Person Page 889

Biography: The biography of Susan Clay Sawitzky from The Kentucky Encyclopedia follows:

SAWITZKY, SUSAN CLAY. Susan Clay Sawitzky, poet and art historian, was born in Frankfort, Kentucky, on July 21, 1897, to Col. Charles and Mariah (Pepper) Clay. Great-granddaughter of Henry Clay, she was raised in her grandmothers' Victorian homes and on her father's horse farm. She attended Miss Ella Williams's School, then briefly Sayre School, Transylvania University, and the University of Kentucky. Her early poems and stories appeared in Town and Country Magazine and the New York Times and in local publications, and in 1923 the book Poems by Susan Clay was published in Chicago. On May 5, 1927, fleeing family interference, she eloped with Russian-born New York art dealer William Sawitzky. Only one poem was published after her marriage, appearing in Poetry: A Magazine of Verse in 1941. From 1927 to 1947 she helped Sawitzky conduct pioneering research on early American art, research she continued after his death in 1947. Sponsored by the New York Historical Society, she published articles on Reuben Moultrop, Ralph Earl, and Abraham DeLanoy. Susan Sawitzky wrote poetry for over sixty years and a short collection was published posthumously by the Kentucky Poetry Review in 1984. Her collected poetry speaks poignantly of her struggle against family and community for the right of self-expression and of the tenacity of traditional Southern values well into the twentieth century. Sawitzky died on July 11, 1981. Her ashes were scattered near a millpond at Stamford, Connecticut. See Woodridge Spears, ed., "The Circling Thread: Poems by Susan Clay Sawitzky," Kentucky Poetry Review (Jan. 1984).

Obituary -- (Findagrave.com:

Frankfort, Ky, March 6 - Robert Pepper Smith, 38, for many years an employee of the State Highway Department, died early today at St Joseph Infirmary, Louisville. He was a son of the late Col. Thomas L Smith and a grandson of the late Robert P Pepper, noted trotting horse breeder.

He is survived by his wife, Mrs Marion M. Smith, his mother, who lives in Lexington, three sisters, Mrs John N Crutcher and Mrs E B Kennedy, Frankfort, and Mrs Victor F Williams, Louisville, and a brother, Thomas L Smith Sr, Washington.

Funeral services will be held here at 11am Thursday.

Louisville Courier-Journal 7-Mar-1945, p.15.

Obituary (Findagrave.com):

Lee E. Lakin died at his Ridgecrest, CA home on June 13, 2007.

Lee was born Feb 19, 1923 in Kansas City, MO. As a youngster, he showed such promise in academic subjects that at age 14 he was skipped over several grades to enroll in a teachers' college in Warrensburg, MO.

He studied at the Univeristy of Wisconsin, Madison then attended the University of Chicago where he majored in physics, mathematics and meterorology. During his senior year in college, he enlisted in the US Army Air Corps. After his 1944 graduation, he spent two and a half years with the Airborne Weather Reconnaissance in the North and South Atlantic. Leaving the service in 1946 with the rank of lieutenant, he decided to start civilian life by driving the family of his brother, Charles T. Lakin, out to join him in the remote desert town of China Lake. In short order, Lee reported to his first job at the Naval Ordnance Test Station.

Arlee Moser, or Moscow, ID and Lee were married in 1950 in the old chapel on the base with Lee's brother and his wife, Gloria, as their attendenats. The marriage lasted 56 years, until Lee's passing.

Survivors include his wife, Arlee M. Lakin; sons, Michael Lee Lakin of Walnut Creek, CA and Tracy P. Lakin of San Francisco, CA; daughter Julie Ann Green and her husband, Steven Green; grandchildren, Nicholas Lee Green of Encinitas, CA, Cassandra Elyse Green and Ethan Loy Green of Ridgecrest, CA; nephew Thomas and wife, Aom Lakin of Ocala, FL; and nieces Marjorie and husband Ed Budd; Patsy and husband Larry Phelps, and Peggy and husband Gary Murphy, all of Ocala, FL

Published in The Daily Independent, Ridgecrest, CA

Arrangments provided by Holland & Lyons Mortuary, Ridgecrest, CA.