Lake County's notable deaths of 2008

They served their communities in a variety of roles including teaching, firefighting, police protection and public office.

Lake County lost several notable people this year who made a lasting impression in the hearts and minds of those left behind.

Here we honor some of those hometown heroes.

Adeline Geo-Karis

Legendary Illinois lawmaker and General Assembly pioneer Adeline Geo-Karis, who hobnobbed with presidents, died Feb. 10 at the age of 89.

Geo-Karis' tenure in public life spanned more than three decades in the Illinois House and Senate. She was a woman of many firsts, breaking the glass ceiling in more ways than one.

Geo-Karis studied law when few women would consider that profession.

In Lake County, she was the first woman to be named an assistant state's attorney and first woman elected to either the Illinois House or Senate.

At the Capitol, she became the first woman - Republican or Democrat - appointed to Senate leadership. She had also served as mayor of Zion.

A constant defender of equal rights and access for women, Geo-Karis never hesitated to speak up.

She was remembered for her trailblazing career, her devotion to her country and community, her calmness in the heat of political debate and her penchant for unabashedly and unapologetically speaking her mind.

Geo-Karis immigrated to the United States from Greece at age 4. She later served as a lieutenant commander in the U.S. Naval Reserves.

Her health had deteriorated in recent years, and she was hospitalized several times.

Geo-Karis' political career ended in 2006 when she lost the Republican primary. She later threw her support behind Democrat Michael Bond, who won the Senate seat Geo-Karis had held for decades.

Nicole Suveges

Army reservist Nicole Suveges, 38, formerly of Mundelein, was killed by a roadside bomb in Iraq on June 24.

Suveges, who was raised in Lake County but most recently lived in Edgewood, Md., was in Iraq as a civilian political scientist working with the U.S. Army. Suveges was among four Americans - two soldiers and another civilian - killed in the attack.

She previously served in Bosnia-Herzegovina.

A graduate of Mundelein High School and later Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Suveges was in Iraq while researching her doctoral dissertation. She worked for BAE Systems, a Maryland firm advising the U.S. Army's 3rd Brigade Combat Team.

Suveges' job involved helping Army commanders understand Iraqis and their culture and society, and to help them avoid inadvertently offending or misunderstanding the Iraqis. She had worked in Iraq as a civilian contractor the previous year.

The war in Iraq had actually prompted Suveges to change the focus of the doctoral dissertation she was researching at Johns Hopkins.

Though she initially planned to write about how political and economic ideas move across geographic borders, she switched to researching how nations transition from authoritarian regimes to democracies and the impact on citizens.

Suveges joined the Army reserves in 1998 and remained in service until 2006.

Ed Miller

Lindenhurst police officer Ed Miller, 49, died Aug. 4 at his Barrington home.

Miller had been on medical leave for the past year or so. He succumbed to complications from a long illness.

Miller joined the department as a full-time officer in 1984. He earned a law degree from Chicago-Kent College of Law and became a practicing attorney. He remained on the force as a part-time officer beginning in 1987.

Miller received several commendations and awards during his 24-year tenure with the police department. He acted as in-house legal counsel, dispensing legal advice to individual officers, and did a lot of charity and pro bono work, McKeever said.

In recent years, Miller was a part-time patrol and bicycle officer. He had been diagnosed with the undisclosed illness three or four years ago.

Jesse Wayne Goldsmith

Vernon Hills police officer Jesse Goldsmith, 42, of Round Lake Beach, died of a heart attack June 2.

His 17-year Vernon Hills career included work as a detective, firearms instructor and tactical team member, along with serving on the Northern Illinois Police Alarm System regional emergency response squad.

Goldsmith often volunteered to drive a Vernon Hills snowplow during major storms.

Robert "Allen" Meyer

Robert "Allen" Meyer, the veteran director of the Vernon Area Public Library in Lincolnshire, died June 22 after a seven-month battle with cancer.

Meyer died at his Buffalo Grove home. He was 57.

He served 20 years at Vernon Area as its leader.

Meyer was born in Lander, Wyo., and was one of 11 children. He earned a bachelor's degree at what's now National-Louis University and a master's degree at Northern Illinois University in DeKalb.

Before coming to Vernon Area, Meyer worked in the Chicago Public Library system and at the Barrington Area Library. He joined Vernon Area as a children's librarian in 1985 and was named director in 1988.

Meyer oversaw the library's move into a new building in 1993, and brought the facility into the digital age, and expanded the library's selection of foreign-language sections for Asian and Russian patrons.

Meyer was diagnosed with cancer in November. He had been on medical leave since late May. His work was publicly recognized by village officials in Lincolnshire, Buffalo Grove and Vernon Hills - the largest towns in the library district. Proclamations honoring him were adopted by village boards in those towns.

Bertram Alan Colbert

Bertram Alan "Buddy" Colbert was a teenager when he worked on a top-secret effort that helped develop the atomic bomb.

Just out of high school, he didn't realize the work he was doing for Cook Electric in Chicago was actually part of the historic Manhattan Project until after the bombs were dropped on Japan in 1945.

Colbert, 81, of Mundelein, died March 28 at Advocate Condell Medical Center in Libertyville after a short illness.

Colbert was born in Chicago. He was a direct descendant of William Brewster, a Pilgrim who came to America on the Mayflower in 1620. He also was a descendant of Jean Baptiste Colbert, the finance minister of King Louis XIV of France, and of George Ketchum, a surveyor on the Erie Canal and developer of the California aqueduct system.

Colbert enlisted in the Navy toward the end of World War II. After being discharged in 1945, he worked under physicist Enrico Fermi at the University of Chicago on the development of the cyclotron, the first atomic collider.

Colbert earned a bachelor of science degree in industrial engineering from the Illinois Institute of Technology in 1950. He later worked at Price Waterhouse and then for about 18 years at Abbott Laboratories. He retired in 1992.

He was active in the Mundelein-area community. He was president of the Loch Lomond Property Owners Association, on the Mundelein plan commission and with the Fort Hill Historical Society. He also was a member of American Legion Post 867 and the Disabled Veterans Association.

Ruth Gesmer Silverman

Ruth Gesmer Silverman, the author of the twice-monthly "Life with Cancer" column in the Daily Herald, died Dec. 10 at age 68.

Silverman's last column was published Nov. 3, even as she knew her breast cancer was terminal. She started writing the column in April 2007 after the return of her cancer, which had gone into remission after a mastectomy and aggressive radiation and chemo.

Silverman had a nearly 30-year career as a freelancer for the Daily Herald. Editors prized her work ethic, her sense of humor and her incredible connections.

She was among the original Daily Herald Neighbor columnists in the early 1980s, writing weekly about Buffalo Grove, unearthing out-of-the-way stories about intriguing people and institutions.

Not long after, she debuted "Etc.," a suburban celebrity column for which she mined local theaters, restaurants and clubs for gossip and entertainment news.

Silverman, a ballet dancer in her youth, loved the entertainment beat and knew how to talk to celebrities.

Silverman was dedicated to the Jewish community in the Northwest suburbs. She worked at the Spertus Museum in Chicago and the suburban JCC.

Silverman, whose parents emigrated to the Boston area from Odessa (Russia) before World War II, was particularly moved by stories about Holocaust survivors in the suburbs and the effect of the Holocaust on their children and grandchildren.

Ronald Ahlgrim

Ronald Ahlgrim's name may not go down in history, but the actions he set into motion while serving as village trustee 34 years ago helped shape Vernon Hills into a thriving shopping mecca.

Ahlgrim, 75, who lived in Vernon Hills much of his life, died Sept. 10 at Advocate Condell Medical Center in Libertyville. He served as village trustee from 1969 to 1974.

Ahlgrim moved to Vernon Hills two years after it incorporated in 1958 when only a handful of houses and a whole lot of cornfields existed in town.

He helped organize the annual Labor Day picnic on Oakwood Road in the original part of town. It was started in the early 1960s and continued until 1999. He was also an original member and usher at St. Mary of Vernon, the first church established in town.

Ahlgrim's involvement in town lasted well beyond his years on the village board. He retired from the Teletype Corp. in Skokie.

Kathleen Surdynski

Kathleen Surdynski, 28, a Lake Zurich High School German-language teacher on March 28 lost her battle against muscular dystrophy, a debilitating illness she had suffered since childhood.

A memorial fund was established at the high school in Surdynski's name to provide scholarships to students for study or travel abroad. The school also named a language lab after her.

Surdynski accomplished everything she set out to do despite her mobility being affected by her illness. She was wheelchair-bound or on a scooter most of her life.

Surdynski graduated from Lake Zurich High School in 1997, then Lake Forest College, and eventually got her master's degree in education and leadership from Chicago's St. Xavier University.

She turned her grade-school passion for the German language into a career and taught German for six years at Lake Zurich High School.

Robert Ray Ratch

Former Lindenhurst Mayor Robert Ray Ratch died May 18 at Midland Hospice House, in Kansas, after a lengthy illness. He was 75.

He served as Lindenhurst village trustee from 1971 to 1975 and 1981 to 1983. In 1983, he was elected mayor and served until 1991.

Ratch helped the village develop a professional staff through the hiring of an administrator and an engineer.

Ratch worked for Allstate Insurance Co. in Northbrook. He retired as state filings director in 1994. After retirement, he was appointed to the Lake County Economic Development Commission from 1984 to 1990. He served on the Lake County Regional Planning Commission from 1991 to 1996.

Ratch was also a veteran of the Air Force and served during the Korean War.

Thomas Garvin

Thomas Garvin, 73, one of the original full-time Libertyville firefighters, died April 5 at Advocate Condell Medical Center in Libertyville.

Garvin helped scores of patients by bringing more comprehensive medical services to the scene of an emergency, and helped train many Libertyville firefighters and paramedics to provide the same services.

He served as chairman of the Emergency Medical Services committee of the Illinois Fire Chiefs Association and was appointed by Gov. James Thompson in 1988 as fire chiefs' representative to the state's EMS council.

Born in Mundelein, Garvin graduated from Libertyville High School in 1953.

Garvin worked for years as a cook at Joe's Fireside Restaurant at Route 176 and Milwaukee Avenue. He eventually bought and renamed the restaurant Tom and Jerry's, a mom and pop place that served hamburgers and made milkshakes to order.

During that time, Garvin also worked as an ambulance driver for neighboring McMurrough Funeral Chapel Home and was a volunteer firefighter.

Garvin was among the first full-time firefighters in 1970 when Libertyville formed its own department.

He retired as deputy chief in 1990 but continued in the fire service on the board of the Libertyville Fire District, where he helped get a new fire station built and equipped.

William Govas

William Govas, longtime owner of the Country Squire restaurant and banquet facility in Grayslake, died May 13.

The Wadsworth resident was 79.

Born Feb. 4, 1929, in Uniontown, Pa., Govas was raised in Greece. After high school, he left Greece to attend culinary school in Kansas. He was an executive chef for 18 years at a well-known Chicago eatery, Grassfield's Restaurant, before leaving to run his own place.

He took over Country Squire in 1977, which was established a few years earlier in a portion of a stately 17-room mansion built for Wesley Sears. The restaurant became a local landmark and gathering place for family, corporate and community events.

Robert Smith Jr.

Associate Judge Robert Smith Jr. of Deerfield died Nov. 10 after a long battle with brain cancer.

Smith, 64, was diagnosed with cancer shortly after being appointed to the bench in July 2007.

He was a former Lake County assistant state's attorney and had been in private practice from 1980 until he became a judge. From 1980 until 1986, he was a partner in the Libertyville firm of Smith and Orlando, then practiced law independently. Smith was also a past president of the Lake County Bar Association.

He was a 1971 graduate of Loyola University School of Law.

Gilbert Stiles

Gilbert "Gib" Stiles, a Harvard and Yale educated businessman, tried out for the Libertyville village board in 1957 and served for the next 24 years, the last eight as mayor.

Stiles died Nov. 8 in Tucson, Az., at the age of 86. He left Libertyville after finishing his term, splitting time between Colorado and Arizona.

A Navy veteran of World War II, Stiles is remembered for his leadership, long tenure in public office, as a financial whiz, and for his business acumen which served him well in his role as Libertyville's mayor during its growth spurt of residential and commercial development.

A village park near Cass Avenue and Adler Drive was dedicated in his honor several years ago.

Stiles battled Alzheimer's disease the last few years of his life. He ran a commercial refrigeration business in Maywood and then a water treatment company in Zion.