Obituaries
Geraldine Fregoso
Copy editor
Gerry Fregoso, whose 2 1/2-year stint
as copy editor of Central City Extra capped a long
journalistic career, died at home with her family
on March 18. She was 70.
Mrs. Fregoso, born and raised in the
Mission District, worked at the West County Times,
the Oakland Tribune and retired from the Chronicle
in 2002. Soon after, she joined The Extra staff as
copy editor, bringing great skill and humor, a sharp
wit and professional tone.
A year ago March she was diagnosed
with kidney cancer. The first prognosis: three weeks
to live. Mrs. Fregoso, a Newspaper Guild member, was
back at work on The Extra for the May issue.
Every month we’d send her stories
by e-mail to edit and write headlines and captions,
then she came into the office from her home in Pinole
for a day or two of prepress proofreading and production.
She worked right up through the February issue, No.
43.
“That Gerry chose to work with
us during this time is the greatest honor The Extra
could receive,” said Geoff Link, editor and publisher
of The Extra.
She leaves Pete, her husband of 47
years, two daughters, two sons and four grandchildren.
Robert Moore
Loved Pier 39
Eight
years ago, Robert Moore and Jack Hinkel moved from
a San Francisco apartment to the Alexander Residence.
It was there, on Feb. 28, that Hinkel mourned the loss
of his partner of 21 years.
“He was like a little brother
to me — I loved him dearly,” said Hinkel
at Mr. Moore’s memorial. The Rev. Glenda Hope
officiated at the gathering of several Alexander tenants
and social workers.
Mr. Moore, who had cancer and had been
seriously ill for six months, died Feb. 18 and was
buried in Oregon, where his mother, father, two sons
and a daughter live. He was 53.
Hinkel’s eyes filled as he recalled
happy times. “Robert was a little homebody, but
he loved Pier 39 and we met my family there one afternoon,” he
said.
He also shared a detail of Mr. Moore’s
past as a vacuum cleaner mechanic in Salem for 12 years.
There was not much else to say, Hinkel
explained: “Robert’s death just broke my
heart.”
– Marjorie Beggs
Phil Brunner
Vietnam veteran
Two
dozen of Phil Brunner’s friends crowded into
the television room in the San Cristina Residence on
Market Street to bid farewell to their friend whose
checkered past didn’t diminish their love for
him.
In front, symbolizing Mr. Brunner’s
veteran status, an American flag hung from a green
chalkboard on which his name and fatal statistic, 1965-2005,
was written. The picture on the memorial program cover
showed Mr. Brunner hugging his little son, Joseph.
Both are smiling.
Mr. Brunner had suffered medical complications
for weeks before he died Feb. 21 after his wife,
Collynne Cook, took him off life-support at St. Francis
Memorial Hospital.
Ben Wynn, who knew Mr. Brunner nine
years, said they were both Vietnam War veterans, Wynn
serving in the Navy. Although they talked often, he
said, they avoided the war as a topic.
“He’d do anything for anybody,” Wynn
said. “He was a stand-up man, a brother. I think
about him every day and there’s a place in my
heart for him. I know he’s in heaven and his
spirit is with us.”
A man who lived on the fourth floor
said Mr. Brunner was “a wonderful gentleman” who
always acknowledged him. Several women praised Mr.
Brunner as sensitive and a kind-hearted friend. Others
noted his dry wit, and his fondness for his cat, Panther,
and for good old rock ’n’ roll. Tony Baldwin,
a tenant supervisor for nine months, described Mr.
Brunner as the “quiet, caring type who always
asked how you were doing.”
Cook said Mr. Brunner had a congenital
hearing impairment. After graduating from high school
in Union City, she said, he wanted to join the Marines
so badly he talked a friend into taking the hearing
test for him. “But he got his ass kicked by the
drill sergeant because he couldn’t hear,” she
said.
Mr. Brunner was sent to Vietnam,
an experience he wouldn’t talk about unless she
prodded him. Then, she said, he’d get upset and
his reluctant stories were so graphic and blood-curdling
that she stopped asking to hear more.
“He did a lot of time in federal
and state prison,” Cook said to the gathering. “We
spent a lot of time together when he didn’t get
caught. He did heroin.”
She told The Extra privately that she
met Mr. Brunner 22 years ago. A friend introduced them
with the hope that Cook would leave the stepson of
Hells Angels’ leader, Sonny Barger, for Mr. Brunner.
They clicked, Cook said, as Mr. Brunner “wined
and dined” her. They moved from Fremont to San
Francisco in 1989 and into the San Cristina in 1997.
She said their son, Joseph, now 12, was born with methadone
and heroin dependency, plus a hearing problem. He lives
in a foster home in the East Bay.
Cook said Mr. Brunner read the Bible
every day.
“Seventy-five percent of the
time when I walked into his room he was reading the
Bible,” she said. “He is the best thing
that happened to me in my life. He was such a very,
very giving person. I am surprised he didn’t
open a center for youth.”
As for the drug-dealing, Cook said
it was “in his blood. Phil said it was what he
did best.”
Refreshments were available afterward.
Many people stopped by to offer Cook their condolences.
– Tom Carter
Edward Cutting
Alexander resident 14 years
Edward Cutting was outgoing. He said
hello to everyone at the Alexander Residence, where
he’d lived for 14 years. He died March 4, in
his room, at age 57.
Social worker Winnie Kwong recalled
Mr. Cutting’s cheerfulness, despite ailments
that forced him to walk, painfully, with a cane. But
she knew little about him except that he was a veteran
and had a brother who lives in Los Angeles.
Among the few Alexander residents who
came to Mr. Cutting’s March 15 memorial was Jack
Hinkel, who’d attended another memorial here
just two weeks earlier, mourning the loss of his partner,
Robert Moore, who died in February.
“I knew Ed for about a year,
and we became friends,” Hinkel said. “He
knew Robert was in the hospital and he talked to me
about that. He was a nice young man.”
The Rev. Glenda Hope, officiating at
the memorial, thanked Hinkel for sharing his thoughts,
especially hard, she acknowledged, with his own grief
so fresh.
Another resident said she knew Ed only “in
passing” but wanted to say something in his
memory. She opened a large Bible and read a few
passages from Ecclesiastes, Chapter iii — “To
everything there is a season, and a time to every
purpose under heaven . . .”
– Marjorie Beggs
Christine Zamora
Quiet and reclusive
A second Alexander resident, Christine
Zamora, was remembered at the same March 15 memorial
as Edward Cutting.
Ms. Zamora, who had lived at the Alexander
Residence for eight years, died in her room March 3.
She was 62.
Ms. Zamora kept very much to herself,
said social worker Winnie Kwong. “She always
walked fast and didn’t talk much to anyone. And
she seemed to never go out in the daytime — only
in the evening.”
Two women at the memorial said they
didn’t know Ms. Zamora or Mr. Cutting, but wanted
to honor their memory by attending.
“We feel the loss of two members
of this family,” said one.
“May their souls rest in peace,” said
the other.
– Marjorie Beggs
{Home} Central
City Extra
