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ALTON, ILL., MONDAY, FEBRUARY 17, 1964, Front Page (as part of an article about deaths of two other area residents)
Saturday near Cascade, IA., Miss Rose Marie Sacchi, 22, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Joseph Sacchi, 311 McGinnis St., Alton, was killed in an auto-truck crash. Miss Sacchi, an honor graduate of Southern Illinois University last June, was a graduate art student at University of Iowa at Iowa City. She and three other students were riding in a car when it collided with a truck driven by William Feyen, 32, of Dubuque, IA. The other students were seriously injured.
Alton Telegraph, MONDAY, FEBRUARY 17, 1964, Page B-7
Services Set Tuesday For Miss Rose Sacchi
Funeral services for Miss Rose Marie Sacchi, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Joseph P. Sacchi, 311 McGinnis St., will be held Tuesday at 11 a.m. in Gent Chapel by Rev. Hugh J. Kennedy, pastor of First Unitarian Church. Burial will be in Valhalla Memorial Park.
Friends may call at the Chapel after 2 p.m. today.
Miss Sacchi, who was killed Saturday in an automobile accident near Cascade, Iowa, was a student at the University of Iowa, where she was majoring in art.
She was graduated last June with honors from Southern Illinois University.
A native of Alton, she was born Sept. 6, 1941. She attended the Alton schools. Surviving besides her parents are a brother, Leo, Orlando, Fla., and her maternal grandparents, Mr. and Mrs. Rocco Sacco, LaPorte, Ind.
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Cindy Kodros (Garvey)
Rose Marie Sacchi was one of my first classmates that I remember dying right after high school. She was a pretty girl with sparkling eyes and a smile everytime you saw her. Friendly to everyone and I am so glad she touched my life in the way that she did. She is unforgetable.Dennis Milford
I met Rose Marie at the Alton Young Democrats around 1956. I was startled when we took a liberal/conservative test, and she was the only one of us who scored as a liberal, a learning experience for me. She was from a wonderful Italian immigrant family, very anti-clerical, and all artistic. Her brother played French Horn with the Denver Symphony & her father was a truly accomplished cabinetmaker in his spare time. Through her family I got my first introduction to classical music, composers like Stravinsky & Britten, a nonpareil gift to me.Since I was so strictly Methodist at the time, dancing was forbidden, and I did not want to go to the Senior Prom (I had avoided the Junior one). My mother insisted however, so Rose Marie and I went off to the Prom together, though we did not dance.
We stayed in touch through college, and in the summer of 1963, the last one either of us spent in Alton, we really got to know each other. Each of us had "come out" by this time, our differentnesses brought us closer.
I remember Don Fritz calling me in Boston to tell me of the horrible collision in Iowa, and that Rose Marie was gone. Because this was a transition period with addresses changing frequently, several letters came to me after I knew she was dead. In one she wrote she was going to come east to see me that spring.
She was a remarkable artist and a loving friend. I treasure the one work, a figure study, I was able to talk her out of -- I just wish we had had more time together, and that her life had been able to blossom as I knew it would. I had heard once upon a year some of her work was in the collection of Southern Illinois University -- I hope that is true.
Marilyn Waide (Lake)
I met Rose Marie in a gym class in 1957. Neither one of us was very accomplished on the trampoline, so the gym teacher paired us off. We somehow managed to not get hurt. I'm delighted to see Dennis's comments. He and Rose Marie and Don Fritz and many others and I were all in the drama club together. I didn't remember that Dennis took Rose Marie to her senior prom. Wow! Congrats Dennis.Rose Marie and I were best friends through high school, and college. She introduced me to the artists and writers at Southern Illinois University Residence Center in Upper Alton. We were going to go to New York City in the fall of 1964 to live there a few months and see if we could make it. Both of us were accomplished make-up artists thanks to Dorothy Colonius. We thought we could get a loft, do make-up for a living. You know about dreams.
In the meantime, Rose Marie was engaged to Byron Davidson, who later married Edith Young, another of our friends in the SIU group. I was going to Illinois State Normal University in Normal IL when I met my first husband. On the Sat. night before we were to marry, I got a call from Byron telling me of Rose Marie's death. I was devastated - She had been so disappointed that I got engaged and probably would not go to New York. I hadn't let her know that we were getting married ASAP, not pregnant but not wanting to get pregnant before marriage.
On the morning of my wedding, I received a post card from her. "Dear Duchess, Are you still alive. I haven't heard from you in so long. Sacchi-san." The duchess and Sacchi-san names are another story.
Willa Wright, my dear college friend and bridesmaid, put the post card away and helped me to get dressed through my tears.
I have a portrait she painted of me in oils, an oil painting called The Mourners that she did as a Rembrandt study in 1959, and two wonderful wood cut prints that I cherish.
Like Dennis Milford, I was included in many family dinners at the Sacchis. I learned to drink red wine with dinner, cut by a half glass a tap water.
Joe Sacchi was a wonderful cabinet maker and Mrs. Sacchi was a dressmaker and furrier. They always made me feel at home. We ate persimmons, yes persimmons, from a tree in her back yard, and anchovies from a can. We had so much fun and a good portion of sorrow.
I also remember at least one family picnic to Forest Park on a lovely Sunday afternoon as part of a trip to the St. Louis Art Museum.
I've recently been in contact with Leo and his wife and they were very comforted by your class's loving memories of Rose Marie.
She was a great friend, a beautiful woman,and a talented artist. I imagine she is a beloved Angel.
We were fortunate to have her for the time we did.
Marilyn Hope (Waide) Lake