Secretary

Sarah L. Howard, a former social club membership secretary who had lived in Baltimore, died June 18 of heart failure at her home in Greenville, S.C. She was 52. Sarah Little Howard was born in Baltimore and raised in Cockeysville and Towson. She was a 1976 graduate of Dulaney High School. She was also a graduate of Towson Stratford Business College. In 1970, she was the recipient of a scholarship to study classical piano at Peabody Institute Preparatory School of Music.

Speaking to hundreds of Baltimore's business leaders in Harbor East on Thursday morning, U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner praised President Barack Obama's handling of the recession and outlined his boss' financial reform wish list, which includes cutting small business taxes and maintaining the federal student loan interest rate. The quickly organized event, suggested last week to the Greater Baltimore Committee, served as a platform for Geithner to attack presumptive Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney's economic policies.

(From the Maryland Politics blog) Maryland's embattled Juvenile Services secretary is stepping down to pursue "an opportunity in a different state," the agency announced this afternoon. The secretary, Donald W. DeVore, is the first cabinet-level departure since Gov. Martin O'Malley won a second term. DeVore's last year has rocked by the murder of a teacher, apparently at the hands of a student, at the Cheltenham Youth Facility in Prince George's County. State auditors also recently turned up chronic problems with the agency's procurement and bureaucratic procedures.

Maryland's deputy secretary of labor stepped up Thursday as interim secretary, filling a job emptied when Alexander M. Sanchez left this week to become chief of staff to Baltimore's mayor. Scott R. Jensen worked two stints at the state Department of Labor, Licensing and Regulation. From 2007 to 2009, he was a special assistant to the secretary, focusing on expanding unemployment insurance benefits to part-time workers and aligning adult education — including in correctional facilities — with the state's workforce development system.

Maryland's deputy secretary of labor stepped up Thursday as interim secretary, filling a job emptied when Alexander M. Sanchez left this week to become chief of staff to Baltimore's mayor. Scott R. Jensen worked two stints at the state Department of Labor, Licensing and Regulation. From 2007 to 2009, he was a special assistant to the secretary, focusing on expanding unemployment insurance benefits to part-time workers and aligning adult education — including in correctional facilities — with the state's workforce development system.

M. Helen Bopp, who worked as a legislative secretary for her brother, the late state Sen. Joseph L. Manning, died of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease Jan. 21 at Oakland Manor Assisted Living in Sykesville. The former Catonsville resident was 97. Margaret Helen Manning was born in Baltimore and lived on Light Street in South Baltimore. She earned a diploma at the old St. Mary's Star of the Sea Commercial School and began work at age 14 as a typist at Schloss Brothers clothing manufacturers.

Doris M. Everett, a retired secretary who served as a Navy WAVE during World War II and the Korean War, died Nov. 12 of breast cancer at her Overlea home. She was 86. Doris Miles was born in Baltimore and raised in the Herring Run neighborhood. After graduating from Eastern High School in 1940, she went to work in the directory department of the Chesapeake & Potomac Telephone Co. In 1943, she became a Navy WAVE and was trained as an airplane handler. "She drove a tractor that parked and moved airplanes at the Anacostia Naval Base in Washington," said her husband of 57 years, William E. Everett, a retired United States Fidelity & Guaranty Co. purchasing department executive.

Ruth C. Mann, a former secretary and cafeteria worker, died Tuesday of complications from a stroke at Stella Maris Hospice in Timonium. The Sparks resident was 89. Ruth Catherine Moran, the daughter of a postman and homemaker, was born and raised in East Baltimore. After graduating from Seton High School in 1939, she attended a local secretarial school, then worked as a secretary. During the 1970s, she worked in the cafeteria of Stoneleigh Elementary School. She was married in 1943 to James L. Mann Sr., a buyer for the state of Maryland, who died in 2000.

Madeline R. Downing, a retired secretary and former longtime College Park resident, died March 3 at Maryland Shock Trauma Center of injuries suffered in a Howard County automobile accident. The Charlestown retirement community resident was 90. Madeline Redmond, the daughter of a farmer and a schoolteacher, was born and raised in Montpelier, Vt., where she graduated in 1936 from St. Michael's High School. After passing the civil service examination, Mrs. Downing moved to Washington and went to work for the old War Department before World War II. In 1943, she married Matthew Patrick Downing, who was serving in the Army.

Bernice Robinson, a retired bank secretary, died of complications from arthritis and osteoporosis Aug. 3 at her Lutherville home. She was 83. Born Bernice Jeffery in Newark, Del., she was a 1946 graduate of Newark High School, where she played field hockey and basketball and was a member of the school band, glee club and dramatic society. She moved to Baltimore and became a teller and then a secretary to the president, S. Page Nelson, at the old Savings Bank of Baltimore at Charles and Baltimore streets.

Maryland Labor Secretary Alexander M. Sanchez is leaving his state post to take over as Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake's chief of staff. Sanchez will be her third chief of staff in so many years and will succeed Peter O'Malley, brother to Gov. Martin O'Malley. Peter O'Malley left for a position in the private sector after less than one year in the role. Sanchez is due to start May 16. In a statement, Rawlings-Blake said Sanchez will bring “a wealth of great experience" to the job. She said his experience with workforce development will "go a long way" to bolster the city's economy.

In 1997, Madeleine Albright couldn't have been more certain that she knew everything important about herself and was in possession of every relevant fact about her life. And then, at age 59, just days after being confirmed as U.S. secretary of state, Albright became aware that her parents had kept a big secret from her, her sister, Kathy, and their brother, John. "I had no idea that my family heritage was Jewish," said Albright, a native of Czechoslovakia. "I had no idea that more than two dozen of my relatives died in the Holocaust.

Maryland Transportation Secretary Beverley Swaim-Staley, the state's first woman in that role, said Monday that she is stepping down on July 1. Swaim-Staley, who has spent 25 years as a state employee, was appointed secretary in September 2009. Before that she served as deputy transportation secretary from 2007 to 2009. Previously, as deputy secretary from 1999 to 2003, she directed all operations at Baltimore/Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport after the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

NBC News announced Friday that Brian Williams' ratings-impaired, journalistically-challenged "Rock Center" newsmagazine will have a report on what it was like inside the Situation Room on the night Osama bin Laden was killed by U.S. Navy Seals. I guess bowing to the president and hiring the secretary of state's unqualified daughter as a special correspondent should be worth something, shouldn't it? Check out the breathless language in the first paragraph: "In a first for network television," "unprecedented access" and "exclusive airing.

Margaret M. "Peggy" Herder, a former school and legal secretary, died April 16 from complications of an infection at Howard County General Hospital. She was 90. A daughter of a Baltimore & Ohio railroader and a homemaker, the former Margaret Mae Partridge was born in Baltimore and raised on Pentwood Road in Northeast Baltimore. She was a 1940 graduate of Eastern High School, and three years later married Godfrey August Herder Jr., an accountant. He died in 2003. During the early 1960s, Mrs. Herder was a school secretary at the Park School in Brooklandville, and from the late 1970s until the 1980s when she retired, she was a legal secretary for the Ellicott City law firm of Seibert, Seibert & Nippert, family members said.

To peer back in time via AMC's hit show "Mad Men" is like gazing into an old GAF Viewmaster. The advertising world it nostalgically depicts, often referred to as the "creative revolution," is frozen in a Purgatorial time warp. Each cultural meme of the show - from the Brylcreemed hair to the mod clothes donned by Don Draper - is a still frame with a Technicolor tint. When held up to the light, it appears more brilliant and unreal. Click fast-forward to a 2012 vantage point, then turn back, and you'll find we've since experienced numerous revolutions, some creative and many destructive.

Helen C. Roe, a retired secretary and Girl Scout leader, died Jan. 17 of complications from a stroke at her Severna Park home. She was 77. Helen C. Skelton was born in Baltimore and raised in Bolton Hill and on Eutaw Place and Chilton Street. She graduated in 1952 from Eastern High School. From 1980 until retiring in the late 1990s, Mrs. Skelton had been a secretary for the Anne Arundel County Department of Health, working at a clinic at Northeast High School. The longtime Severna Park resident had been a Girl Scout leader for more than 12 years.