Obituaries

Chancellor Emeritus William H. Danforth, MD, who served as chancellor for 24 of his more than 65 years of service to Washington University in St. Louis, died on Wednesday, Sept. 16, 2020, at his home in Ladue, Mo. He was 94.

Mel F. Brown, a former member of the Washington University in St. Louis Board of Trustees, died Sept. 1, 2020. He was 85. Brown was an active, longtime university volunteer. In addition to being a trustee, he served as chair of the Alumni Board of Governors and as president of the William Greenleaf Eliot Society.

Robert L. Williams II, professor emeritus of psychological and brain sciences and founding director of Washington University’s Black Studies program (now the Department of African & African-American Studies) in Arts & Sciences, died Aug. 12, 2020. He was 90.

Natalie Sorenson, a first-year student at the McKelvey School of Engineering at Washington University in St. Louis, died May 5, 2020. She died as a result of emotional challenges during lockdown for COVID-19. Natalie Sorenson was 18.

Genevieve “Jane” Reuter Hitzeman, who with her late husband, Herbert F. Hitzeman Jr., was a longtime supporter of Washington University in St. Louis, died Saturday, July 11, 2020, at Brookdale West County Senior Living in Ballwin, Mo. She was 89.

Cindy Lynn Norman, business office operations supervisor at the Brown School, died in her sleep on July 15, 2020. She was 50. Norman had worked at Washington University for 26 years.

Nancy Rubin, longtime administrative assistant in the Department of Art History & Archaeology in Arts & Sciences, died of cardiac arrest June 27 at St. John’s Mercy Hospital in St. Louis. She was 58.

Leon E. Ashford, an early advocate for first-generation and Black students at Washington University in St. Louis, died March 28, 2020. He was 90. Ashford worked for the university for 39 years, retiring in 1995 as director of Student Educational Services, a precursor to The Learning Center. 

Momoko Oyama, a Washington University graduate on the verge of beginning her third year of medical school at the university, died Sunday, June 14, 2020, at her campus apartment in St. Louis. The cause of death is not yet known. Oyama, who had planned to become a neonatologist, was 24.

Denise Saim, a 27-year employee at the McKelvey School of Engineering, died suddenly May 26, 2020, at her home of an apparent heart attack. She was 64.