Jeanne Evans Whittaker-Hines

Jeanne Evans Whittaker-Hines succumbed to inoperable lung cancer in Mission Viejo, CA on November 17.th She was born on New Year's Day, 1934, to the late Margaret Evans and Alfred Heacock Whittaker, M.D. of Detroit and Grosse Pointe, MI. She graduated from the Grosse Pointe Country Day School (now University-Liggett School) and the University of Michigan.

Following graduation she served in Korea and France with the American Red Cross –sponsored Supplemental Recreational Activities Overseas (SRAO) programs. After she returned from Europe she was appointed Youth Director for Southeastern Texas headquartered at the ARC Bexar County Chapter in San Antonio where she met husband Charles Martin Hines, later returning to Michigan where she served as Assistant Director of Youth Activities with the Southeastern Michigan Chapter, ARC, in Detroit.

Mrs. Whittaker-Hines subsequently began a journalistic career writing the popular "John Detroit" column for the Detroit Free Press in which she chronicled the activities of many social, civic, local and national political and entertainment figures over the last half century. She went on to edit the Michigan Social Register for several years and then edited the Suburban Life section of the Birmingham Eccentric for which she won the University of Missouri Penney-Missouri Award and several Michigan Press Association Awards. She concluded her writing career as a columnist and staff writer with the Detroit News.

Later she returned to the Red Cross to found and direct fund raising galas that earned more than $1-million for the Detroit chapter of the American Red Cross. Asked about her favorite experiences, she often remarked that the American troops amazed her with lively antics that livened up Korea's freezing cold winters and blazing hot summers, or that most of the many name figures she interviewed were interesting not only for their accomplishments but, in most cases, for their generosity and approachability. She found that the more successful these people were, the less they felt they had to impress you. A poignant night she sometimes described was helping tragic Maria Callas depart after her last appearance at the Masonic Temple.

She was a member of the Sigma Gamma Association and served on area boards including the Southeastern Michigan Chapter of the American Red Cross, the Grosse Pointe Public Library, the Detroit Historical Society, the Wayne State University Press Advisory Board, the University-Liggett Alumnae Association, Detroit Institute of Arts, and Art Train.

She attributed her civic interests to the example set by her father, a prominent orthopedic surgeon who co-founded the Detroit Historical Museum, headed numerous local, state and national civic, historical, and educational organizations and was elected to the Wayne State University Board of Governors. Her mother, an accomplished pianist, was active in Detroit area musical and civic affairs. "Community involvement was just something we were all expected to do," she said, "and all these interests often enriched whatever subject I was covering."

Two children survive her; a son Charles Martin Hines III, and a daughter Margaret Helen Whittaker (Tobias E. Zimmerman), and two grandsons Samuel and Joseph Zimmerman, all of Washington DC; as well as sisters Hilary and Joyce of Laguna Woods CA, two brothers, Alfred E. Whittaker of Orlando FL, and James Whittaker of Las Vegas, NV and Grosse Pointe; two nieces, Linda Bugaiski of Harper Woods, and Victoria Valice of Burbank, CA; a grand nephew James Valice of Reseda CA, a grand niece Leigh Anne Lawson of St. Clair Shores, and a goddaughter Dana Standish Seixas of Seattle, WA.

Memorial Service will be held at 11:00 a.m. on Saturday, June 5, 2010 at Nein-Barnes Funeral Home, 249 N. Main Street, Camden, Ohio. Inurnment will be in Fairmount Cemetery in Camden.

Memorial contributions may be made to the Treasurer, Sigma Gamma Foundation, P.O.Box 36373, Grosse Pointe Farms, MI 48236; to the Southeastern Michigan Chapter of the American Red Cross, 100 Mack Avenue, Detroit MI 48201, or to the University-Liggett School, 1045 Cook Road, Grosse Pointe Woods, MI 48236.