Clara Jo Davis
Clara Jo Davis died Sunday, June 7, 2015 in Athens.
She was a community news writer for the Athens Daily Review for more than 30 years covering the Cross Roads and Shady Oaks areas. Those writings reflected her passion of food, church and her friends.
George La Don Hamilton
George La Don Hamilton died April 15, 2015, at age 78. He was known for dedicating much of his life to bettering the small community of Fritch.
Hamilton was born April 6, 1937, in Rifle, Co., to Charlie and Verda Hamilton. He was husband to Fern Sheets.
With his first wife, Cherry Hamilton, he founded The Eagle Press on Aug. 19, 1987. The Eagle Press graduated from the back room of their home to a building he designed and built expressly for the paper.
Claudia Poff Gill
Claudia Gill, 86, of Tuleta, died Sunday, April 12, 2015.
Gill was born April 18, 1928, in Beeville to Christine Holly Stoftzfus and Dr. C.M. Poff. She married Truman Flournoy Gill in Tuleta on April 28, 1945.
She was a housewife, rancher, retired newspaper reporter and a member of First Presbyterian Church.
She raised registered Brahman cattle and was a member of the American Brahman Breeders Association.
Robert Lee Jenson
Mark Engebretson, former editor of the Lake County Sun, died March 22, 2015, in Graham after a battle with cancer.
Engebretson was born in Stephenville, on Sept. 10, 1947, to Oscar and Ethel Engebretson.
Nessye Mae Proffitt Roach, 91, former columnist for the Jeff Davis County Mountain Dispatch, died Jan. 26, 2015, after a lengthy illness. Her column “Long Ago” ran for 13 years and received an award from West Texas Press Association in 1998.
Roach was born on June 4, 1923, on a ranch near Junction, Texas, after her father rescued the doctor from the flooding Llano River. Her father taught her to ride and train horses and cut cattle. She learned to sing from her mother and to play guitar by listening to the shearing crews and Jimmy Rogers records.
JACK D. LOFTIS - Jack D. Loftis, who led the Houston Chronicle newsroom through space shuttle flights, the Enron scandal and the 9/11 terror attacks, died Dec. 29 at the age of 80 after a long illness. Loftis served as the Chronicle’s vice president and editor from 1987 to 2002. Loftis joined the Chronicle in 1965 as a copy editor, often working the 10 p.m. to 6 a.m. shift. Soon he was named editor of Texas Magazine, the Chronicle’s Sunday supplement.
MARTHA ANN WALLS — Martha Ann Williams Walls, 87, died Dec. 2.
John Taylor, 88, remembered as Gazette publisher, local leader This article was originally published in the Seguin Gazette. SEGUIN — A widely renowned "old-school" Texas newsman whose love for journalism might only have been surpassed by his adoration for this community has ended his tenure as publisher emeritus of the Seguin Gazette. John Taylor, who bought the Gazette in 1954 and built it into a South Texas publishing powerhouse that printed more than 30 other newspapers, died Friday at a South Austin hospital. He was 88 years old.