive courses with clerics in “correct” Islam to sway them away from violence. The program brought praise from the United States. Nayef never clashed with Abdullah over reforms or made attempts to stop them — such a step would be unthinkable in the tight-knit royal family, whose members work hard to keep differences under wraps and ultimately defer to the king. But Nayef was long seen as more favorable to the Wahhabi establishment. In 2009, Nayef promptly shut down a film festival in the Red Sea port city of Jiddah, apparently because of conservatives’ worry about the possibility of gender mixing in theaters and a general distaste toward film as immoral. Nayef, a soft-spoken, stocky man of medium build, was born in 1933, the 23rd son of AbdulAziz, the family patriarch who founded the kingdom in 1932 and had dozens of sons by various wives. Nayef was one of the five surviving members of the Sudairi seven, sons of Abdul-Aziz from his wife Hussa bint Ahmad Sudairi who, for decades, have held influential posts. That made him a half-brother of King Abdullah. Before being appointed interior minister, he held the posts of Riyadh governor, deputy minister of interior and minister of state for internal affairs. Nayef has 10 children from several wives.