robert - News - The Coastal Star2024-03-28T23:20:42Zhttps://thecoastalstar.com/profiles/blogs/feed/tag/robertGulf Stream: Town agrees to sue AT&T to finish underground workhttps://thecoastalstar.com/profiles/blogs/gulf-stream-town-agrees-to-sue-at-t-to-finish-underground-work2020-07-01T15:25:14.000Z2020-07-01T15:25:14.000ZThe Coastal Starhttps://thecoastalstar.com/members/TheCoastalStar<div><p style="text-align:center;"><strong><a href="{{#staticFileLink}}7960955256,original{{/staticFileLink}}" target="_blank"><img src="{{#staticFileLink}}7960955256,original{{/staticFileLink}}" class="align-center" alt="7960955256?profile=original" /></a></strong><em>Plastic netting surrounds the historic Australian pine trees that line A1A in Gulf Stream to ensure that workers installing a water main do not damage the roots. <strong>Jerry Lower/The Coastal Star</strong></em></p>
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<p><strong>By Steve Plunkett</strong><br /> <br />The town will ask a federal judge to order AT&T to finish putting its lines underground after the telecommunications giant walked off the job in May.<br /> The contract dispute could add another year to the overall project, which started in 2013. AT&T wants more than $1 million to complete the job; Gulf Stream says it owes only $400,000.<br /> Joanne O’Connor, an attorney for the town, showed town commissioners a draft lawsuit at their June 12 meeting. Commissioners unanimously agreed to file suit.<br /> “I don’t think we have any alternative but to follow this advice and get a lawsuit filed as soon as possible,” Mayor Scott Morgan said.<br /> Robert Wright, a Tallahassee lawyer who specializes in utilities, will assist the legal action. O’Connor said the lawsuit will be filed in the U.S. District Court in part to get action more quickly.<br /> “We can’t get the lawsuit done over the summer. But compared to being in state court where this could take three to five years, if we file imminently … generally they set trial dates one year out,” O’Connor said.<br /> Wright agreed to discount his legal fees to $250 an hour.<br /> Town officials, surprised by AT&T’s demand for more money, are continuing to ask the company for more details to explain the higher cost. Comcast, which also put its lines underground, said it encountered nothing in the field to make its job more costly, Assistant Town Attorney Trey Nazzaro said.<br /> Morgan said AT&T put its lines underground in the southern half of town for $160,000 and now wants $1.2 million for the northern half, “a striking difference,” he said.<br /> <br /><strong>In other business:</strong><br /> • Foster Marine Contractors began installing a new water main along State Road A1A on June 8. The $1.9 million project will force traffic detours into town at times. Residents close to the work will receive an informational flyer 24 hours ahead of time and can call 888-267-0321 with concerns.<br /> • Commissioners gave Chet Snavely permission to demolish the decrepit house at 2775 Avenue Au Soleil and sod the lot. Snavely, who is also president of the Place Au Soleil Homeowners Association, bought the house for $400,000 after the heirs of deceased homeowner Richard Lavoie paid Gulf Stream $125,000 in code enforcement liens. Ú</p></div>South Palm Beach: Surge in property values paints rosy budget picture for townhttps://thecoastalstar.com/profiles/blogs/south-palm-beach-surge-in-property-values-paints-rosy-budget-pict2020-07-01T15:06:42.000Z2020-07-01T15:06:42.000ZThe Coastal Starhttps://thecoastalstar.com/members/TheCoastalStar<div><p><strong>By Dan Moffett</strong></p>
<p>Town Manager Robert Kellogg had plenty of good news to report about the financial health of South Palm Beach during the Town Council’s meeting on June 9.<br /> Kellogg told council members that the town’s taxable value has skyrocketed 21.7% this year over last, far more than any other municipality in Palm Beach County.<br />Two reasons for the surge: the $70 million luxury condominium building, 3550 South Ocean, has finally come onto the tax rolls. And so has developer Frank McKinney’s five-bedroom, five-bath single-family home at 3492 S. Ocean Blvd., currently on the market for $13.9 million.<br /> The net result is a $78 million jump in taxable value for the town, from $361.5 million in 2019 to $439.6 million in 2020, according to the Palm Beach County Property Appraiser’s Office.<br /> But wait. Council members have more good news as they begin to deliberate next year’s budget.<br /> The town is projected to save about $200,000 this year because it has merged its Police Department with the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office. Moreover, cash reserves are healthy, too, because money that for years was set aside to pay for an expensive beach stabilization project won’t be needed. That beach plan fell apart last year and has been replaced with a far less costly sand dune replacement project.<br /> “This is the best it’s ever looked,” said Mayor Bonnie Fischer, who has served on the council since 2011. “What we do with the revenue will be determined during a budget workshop as a decision by everybody.”<br /> The continuing budget issue facing the council is whether to repair or replace the aging Town Hall building. Officials have wrestled with a decision on that for the past three years, going through a number of false starts and aborted plans over how much to spend and how far to go in upgrading the building.<br /> “It’s a live wire,” said Fischer, who said she expects the debate to begin anew as the council begins deliberating this summer on a budget for the 2020-2021 fiscal year.<br /> One thing the mayor has already promised from the new tax windfall, however: “We will be able to buy more masks,” she said with a laugh.<br /> The council intends to continue distributing free face masks to residents as long as the COVID-19 pandemic threat remains, she said.<br /> In other business, the council unanimously approved a contract with The MS Factor Inc., a West Palm Beach public relations and advertising firm, to improve communication services between the government and residents. <br /> Fischer said she wants the town to have a stronger internet presence and be able to inform residents quickly during emergency situations with text messages and emails.<br /> “We hope to see improvements on our website and how we get information out to our residents,” Fischer said.<br /> Vice Mayor Robert Gottlieb has argued for months that the town should use social media and the internet to get more people involved in government and civic activities.<br /> The contract with MS Factor calls for paying the company on an hourly basis for specific assignments the council approves. The MS Factor is a partnership between former state Rep. Sharon Merchant and marketing specialist Valerie Staggs. Merchant’s firm has done work for West Palm Beach, Palm Beach and Boynton Beach, as well as the Florida Department of Transportation.</p></div>MEET YOUR NEIGHBOR: Robert Barfknechthttps://thecoastalstar.com/profiles/blogs/meet-your-neighbor-robert-barfknecht2020-05-20T16:30:00.000Z2020-05-20T16:30:00.000ZThe Coastal Starhttps://thecoastalstar.com/members/TheCoastalStar<div><p style="text-align:center;"><a href="{{#staticFileLink}}7960951278,original{{/staticFileLink}}" target="_blank"><img src="{{#staticFileLink}}7960951278,original{{/staticFileLink}}" class="align-center" alt="7960951278?profile=original" /></a><em>Robert Barfknecht, chairman of the Lantana Library Foundation, is as much a part of the library as is the ponytail palm outside. <strong>Tim Stepien/The Coastal Star</strong></em></p>
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<p style="text-align:center;"><strong>Related Story: <a href="https://thecoastalstar.com/profiles/blogs/lantana-library-on-track-for-renovation-modernization" target="_blank">Library on track</a> for renovation, modernization</strong></p>
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<p><strong>By Brian Biggane</strong></p>
<p>It was no surprise some years back when Hypoluxo Island resident Robert Barfknecht, a voracious reader, became a dues-paying member of the Lantana Library Foundation.</p>
<p><br /> Then, about 10 years ago, he became even more.</p>
<p><br /> “I made the mistake of giving them too much money one year and they immediately invited me to become a member of the foundation’s board of directors,” Barfknecht recalled with a laugh. “I accepted delightfully. I like giving back to the communities where I’ve lived and prospered.”</p>
<p><br /> Sanford “Sandy” Beach was the foundation director at the time “and he was very, very passionate about the library,” Barfknecht said. “Later Sandy left, and I was got elected chairman of the foundation.”</p>
<p><br /> Located for the past 25 years in an old bank building on Ocean Avenue just west of the railroad tracks, the library is not in the county system but is maintained and supported by the town of Lantana.</p>
<p><br /> “Sid Patchett, the director for so many years, worked hard to make it different, through the quality of the literature that was to be found there,” Barfknecht said.</p>
<p><br /> Patchett died last year and Barfknecht oversaw the hiring of his replacement, Kristine Kreidler.</p>
<p><br /> But now he and his board have a much larger assignment.</p>
<p><br /> The 1-cent sales tax increase levied by Palm Beach County a few years ago has allowed Lantana to improve some public utilities and, according to Barfknecht, much of the money for a significant upgrade in the library is in this year’s budget.</p>
<p><br /> The foundation interviewed four architectural firms and hired PGAL of Boca Raton, which has designed more than 30 libraries. Former Greenacres Mayor Sam Ferrari is the lead architect.</p>
<p><br /> “What we have in that plan are some wonderful spaces for children, special places for teens, a teen creation lab, and also a community center for adult activities. That’s something that’s missing here,” Barfknecht said. “It’s going to enrich our community and bring us forward for the next decades.”</p>
<p><br /> The plan was approved by the Town Council at its May 11 meeting. Barfknecht was praised for his dedication to the effort.<br /> As it happens, the meeting coincided with Barfknect’s 82nd birthday, “and I can’t imagine a better birthday present. Our community needs it and will prosper with it.”</p>
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<p>Q: Where did you grow up and go to school? How do you think that has influenced you?</p>
<p>A: I grew up in the city of Detroit when it was the industrial center of the world. I went to school and university there, earning a B.S. in mechanical engineering and an M.S. in engineering mechanics at Wayne State University.</p>
<p><br /> It was a great place to work in my chosen profession as there were producers of every kind of product and their support industries. I worked for a consulting engineering firm started by several of my professors at the university and gained incredible experience across many industries as a young project engineer.</p>
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<p>Q: What professional accomplishments are you most proud of?</p>
<p>A: I developed an early pneumatically powered robot that was quite successful. I also obtained my license as a registered professional engineer. I maintain that license in Michigan even today.</p>
<p><br /> After the Detroit riots in 1967, with the burning of large parts of the city, my wife and I began planning our departure. My experience in Detroit convinced me that I could find useful employment anywhere in the world. So, Louise and I decided to go to my mother’s beautiful country of Italy to learn the language and perhaps learn to cook like my grandmother did. Louise suggested that we go to Italy via the Orient.</p>
<p><br /> In August 1969, I resigned my position, we sold our stuff, packed two backpacks and flew west to California, Hawaii and Japan to begin our five-month trip to Florence, Italy, where we had reserved spots in a good language school. Louise published a memoir about all this called Leaving Detroit, which is available on Amazon and at the Lantana and Manalapan libraries.<br /> We had saved enough money to last at least a year while I learned enough Italian to find professional employment. It took longer than I thought. But after a year in the wonderful city of Florence we had made enough friends to find small jobs to augment our savings.</p>
<p><br /> I worked as a carpenter and as a house painter for an American countess who owned a grand villa. These were skills that my father had taught me and that I had used to work my way through college. As we got better with the language we both found work as translators. </p>
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<p>Q: Have you had mentors in your life? Individuals who have inspired your life decisions?</p>
<p>A: In Italy, while working to upgrade the former villa stables to a grand apartment, I was introduced to the new renter, an American named Bob Collier, who had arrived to take over an Italian plastics company. We hit it off. After building him some closets and painting the place to his satisfaction, I gave him my bill and enclosed my résumé. I asked him to call me if he ever needed a good engineer.</p>
<p><br /> Two weeks later he called, and that began what became a wonderful 20-year career with Mobil Corp. I was hired first as a consultant to help them purchase three Italian plastic manufacturing plants in northern Italy. Then they hired me to be engineering manager, operations manager and ultimately general manager of various plastics manufacturing businesses in Europe and the United States. This marvelous man became my mentor and helped me launch a great new career.</p>
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<p>Q: What advice do you have for a young person seeking a career today?</p>
<p>A: Get the best technical education you can. This will give you independence. With a great technical education, you can go where you wish and find a good occupation and a good life.</p>
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<p>Q: How did you choose to make your home in Lantana on Hypoluxo Island?</p>
<p>A: During our early years in Italy we returned on a visit to Detroit to find my old neighborhood very depressed and my widowed mother looking for change. Mom had a close cousin who lived in Lantana and we suggested she visit and check out the town. She loved it and bought a condo at the new Croton Harbor, one block away from her cousin.</p>
<p><br /> We visited in 1974 and were smitten by the tropical wonders. On every visit we would barbecue and picnic at the Lantana beach pavilion, which was open to the public in those days. We snorkeled, spear-fished and played lots of pinochle.</p>
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<p>We bought our condo apartment across the street from my mother’s place in 1988. We used it as a getaway whenever I could get some time off. I vowed that someday when I retired, we would find a home on Hypoluxo Island. We moved to the island in 2000.<br /> In 1991, I was offered the opportunity to become president and CEO of a wonderful company in Chippewa Falls, Wisconsin, called EDI. We left our home in Tuscany to come to Wisconsin for my new career. We had softened the bitterly cold winters of northern Wisconsin with frequent visits to our condo in Lantana but looked forward to retirement in the tropics.</p>
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<p>Q: What is your favorite part about living on Hypoluxo?</p>
<p>A: We are as happy today as we were when we bought it 20 years ago, maybe even more so. We have found good friends here, very interesting people who have worked hard at their professions and who appreciate the tranquility and beauty of this place.<br /> Now in the time of the COVID-19 pandemic, this is as good a place to shelter as I can imagine. We are walking on the island, swimming in the pool, painting watercolors in the garden (me) and writing a memoir of food and friends in Italy (Louise). We don’t watch television but read tons of books. Louise got us both involved with the Lantana library some 15 years ago.</p>
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<p>Q: What book are you reading now?</p>
<p>A: I have just started Hilary Mantel’s third book of the Wolf Hall trilogy, called The Mirror & the Light. On the reading table are started but not yet finished, The Anarchy by William Dalrymple, about the British East India Company, and Disunited Nations by geopolitical strategist Peter Zeihan.</p>
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<p>Q: What music do you listen to when you want to relax? When you want to be inspired?</p>
<p>A: We have instituted opera night every Friday during the pandemic. We will prepare a special dinner and follow it with an opera film. This started when our last opera of the Palm Beach Opera season, Eugene Onegin, was canceled due to the virus. I bought a copy of an old (1958) Russian film of the opera and we started with a 7:30 curtain time that Friday evening. This was so much fun that we started doing our own Friday night at the opera.</p>
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<p>Q: If your life story were to be made into a movie, who would play you?</p>
<p>A: James Dean.</p>
<p>Q: Is there something people don’t know about you but should?</p>
<p>A: I have a show of my watercolor paintings hanging in the Manalapan Library and I have been honored with commissions for paintings that hang both in the library and in the new Manalapan Council Chambers.</p></div>Lantana: Library to be renovated — or perhaps rebuilt in new locationhttps://thecoastalstar.com/profiles/blogs/lantana-library-to-be-renovated-or-perhaps-rebuilt-in-new-locatio2020-04-01T19:09:43.000Z2020-04-01T19:09:43.000ZThe Coastal Starhttps://thecoastalstar.com/members/TheCoastalStar<div><p><strong>By Mary Thurwachter</strong><br /> <br />One way or another, substantial changes are coming for the Lantana Public Library. The town has earmarked $400,000 for upgrades to the building, and architectural plans for those renovations are to be viewed by the Town Council on April 13.</p>
<p><br /> But at the March 9 town meeting, a few other proposals were pitched by a developer hoping to build a hotel on or beside the town-owned library at 205 W. Ocean Ave.</p>
<p><br /> Tony Mauro and his son Michael Mauro, who own the land behind the library (where the old bowling alley once stood) as well as the post office building next to the library, said they wanted to include the town in the vision for their development.</p>
<p><br /> “Michael and I feel we have enough land with the bowling alley property to do something nice, but in all the design we’ve been playing with for over a year, it’s become pretty clear to us that to do something that will withstand the test of time, and make everyone very proud, it would be nice to be able to bring the library into the project,” Tony Mauro said.</p>
<p><br /> “Our No. 1 choice would be to design and develop a hotel,” he said. “The design would be very different if it were just on our portion of land right now, and if the library were included it would change the design totally.”</p>
<p><br /> One of the options the Mauros proposed was for them to purchase the library for a sum to be determined by multiple appraisers. Another option would involve exchanging the library for another parcel in the town and funding the construction of a new building.<br /> A third proposal would be to build a new library at 500 Greynolds Circle to create a more centralized town municipal center, which would allow all of the funds to be utilized for the structure itself.</p>
<p><br /> Council members quickly declined to consider a fourth option, which would be to provide a dedicated and permanent location for the library within a new overall project designed by the developers.</p>
<p><br /> “Our library needs to be not in control of anyone else’s facility,” Mayor Dave Stewart said.</p>
<p><br /> But some of the other proposals would be worth looking at, council members agreed. The Mauros will return with more fleshed-out ideas at the May 11 meeting.</p>
<p><br /> In the meantime, the town will have an opportunity to see plans two Miami architects have put together for the Library Foundation.</p>
<p><br /> Robert Barfknecht, president of the Lantana Library Foundation, asked the council to delay any decision on the Mauro proposals until he had a chance to show them the architectural plans the foundation had sponsored.</p>
<p><br /> “We’re delighted to know that the town has budgeted a significant amount of money to upgrade the library to conform to ADA laws, etc., and we have offered to support architectural drawings and a new concept for this upgrade,” Barfknecht said. “We have dedicated $10,000 of our funds from the foundation to create architectural drawings and plans which will include cost estimates for upgrading the library. We’ll be ready to present these to the council in April and I think you’ll be delighted to see what’s coming along.</p>
<p><br /> “The architects we have working on this are coming up with some very interesting ideas to make it a beautiful building which will include community spaces,” Barfknecht said. “I think you’ll be very pleased and proud that the building can be something really special. It already is special, but it can be much more special.”</p>
<p><br /> “The way I see this, these are just ideas,” Stewart said. “We are getting ready to spend considerable money on the library and before we spend considerable money on the library, I think the question is would the council like to see a new building somewhere else, or would they like to see it as part of whatever project is going to be on the property? And there are all kinds of stipulations.”</p>
<p><br /> For one thing, if the town would choose to sell the library, that would need to be voted on by residents, according to the town charter.<br /> Lantana’s Public Library was founded in 1947 in the former bridge-tender’s house on Ocean Avenue. The town bought the current library building, which is 50 years old, in the early 1990s after the Carteret Savings & Loan failed. It is operated by one full-time employee and a small army of volunteers.</p></div>Our Clubs: St. Andrews marks completion of renovationshttps://thecoastalstar.com/profiles/blogs/our-clubs-st-andrews-marks-completion-of-renovations2019-12-31T15:36:01.000Z2019-12-31T15:36:01.000ZThe Coastal Starhttps://thecoastalstar.com/members/TheCoastalStar<div><p style="text-align:center;"><a href="{{#staticFileLink}}7960914076,original{{/staticFileLink}}" target="_blank"><img src="{{#staticFileLink}}7960914076,original{{/staticFileLink}}" class="align-center" alt="7960914076?profile=original" /></a><em>New color schemes and settings help to create a more open feel in the dining rooms. <strong>Photo provided</strong></em></p>
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<p><strong>By Brian Biggane</strong></p>
<p>Nearly 200 people were entertained by the Palm Beach Pipers bagpipe ensemble and a five-piece band as St. Andrews Club of Delray Beach celebrated the completion of its expansive renovation project on Dec. 6.</p>
<p><br /> President Henry Blackiston made a short speech and presided over a ribbon-cutting ceremony before the bagpipe ensemble, respecting the Scottish tradition of St. Andrews, led attendees inside the clubhouse and up the stairs to the refurbished ballroom.<br /> “It was really spectacular,” General Manager Robert Grassi said.</p>
<p><br /> Blackiston presented gifts to members who had been involved in planning for the project, which began in November 2018. Permits were secured in April, construction started in May and the job was completed in late November.</p>
<p><br /> Grassi said the goal of the renovations was to meet members’ requests to bring a “more airy atmosphere” and more of a Florida feel to the facility. “The dining rooms are yellow, gold and white, and each room has a distinctive color combination with the wallpaper, so they blend nicely,” he said. “The members wanted more casual dining and more bars, so we built a huge bar downstairs and we have more casual space. There’s also a beautiful porch that looks out on the ocean.”</p>
<p><br /> The renovations were more than cosmetic. They included new furniture throughout, improved lighting and an upgraded sound system. Also updated were the software, wiring and phone systems.</p>
<p><br /> “It was a massive renovation because we took everything in need of an update and addressed it,” Grassi said.</p>
<p><br /> The goal going forward is to offer more diversity in the dining area and attract more members by broadening the club’s target market. While the club has typically cut back on activities during summer months, Grassi said the plan now is to be open year-round except for September.</p>
<p><br /> “We’re a family-friendly club,” Grassi declared. “The most family-friendly club on A1A.”</p></div>Obituary: Robert ‘Smitty’ Smithhttps://thecoastalstar.com/profiles/blogs/obituary-robert-smitty-smith2017-11-29T19:05:04.000Z2017-11-29T19:05:04.000ZThe Coastal Starhttps://thecoastalstar.com/members/TheCoastalStar<div><p><strong>By Willie Howard</strong> <br /><br /> COUNTY POCKET — Robert “Smitty” Smith, an accomplished craftsman and a member of a pioneering wave of surfers who helped popularize the sport in Palm Beach County during the 1960s, died Oct. 31 of heart failure at his apartment in the County Pocket.<br /><a href="{{#staticFileLink}}7960764469,original{{/staticFileLink}}"><img src="{{#staticFileLink}}7960764469,original{{/staticFileLink}}" class="align-left" width="95" alt="7960764469?profile=original" /></a> He was 71.<br /> Also known as Bob, Mr. Smith was best known for his long affiliation with Nomad Surf Shop, a focal point for area surfers founded in 1968 by Ron Heavyside, who befriended Mr. Smith the day he arrived in Briny Breezes on Oct. 31, 1962.<br /> Mr. Smith helped Heavyside remodel the buildings that became the surf shop and helped maintain them over the years. He was a well-known handyman in Briny Breezes and Gulf Stream, accomplished in carpentry, plumbing and electrical work as well as painting and wallpapering, trades learned from his father.<br /> Heavyside said Mr. Smith was born in Brooklyn, N.Y., and moved to Briny Breezes with his father, Ben, and stepmother, Mary.<br /> After attending Seacrest High School in Delray Beach, Mr. Smith took the entrance exam for the Air Force and scored so high that he went out and bought a new Chevy Corvair Monza convertible, longtime friend Dana Littlefield said.<br /> But the Air Force rejected Mr. Smith because of poor hearing in his left ear. <br /> “He would have gone places because he was really smart,” Littlefield said. <br /> Mr. Smith was not able to return to high school after his attempt to join the military, Heavyside said. He went to work with his father in the painting and wallpapering business and later spent time in California and Tennessee before returning to the Briny Breezes area. <br /> Littlefield and Heavyside recalled carefree times they enjoyed with Mr. Smith in the 1960s and ’70s, including camping on the beach and boisterous beach parties. <br /> During one night of beach camping, a front came through and pushed waves up the dune, pulling Mr. Smith into the surf in his sleeping bag. He was such a heavy sleeper that he didn’t wake up, but was mad as a hornet when he finally did, Littlefield recalled.<br /> Heavyside’s sons, Ronnie and Ryan, remember Mr. Smith as an avuncular figure who was quick with a joke and sometimes grumpy but always willing to share his knowledge of how to build and repair things.<br /> Gemma Dinanath of Gulfstream Texaco said Mr. Smith installed the lighted sign bearing the Texaco star at the gas station just north of Briny Breezes Town Hall. <br /> “He was a very smart guy,” Dinanath said, but noted that he shied away from doctors and hospitals that could have helped him with health problems in his later years.<br /> Mr. Smith enjoyed lounging in the chairs in front of the Texaco station office, talking with friends, drinking Budweiser and smoking Marlboro 100s, Dinanath said.<br /> Ronnie Heavyside said Mr. Smith helped him mend a wooden fence damaged by Hurricane Irma a few days before he died, even though he was very weak.<br /> “Anything you needed help with you could ask Bob and he would know,” said James Russell, a longtime friend of the Heavyside family.<br /> James Arena, a real estate broker who grew up surfing the waters off Briny Breezes, said Mr. Smith was like a father to many of the area’s young surfers.<br /> “He treated us all like we were his kids,” Arena said. “Everybody knows him in Briny. It’s definitely the loss of an icon around here.”<br /> As a surfer in his younger days, Mr. Smith garnered respect on the waves. He continued to paddle out now and then in recent years, even as his frame withered from the effects of diabetes.<br /> “He was one of the bulls who would go out when it was really rough,” said Tom Warnke, a longtime surfer who attended Seacrest High School with Mr. Smith in the 1960s. “He hardly ever wore a wetsuit, either.”<br /> In his heyday, Mr. Smith was a muscular man about 6 feet tall, 180 pounds, with brown hair, a beard and a penchant for big waves.<br /> “He was a big guy, strong and just totally cool,” Littlefield said.<br /> A tattered newspaper photo hanging on the wall at Nomad Surf Shop shows Mr. Smith and friends in his 1937 Plymouth, windshield folded down, surfboards jutting out over the hood.<br /> “He was a waterman,” Ron Heavyside said. “He liked riding the big waves.”<br /> Members of the Heavyside family organized a group “paddle out” into the ocean in honor of Mr. Smith in late November. His ashes were scattered in the waves.</p></div>Health: Pioneer in ovarian cancer research still takes forward viewhttps://thecoastalstar.com/profiles/blogs/health-pioneer-in-ovarian-cancer-research-still-takes-forward-vie2015-12-29T19:30:00.000Z2015-12-29T19:30:00.000ZChris Felkerhttps://thecoastalstar.com/members/ChrisFelker<div><p style="text-align:center;"><a href="{{#staticFileLink}}7960610498,original{{/staticFileLink}}"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}7960610498,original{{/staticFileLink}}" width="389" alt="7960610498?profile=original" /></a><em>Robert Knapp is retired from practice, but still teaches.</em></p>
<p style="text-align:center;"><strong>Tim Stepien/The Coastal Star</strong></p>
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<p style="text-align:left;"><strong>By Lona O’Connor<br /> <br /></strong> Robert Knapp’s medical career spans more than five crucial decades of women’s reproductive health. As a young medical resident back in the 1950s, Knapp was an early advocate for safe, legal abortions. The majority of his career has been spent as a researcher into the diagnosis and treatment of ovarian cancer.<br /> Now, at 88, he is retired, but still teaching — between walks along A1A and weightlifting at a gym near his home in Manalapan. And he is looking forward to the possibility that a diagnostic tool he co-discovered will prove to aid early diagnosis for ovarian cancer, which usually is far advanced when discovered.<br /> On Jan. 25, he will attend a fundraising luncheon for PBC H.O.W. (Hearing the Ovarian Cancer Whisper, the organization he founded). PBC H.O.W. offers a three-year, $50,000-per-year research fellowship to gynecologists. It also offers the Robert C. Knapp Medical Student Award and sponsors an “angel fund” to defray expenses for families of ovarian cancer patients.</p>
<p style="text-align:left;"> “Let’s face it, when you realize that one in 70 women will get ovarian cancer, certainly one of those students will be the doctor taking care of them,” said Knapp.<br /> In 2015, 14,000 of the 21,000 women diagnosed with ovarian cancer died, according to the American Cancer Society, a higher mortality rate than for either cervical or uterine cancer.<br /> Early in his career, in emergency rooms, Knapp treated many women who later died from the effects of illegal abortions, often performed at home or under unsafe conditions. <br /> The death rate from infection was “appalling,” he said. “I was terribly upset that these women died.” After treating those cases, he joined the board of Planned Parenthood.<br /> He has spent much of his distinguished medical, teaching and research career at Harvard Medical School, Brigham and Women’s Hospital and the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute.<br /> In the early 1960s, he began working on a way to detect ovarian cancer. He wanted to know why patients who seemed to be in stage 1 cancer died even after their ovaries were removed. <br /> In the 1970s, he and another collaborator, Daniel Friedman, also discovered how ovarian cancer spreads to the lymph nodes. <br /> Then Knapp, the expert on ovarian cancer, joined forces with Robert Bast, an immunological specialist, at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston.<br /> “When I became an assistant professor at the DFCI, Bob and I set up our laboratories next to one another and pooled our resources to collaborate on immunotherapy in mice and in women with ovarian cancer,” wrote Bast in an email.<br /> In their studies of ovarian cancer in mice, Knapp and Bast used cancer cells from one of Knapp’s patients. A sign of past times and an indication of his focus on doctor-patient relationships, Knapp made regular Thursday night house calls to his cancer patients.<br /> “Bast sat there with the patience of a saint,” said Knapp of his younger colleague. <br /> Bast tested cancer antigens (CA) one after another, until, his 125th try — CA 125 — provided the basis of a test for signs of ovarian cancer.<br /> Besides the CA 125 test, the two doctors worked on using immunotherapy to form antibodies that would contain the cancer. Bast, now a professor at the University of Texas and researcher at the M. D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, is also on the medical advisory board of PBC H.O.W. Bast called their years working together “a wonderful collaboration.” “Bob has been an exceptional mentor for many young physicians and scholars over the years who have made significant contributions to our understanding of ovarian cancer and to the care of women with this disease,” said Bast.<br /> The CA 125 test is used as a follow-up tool, to see whether chemotherapy has been effective. A rising level of CA 125 is considered highly significant in such cases, said Knapp.<br /> In the next few weeks, Knapp hopes to read the results of CA 125 tests expected to be published in the Lancet, the prominent British medical journal.<br /> The study in Britian looked at 200,000 post-menopausal women, who are at greater risk than younger women of contracting ovarian cancer. It should show whether using CA 125 would work as a way of detecting ovarian cancer in the earlier, more treatable stages. <br /> Knapp teaches a session on ovarian cancer at the Weill medical school of Cornell University and another seminar on how patients and doctors interact. He is the author and co-author of numerous publications on obstetric cancers.</p>
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<p style="text-align:left;"><span class="font-size-3" style="font-family:georgia, palatino;"><strong>If You Go</strong></span><br /> Sherry Lansing, former chairwoman and CEO of Paramount Pictures, is the guest speaker at the Time is of the Essence luncheon, 11:30 a.m. Jan. 25 at Mar-a-Lago Club Palm Beach, 1100 S. Ocean Blvd., Palm Beach. Pamela Fiori, former editor of Town & Country magazine, is the moderator. For more information, e-mail Jennifer@howflorida.org.</p></div>