Author: Ruth Olson

William W. Telford, Jr., 77, of Cary, North Carolina, passed away peacefully on July 6, 2026.

Bill was born on October 23, 1948, in Moriah, NY to William and Susie Telford. He graduated from Davidson College and enjoyed a successful 32-year career in wastewater management for the City of Durham. He was an avid traveler and friend to all.

Bill is survived by his wife of 54 years, Marcia Telford; children John (Beverly) and Cliff; and two beloved granddaughters. He was preceded in death by his parents and his brother, Kendrick Telford.

Bill will be remembered for his kindness, quick wit, unwavering integrity, and deep devotion to his family, friends and church. He never met a stranger and always found time to help others.

A celebration of life service will take place on Saturday, July 25, at 10:00am at Trinity Avenue Presbyterian Church of Durham.

In lieu of flowers, the family requests memorial donations be made to The The Parkinson’s Foundation or Transitions HospiceCare.

Jerry Jay Eller, 89, passed away peacefully on July 5, 2026. Born in Greensboro, North Carolina. Jerry lived a life marked by faith, service, compassion, and dedication to his family and community.

Jerry was the son of the late Albert Henry Eller and Clyde Alieen Eller. He was preceded in death by his parents and his beloved wife of 43 years, Eleanor Anne Eller.

Jerry earned his undergraduate degree from Davidson College before receiving his medical degree from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Medicine. He furthered his studies completing a fellowship in pediatric infectious disease at the University of Colorado Medical Center. He and Eleanor met during their pediatric residency in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Together they built a marriage centered on faith, family, and service.

Throughout his distinguished medical career, Jerry served as a major in the U.S. Army Medical Corps and practiced medicine in Colorado, Texas, and Alabama where he also helped educate and mentor future healthcare professionals. He made important contributions in the field of infectious diseases and virology leading countless research studies and was a contributing author in multiple textbooks. He served as pediatrician and medical director of emergency services in Livingston for many years caring for patients and families throughout the community.

Outside of medicine, Jerry enjoyed golf, photography, playing the trumpet, and singing in the church choir. His greatest passion, however, was sharing his faith. He served as an elder and faithfully taught Sunday School at Livingston First Presbyterian Church for many years, leaving a lasting impact through his wisdom, kindness, and love for God’s Word.

Jerry is survived by his children:

Ruth Crane (Mac)

Wesley Neighbors (Kelsey), Ford, Hudson, Ollie, and Miller

Connor Neighbors (Meghan), James and Sutton

Anna Lakin Campbell (Scott), Emmett and Rowan

Dr. Timothy Eller (Janae), Chaney, Luke, and Grant

Karen Marks (Will), Stewart and Alex

Christina Paparella (Bryan) Preston, Meg, and Elle

Jerry will be remembered as a devoted husband, loving father and grandfather, compassionate physician, faithful teacher, and humble servant of Christ. His gentle spirit, generosity, and unwavering commitment to caring for others will continue to inspire all who knew him.

Funeral services for Jerry will be held on Monday, July 13, 2026 at 11:00 A.M. at Livingston First Presbyterian Church with Pastor Luke Ponder officiating. Visitation services will be held at 10:15 A.M. prior to the funeral service. Graveside for family members will follow the service.

In lieu of flowers, the family requests that memorial donations be made to:

Campus Outreach Ministries/Preston Paparella

P.O. Box 43737

Birmingham, AL 35243

Online giving: https://www.cobirmingham.org/donate/preston-paparella

Gideons International Sumter County

P.O. Box 193

York, AL 36925-0193

Livingston First Presbyterian

Church 105 N Washington St

Livingston, AL 35470

Tom Bersuder died on July 2nd after a hard-fought battle with cancer. He was born to John Edward and Virginia Patterson Bersuder in Dayton, Ohio in 1948 and when he was a child, his family moved to Texas City, Texas. On the recommendation of his minister, an alumnus of Davidson College, Tom attended Davidson where he developed lifelong friendships and became an active alumnus and ambassador of the “Great Class of 1970.” He was honored to receive the Alumni Service Award from Davidson in 2025.

After graduating and working for his Texas congressman in Washington, D.C., Tom returned to North Carolina and lived with several other Davidson alumni as they attended graduate and professional schools. After receiving a master’s degree from UNC-Chapel Hill, Tom moved to Raleigh and began a career of more than 30 years in state government. He retired in 2010 from what is now the NC Department of Information Technology and he was awarded the Order of the Long Leaf Pine.

Tom also actively supported his wife, Hope Williams, in her work with NC Independent Colleges and Universities. Together, they took great joy in raising their two sons, Jonathan and Edward, and in welcoming Edward’s wife, Gabby, and their darling granddaughter, Marcella, to the family. In addition, Tom was proud to be the big brother to his sister, Suzi, and brother-in-law to her husband, Dick Grbac.

Other relatives include his uncle, Ron Bersuder, and wife Cindy, of Ohio, and many cousins, including Jeannette Albert and her husband, Danny, of New Orleans.

A Celebration of Life Service, followed by a reception, will be held on Saturday, August 15th at 2pm at First Baptist Church of Raleigh on Salisbury Street.

In lieu of flowers, the family would welcome donations to the Tom Bersuder ’70 Fund, Davidson College, PO Box 5000, Davidson, NC 28035 (or Office of Donor Relations – tel:704-894-2077) or in memory of Tom to the Independent College Fund of North Carolina, 530 N Blount St, Raleigh, 27604 (919-832-5817).

Arthur Dye of Portland, Oregon, died peacefully in the company of cherished family members on June 29, 2026. He was born September 26, 1935, in Charlotte, North Carolina, the eldest child of Mildred Taylor Dye and Dr. Arthur McKee Dye. 

As a teenager, Arthur attended boarding school at The McCallie School in Chattanooga, Tennessee, then continued his education at Davidson College in Davidson, North Carolina. After receiving his bachelor’s degree in 1957, he enrolled at the Putney Graduate School of Teacher Education, an experimental master’s degree program in rural Vermont. The program’s founder, progressive educator and pacifist Morris Mitchell, became one of Arthur’s earliest mentors, inspiring him to dedicate himself to a lifetime of community service and social activism. 

Arthur’s wide-ranging career included a decade of fundraising and community organizing for the American Friends Service Committee, a prominent Quaker service organization. As a staff member at the AFSC headquarters in Philadelphia, he was assigned to the organization’s Peace Education Program, which provided crucial support and counseling for conscientious objectors at a time when young Americans were being drafted to fight in Vietnam. Other assignments in those early years at AFSC included support for the Civil Rights Movement in the South, and humanitarian aid programs for civilians in active war zones. 

Some of the proudest moments of his career date back to his time as executive secretary of AFSC’s Pacific Northwest regional office, where he developed deep and lasting friendships with members of Native American tribal groups, African American trade unions, and the United Farmworkers of America as they fought for racial justice and human rights in Oregon and Washington.

From the mid-1970s, his career also embraced higher education and scientific research, including administrative roles at Wilmington College, the Missouri Botanical Garden, the Kaiser Permanente Center for Health Research, and his father’s alma mater, the Kirksville College of Osteopathic Medicine. He ended his career at Ecotrust, a Portland-based environmental nonprofit that partners with local communities to implement economically sustainable conservation strategies up and down the West Coast. 

At the retirement community where he lived with Jill Spencer, his wife and partner of more than four decades, Arthur was known as a gentle and caring neighbor who participated in diverse community activities and volunteerism. In recent years, when his longtime hobbies of home remodeling, gardening, and furniture making were no longer viable, he became an avid nature photographer and an amateur cultivator of bonsai trees. And nothing gave him greater joy in life than seeing his two grandsons grow into young adults.

With his first wife, Becky Dye, Arthur had three sons, all of whom were able to spend time with him during his final days. In many respects, Arthur’s character was shaped by his formative years in the South, and although he lived away from his home state of North Carolina for most of his adult life, he never lost his Southern affinity for story-telling and tall tales. Up until the very end, he held on to his abiding kindness and sense of humor – bantering with hospital staff, delighting in oft-repeated jokes, sharing memories of good times past, and expressing gratitude for the full life he had lived. Arthur is survived by his wife, Jill Spencer, his first wife, Rebecca Dye, his sons, Lewis Dye (Joan Husman), Allen Dye (Belle Gironda), and Morris Dye (Lyn Hikida), and his grandsons, Taylor Dye and Jackson Dye.

The family has requested that any memorial tributes be made in the form of charitable contributions to:

 ● Right 2 Dream Too in Portland, Oregon

https://www.zeffy.com/en-US/donation-form/donate-to-keep-us-open

● Fox Creek Park, c/o the Swannanoa Community Council in Swannanoa, North Carolina 

https://grovemontpark.square.site/s/order?si=true&item=QB65KDEE5MTIN3LTEBYG6LV 7#most-popular