Calvert School

Business entrepreneur and philanthropist William Polk Carey, who donated more than $100 million to Maryland schools and universities, spent most of his life outside the state, but he never stopped thinking of himself as a Baltimorean. Mr. Carey, 81, died Monday at a West Palm Beach, Fla., hospital. But he left a legacy here. He maintained a rooting interest in state politics and the Baltimore Orioles. He was proud of the six generations that his family spent in Baltimore, relatives and friends said, and the influence they've had on the city.

The Rev. John Anson "Jack" Mote, retired pastor of the old Wilson Memorial United Methodist Church, died of pancreatic cancer Oct. 4 at his home on Camano Island, Wash. The former North Baltimore resident was 91. Born in Piqua, Ohio, he was a graduate of what was then Western Maryland College who had served in the Army during World War II. He opposed the war on moral grounds "In 1944, when he asked to be released from the Army as a conscientious objector, Mote was a 24-year-old attendant at Valley Forge General Hospital in Pennsylvania.

Elizabeth S. Cissel, whose career as a private school educator spanned more than 30 years, died Tuesday at a Belfast, Maine, nursing home from complications of a fall. The former longtime Roland Park resident was 90. The daughter of an insurance executive and a homemaker, the former Elizabeth Short was born in Salisbury and raised in Ednor Gardens. She was a 1939 graduate of Notre Dame Preparatory School and Colby-Sawyer College in New London, N.H., which was then a two-year college.

The correlation between education and employment is clear: The better the education, the more likely a person will seek and find employment. The U.S. unemployment rate for those without a high school diploma is 14.3 percent; for those with a bachelor's degree or higher, it is 4.3 percent. This relationship is confirmed in study after study and in country after country. As the president, Congress and the nation debate the legislative solutions to the disaster that is our unemployment rate, we must emphasize education for its unique ability to deliver systemic and sustained improvement.

Walid Hajj is happy he followed his instincts and bought an incomplete condo redevelopment in Baltimore's Mount Vernon neighborhood last fall. Within three days of advertising the building's 13 newly redeveloped apartments this month, Hajj had rented all but four. And prospective tenants kept on calling to tour the century-old former school on West Chase Street. While the building's previous owner struggled to sell units amid the housing market downturn, the timing was better for Hajj, a partner in a company that bought the property in October.

Ruth B. Chapin, a retired educator and volunteer who had been admissions director at Calvert School, died Saturday at Gilchrist Hospice Care. The longtime Ruxton resident was 88. The daughter of a Methodist minister and a homemaker, Ruth M. Keele Brooks was born in Cooperstown, N.Y., and was raised in several towns in upstate New York where her father was pastor for local churches. "They were basically small towns along the upper reaches of the Susquehanna River," said a son, David W. Chapin, who lives in Cockeysville.

Sondra Elise Banfield Dailey, a book publisher, died of cancer Feb. 27 at her son's Canton home. She was 66. Born Sondra Elise Banfield, she was a 1962 graduate of Forest Park High School, where she was cheerleading captain. He father was a Provident Hospital physician; her mother was a social worker. "She was the first black to hold that position and it was the tradition that she would become homecoming queen. The principal cancelled the homecoming position," said a classmate, radio host Marc Steiner.