Our community lost Delores Maxine Peyton, church mother, a delicious Louisiana cook and a beloved school bus driver for over thirty-five years for a variety of schools. So many of our students ride school buses, and Mother Peyton was the first face they would see to start off their day well. She was a marvelous blend of kindness and no nonsense allowed. The perfect combination for both discipline and understanding of sleepy children standing on bus stops in all kinds of weather. The community will not forget her hospitality and the tasty food that welcomed people to her home and into the magic of her kitchen.

Our community also lost Lee Andrew Thomas, with a long career in the Madison School District. He retired as the beloved principal of East High School. Mr. Lee was the assistant principal under Mr. Milton McPike yet always expressed his own gentle, determined personality. He influenced and inspired students at East High School through encouraging them. Staff and students respected him alike because he invested in people with genuine interest and an honest desire for all to succeed. His was a marriage of school educators with his wife, Mrs. Barbara Thomas, an extraordinary well-respected teacher herself.

Our community lost Dr. Perry Henderson MD, retired professor Obstetrics and Gynecologist at the UW Madison Medical School, who was a high-risk obstetrician and taught many cohorts of future OB/GYN doctors for 22 years. Dr. Henderson assisted high risk mothers in successfully giving birth to their children, despite many of these mothers previously having multiple miscarriages or these children being born prematurely. He is beloved because he helped children live in their mothers’ wombs, enabling babies to become productive men and women.

Dr. Perry Henderson and his late wife, Dr. Virginia Henderson, a school psychologist and administrator, were both philanthropists and important mentors to many people in Madison. They were a couple who could still be seen holding hands after decades of marriage, until separated by her death. Dr. Virginia Henderson was honored for her work on behalf of youth by changing the name of Glendale Elementary School to Dr. Virginia Henderson Elementary School. Dr. Henderson served on many boards and was an early president of the Madison Rotary Club where the couple started a scholarship for students with financial needs.

These three people, Delores Maxine Peyton, Lee Andrew Thomas and Perry Henderson, contributed to the well-being of young people in Madison from before their birth, through their education and beyond into adulthood. Their legacy of love and giving to our community honors them, yet while we mourn their loss, we can best celebrate all that their lives meant by continuing to deeply care for others personally and professionally.