In Memoriam

Patricia Louis Peterson ’48, New York City, June 15, 2025, at age 99. As fashion editor of The New York Times from 1957 to 1977, Peterson chronicled shifting trends in hemlines and the rise of pantsuits, tie-dye and other fashion evolutions as measures of societal change. She frequently collaborated with her husband, photographer Gösta Peterson, on visually bold editorial shoots. In 1967, for example, she oversaw Fashions of The Times’ groundbreaking cover photo by Gösta featuring Naomi Sims — the first Black model to appear on the cover of a major American fashion magazine. (Fashions of The Times was a seasonal section of The New York Times Magazine.) In 1977 Peterson took on an executive marketing role at Henri Bendel, a women’s department store in New York City. There, she and her husband created whimsical, eye-catching ads that often ran in the Sunday edition of The Times. An art theory and practice major at Northwestern, Peterson was fashion editor for The Purple Parrot student magazine and began her career at Marshall Field & Company before joining Mademoiselle in New York City. Later in life, she served as a docent at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, working at its Costume Institute until 2015. She is survived by her children, Annika and Jan; and Jan’s wife, Lori Barrett-Peterson ’93 MA/MS. 

Ramona Lenny Alpern ’49 MA/MS, Frisco, Texas, June 6, 2025, at age 97. An expert in dialect and speech, Alpern spent much of her career working with preschool children to address speech challenges. She developed a method to integrate speech therapy into broader special education programs and published her research in Academic Therapy and other journals. She also worked as a public speaking and dialogue coach for corporate executives, former athletes, and actors and performers. A member of the Screen Actors Guild and the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists, Alpern appeared in movies as an extra, voiced commercials and radio shows, and briefly served as the automated voice behind 411 directory assistance. She earned her master’s degree in speech pathology from Northwestern, where she met her husband, Melvin Alpern ’50 MA/MS. He died in 2009. She is survived by her children, Jill, Kyle and Ed; and seven grandchildren. 

William “Bill” F. Hayes III ’49 MMus, Studio City, Calif., Jan. 12, 2024, at age 98. A daytime TV actor, singer and Broadway performer, Hayes is best remembered for his role as Doug Williams on the soap opera Days of Our Lives. Beginning in 1949, he made appearances on Fireball Fun-For-All and Your Show of Shows before joining the cast of Days of Our Lives in 1970. His character would become one of the longest-running characters on the show, appearing in more than 2,000 episodes over the next 53 years. He also earned two Daytime Emmy nominations during that time. He and his wife, Susan Seaworth Hayes, who played Hayes’ on-air wife, Julie, on Days of Our Lives, received Lifetime Achievement Awards from the Daytime Emmys in 2018. In 1955 Hayes also sang a rendition of the “The Ballad of Davy Crockett,” the theme song for the show Davy Crockett. In addition to his wife, he is survived by his children, Carolyn, Margaret, Thomas and William; 13 grandchildren; and 30 great-grandchildren. 

Photo Credit: Michael Ochs 

Sheldon Harnick ’49, ’18 H, New York City, June 23, 2023, at age 99. Harnick, a highly acclaimed lyricist and composer, was best known for his work with Jerry Bock on the Tony Award–winning musi­cals Fiorello! and Fiddler on the Roof. Harnick and his collabora­tors won the 1960 Pulitzer Prize in drama for their work on Fiorello!. He also received the 2009 Oscar Hammerstein Award for Lifetime Achievement in Musical Theatre and the 2016 Drama League Award for Distinguished Achievement in Musical Theatre. Harnick, who grew up in Chicago, served in the U.S. Army Signal Corps. While stationed at Robins Air Force Base in Georgia, he wrote songs and performed in shows for his fellow troops. After an honorable discharge in 1946, he enrolled at Northwestern, where he partici­pated in The Waa-Mu Show. Though Harnick moved to New York City in 1950 to pursue his Broadway career, he kept close ties with Northwestern. His musical Dragons pre­miered at Northwestern in 1984. A decade later, his musi­cal A Wonderful Life was one of the first shows that played in the newly remodeled Cahn Auditorium. In 2009 the American Music Theatre Project mounted a staged read­ing of Harnick’s adaptation of Molière’s A Doctor in Spite of Himself. Harnick is survived by his wife, Margery; their children, Beth and Matthew; and four grandchildren.

Photo Credit: Getty Images/Stephen Lovekin

Newton N. Minow ’49, ’50 JD, ’65 H, Chicago, May 6, 2023, at age 97. An accomplished communications expert and attorney, Minow originated the idea for the first televised presidential debates and called TV a “vast wasteland” in a famous 1961 speech as Federal Communications Commission (FCC) chairman. After graduating with his law degree, Minow served as law clerk to Chief Justice of the United States Fred M. Vinson and then as assistant counsel to Illinois Gov. Adlai Stevenson ’26 JD. President John F. Kennedy appointed Minow chairman of the FCC in the early 1960s, during which time Minow drafted legislation that expanded the broadcast spectrum and promoted the use of satellite technology. Minow served in the Kennedy Administration until 1963, then returned to Chicago in 1965 and joined the law firm Leibman, Williams, Bennett, Baird & Minow, which merged with Sidley & Austin. He was a partner there until 1991, when he became senior counsel. He was chair of the Public Broadcasting Service, co-chaired the 1976 and 1980 presidential debates and was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President Barack Obama ’06 H in 2016. Minow, the Walter Annenberg Professor Emeritus of communications and law at Northwestern, joined the Board of Trustees in 1975 and became a life trustee in 1987. His friends and colleagues established an endowment that funded a professorship in honor of Minow in 2014. The gift also created the Newton and Jo Minow Debate Series at the law school, first held in 2015. He received the Northwestern Alumni Association’s Alumni Medal in 1978 and an Alumni Merit Award in 1963. Minow and his wife, Josephine “Jo” Baskin Minow ʼ48, who died in February 2022, were married for more than 70 years. Minow is survived by his children, Martha Minow ʼ12 H, Nell and Mary.   

Photo Credit: Getty Images/Chip Somodevilla

Louann Hurter Van Zelst ’49, ’51 MA/MS, Glenview, Ill., Feb. 15, 2023, at age 94. After training under the tutelage of a Russian prima ballerina, Van Zelst per­formed onstage in musicals as a teen. At Northwestern, she partic­ipated in University Theatre pro­ductions and The Waa-Mu Show. Van Zelst remained involved in the Northwestern community, serving as director-at-large of the Northwestern Alumni Association; a member of the School of Speech Steering Committee; editor of Dialogue, the School of Communication magazine; and co-chair for the campaign to build Northwestern’s Sheil Catholic Center and Galvin Memorial Chapel. She received an Alumni Service Award in 1978 and served on the Northwestern Board of Trustees from 1980 to 1983. She and her husband, Theodore Van Zelst ’45, ’48 MS, funded the School of Communication’s Van Zelst Research Chair in Communication in 1981. She is survived by her children, Anne, Jean Van Zelst Bierner ’89 MA/MS and David; seven grandchildren; and three great-grandchildren.

Ned Rorem ’44, ’77 H, New York City, Nov. 18, 2022, at age 99. A Pulitzer Prize–winning composer, Rorem wrote more than 500 art songs and orchestral pieces over his lifetime. Growing up on Chicago’s South Side, he began composing music at a young age. He was known for composing pieces to accompany classic poetry as well as dramatic orchestral arrangements, for which he drew inspiration from the natural world. After graduating from Northwestern, he attended the Curtis Institute of Music and earned his master’s degree from the Juilliard School. He received a Fulbright Fellowship in 1951, a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1957 and the Pulitzer Prize for his orchestral concerto Air Music in 1976. He also received an honorary doctorate from Northwestern in 1977. In addition to composing, Rorem kept a journal for most of his life and published 15 books of his diaries. He served as president of the American Academy of Arts and Letters from 2000 to 2003 and received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers. His art songs continue to be studied by voice students at the Bienen School of Music. Rorem outlived all of his immediate family members.