Decades before Helene Fugazzi worked at the Montauk Lighthouse — retiring, then returning to the job because she enjoyed her co-workers and visitors so much — Montauk and the beach played a big role in her life. 

She and her husband, the late Harold Fugazzi, were native Brooklynites who met at the beach at Breezy Point in Queens.

“Today when I look at pictures of them and their best friends — we have one of these great 1960s photos of all of them — they looked like the Brat Pack, the way they were all laughing and stuffed into one cabana,” said Mrs. Fugazzi’s daughter, Tina Fugazzi-Wagner. “I always think they all had such style. Back then, they even dressed up to go to the beach.”

Mrs. Fugazzi died of colon cancer on Nov. 27 at the Kanas Center for Hospice Care on Quiogue after two years of ill health. Her husband died on Feb. 21, 2011. 

Mrs. Fugazzi first became acquainted with Montauk as a child with her father, a fisherman. She and her husband rented in Montauk annually, at Shepherd’s Neck Inn and Roosevelt Drive, and bought land on Franklin Drive in 1960, shortly after they were married. Fourteen years passed before they built their house there. They moved to Montauk full time when Mr. Fugazzi retired in 1999.

Mrs. Fugazzi was active in Montauk as a member of the Montauk Historical Society and Montauk Village and Beach Property Owners Associations. 

Early on, her 15-year stint at the Lighthouse included greeting tour buses with a talk about the area and the facility’s history. She led tourists on the trek to the top to see the view. “Later,” Ms. Fugazzi-Wagner said with a laugh, “she told them, ‘I’m done. I can’t keep going up those stairs.’ She loved it so much there. She’ll be missed. She loved being there and loved being a grandmother.”

Mrs. Fugazzi was born on Jan. 28, 1939, in Brooklyn to Joseph DeLauzon and the former Eileen Smyth. She graduated from Catherine McCauley High School in Brooklyn. She and Mr. Fugazzi, who were married on Aug. 20, 1960, changed addresses twice in Queens before settling in East Northport, where they raised three children, who survive. They are Lisa Fugazzi of Northport, Mark Fugazzi of Port Washington, and Ms. Fugazzi-Wagner, who lives in Island Park. Three grandchildren also survive.

A service for Mrs. Fugazzi was held on Dec. 3. She was buried at Calverton National Cemetery. The family has expressed appreciation for the caregivers at the East End Hospice Kanas Center.

Yves Henri Robert of East Hampton, who was born in Hong Kong to French parents, died of pneumonia at Southampton Hospital on Dec. 2 at the age of 91.

Mr. Robert had a peripatetic life, moving as a youngster to Shanghai and then to Paris in 1937 when the second Sino-Japanese War began. He was caught there at the outbreak of World War II.

An adventuresome businessman, Mr. Robert came to New York in 1954 when his French employer, the metal and chemical conglomerate Pechiney, asked for volunteers willing to relocate to America. Only Mr. Robert, who worked in the investment division, said yes.

He met his future wife two years later. 

He was born on Sept. 17, 1927, to Henry Robert of Brittany, France, and Jeanine Chenut of Paris. He was only 10 when his father died in Paris. He and two brothers survived the German occupation and were educated at the Lycée Saint Louis de Gonzague. He always said the Jesuit brothers there were his guiding force and shaped his critical thinking.

During his career he went from Pechiney to owning a medical company and then working for Continental Grain in a post that took him to Russia and to China in the late 1970s in one of the first trade delegations. When he was in his 60s, Mr. Robert retrained himself as a banker, and he and his wife lived for a time in London, where he worked for Alex Brown and Sons.

Mr. Robert met his future wife at a party at the Newport, R.I., family home of her friend Emmie Heppenheimer of East Hampton. He always said he was smitten at first sight. Worried, however, that he might make a misstep as an immigrant in a new country, Mr. Robert wrote to the host of the party, Ms. Heppenheimer’s brother Harold Sands, asking permission to invite Patricia to dinner.

“My mother has always said, ‘I had dated before, I didn’t need permission from one man to date another!’ ” Christina Robert said with a laugh.

The Roberts were married on Aug. 10, 1957, and celebrated their 61st anniversary this year.

The Heppenheimers and another of his wife’s friends, Calista Washburn, introduced the couple to East Hampton in 1961. Four years later, they bought an 18th-century saltbox on Egypt Lane. They also maintained a residence in Manhattan.

In 1984, French Prime minister Francois Mitterand awarded Mr. Robert the Ordre National de la Legion d’Honneur, France’s highest honor for military and civil merits. He was honored with the Chevalier l’Ordre du Merite in 1971.

“I have been thinking a lot lately about how many major events he witnessed in the 20th century. The sprawl of his life,” his daughter said.

In addition to his wife, Patricia Hutchinson Robert, and a brother, Dominique Robert of Paris, Mr. Robert is survived by three children, Marc Robert of Bronxville, N.Y., and Shelter Island and Christina Robert and Michel Robert, both of London, and eight grandchildren. 

A funeral service will be held on Dec. 22 at Most Holy Trinity Catholic Church in East Hampton, and Mr. Robert will be buried at the church’s cemetery on Cedar Street.

The Robert family has suggested memorial contributions to the Angel Fund at Most Holy Trinity Church, which helps families and the elderly with the cost of heating in the winter. Having lived through the deprivations of war, the ability to heat a home had particular significance for Mr. Robert, his family said.

Through the years, Mr. Robert told his family, East Hampton became the place in the world where he found peace. “It was home,” his daughter said.

Diana V. Bianchi, who had been a waitress at Michael’s restaurant in Springs, died of liver and kidney failure at Doctors Hospital of Sarasota, Fla. on Nov. 27. She was 65. 

Born on April 8, 1953, in New York to the former Mary Elam and Joseph Bianchi, she grew up in Queens and attended the former Mabel Dean Bacon Vocational High School, where she studied nursing. 

After working in a Manhattan emergency room, she moved to Central Islip, where she focused on raising a daughter, Lacy Bejsovec, who now lives in Springs.

She moved to East Hampton in 1994, where she developed a base of loyal customers at Michael’s. She lived here until 2012, when she moved to Englewood, Fla. 

Ms. Bianchi loved gardening, going to the beach, and taking care of her many dogs. She had many friends here and in Englewood, where they joined her in taking advantage of the warm weather and spending time by the pool. 

She is survived by her daughter and a sister, Joyce Vauter of Lakehills, Tex.

John Cooley was a detective in the New York Police Department’s 19th Precinct, which serves the Upper East Side, for 20 years, retiring to go to work for another 20 years in fire safety and security. Since childhood he called Montauk a second home.

Mr. Cooley died of cardiac arrest on Oct. 4, his family said. He was 74. 

Born in Queens on March 7, 1944, to Leo Cooley and the former Alice Denning, he grew up in Flushing and was introduced to Montauk in the 1950s, when his family spent summers at the Ditch Plain trailer park. He later bought a house in the neighborhood.

After graduating from Holy Cross High School in Flushing, he attended the John Jay College of Criminal Justice and served in the Coast Guard.

In 1975, Mr. Cooley married Catherine O’Connell, who survives. The couple spent winters in Flushing and summers in Montauk, where he was a member of St. Therese of Lisieux Catholic Church. 

In addition to his wife, he is survived by three siblings, Mary Kubler of Queens, Joseph Cooley of Urbandale, Iowa, and Frisco, N.C., and Philip Cooley of Queens and Montauk. Another brother, Leo Cooley, died before him.

A funeral Mass was said on Oct. 9 at St. Andrew Avellino Catholic Church in Flushing, followed by burial at Mount St. Mary Cemetery in Queens

Bettie B. Wysor, a novelist and playwright who also was an East Hampton real estate broker, died of the complications of Alzheimer’s disease last Thursday at the Kanas Center for Hospice Care on Quiogue. She was 90.

In 1952, she became the resident playwright at the Barter Theatre in Abingdon, Va., after which Ms. Wysor worked as an advertising copywriter for J. Walter Thompson, Benton and Bowles, and other prestigious firms in New York City. A career as a magazine writer followed. She was art and antiques editor and a columnist for Town and Country, and wrote for Harper’s Bazaar, Vogue, and Ladies Home Journal.

Her nonfiction book, “The Lesbian Myth,” was published in 1974, and she later wrote three novels. She also worked as the director of special projects at the Dramatists Guild of America. 

Born on June 28, 1928, in Lebanon, Va. to the former Stella May Snead and William Clarence Wysor, she attended Virginia Intermont College. She moved to New York four years after graduation. 

Ms. Wysor became a real estate broker, primarily for Sotheby’s, when she moved to East Hampton in the 1980s. She was a member here of St. Luke’s Episcopal Church and loved cooking and gardening. Six years ago, she moved to Peconic Landing, a retirement community in Greenport. 

A memorial service will be held at St. Luke’s Episcopal Church in East Hampton in the spring. She is buried at the church’s Memorial Garden. She is survived by a niece, two nephews, and a goddaughter.

Donations in her memory have been suggested to the Kanas Center for Hospice Care, P.O. Box 1048, Westhampton Beach 11978.

Charles Hitchcock, an educator, scholar, and activist who lived on the South Fork for 49 years, died on Oct. 24 at Cathedral Village, a retirement community in Philadelphia, of small cell lung cancer. He was 79.

Mr. Hitchcock, who was called Chuck, taught sociology at South­ampton College for 35 years and was dean of the college for five years. He also was chairman of its faculty council and a member of its long-range planning and affirmative action committees, in addition to working on student life and curriculum development. In 1999, he received the David Newtown Teaching Excellence Award.

 Mr. Hitchcock held many leadership positions in East Hampton Town, including chairman of the East Hampton Town Zoning Board of Appeals and the East Hampton Town Democratic Committee. He also was a member of the Springs School Board, the town preservation advisory committee, and a board director of the Retreat, a domestic violence agency.

A pioneer in the gay rights movement, he was a founder of the East End Gay Organization, served on the National Gay Task Force from 1981 to 1983, and ran for Congress in 1984 as the first openly gay candidate. After retiring from Southampton College in 2008, he became active in a group called Peace Action at the United Nations and chaired a conference on disarmament and development in Mexico City. He continued his work for the U.N. after moving to Philadelphia, where he was on its election board.

He was born in Glendale, Calif., on July 7, 1939, growing up there and graduating in 1957 from Glendale High School, where he was active in student government and a ranked junior tennis player.

Starting with a B.A. in 1961 in political science from Colgate University, Mr. Hitchcock then received a master’s degree from New York University in community studies and human relations and a doctorate from Union Graduate School with a dissertation on psychiatric attitudes toward homosexuality. His research helped prompt the American Psychological Association to stop classifying homosexuality as a disease.

 While a student at Colgate in 1960, Mr. Hitchcock participated in Operation Crossroads Africa, joining the Peace Corps after graduating, five months after it was founded, and hoping to return to Africa. Instead, he was posted to Bangladesh, where he lived with a Muslim family, observing Muslim holy days and learning Bengali from the children.

“When he came back from the Peace Corps, he had a plan for what wanted to study, and how he wanted to live,” said H. David Wilt, his husband and partner.

Mr. Wilt and Mr. Hitchcock and nine openly gay men and women founded the East End Gay Organization, which grew to include more than 900 members and raise more than $100,000 for AIDS research. The group started a series of one-act plays written and performed by Edward Albee, Harvey Fierstein, and Tom Kirdahy among others on Friday nights at Southampton College. They were on the Phil Donahue Show in 1980. 

Before earning his M.A. from New York University, Mr. Hitchcock worked for the Y.M.C.A. of Greater New York and in community studies and human relations. As a college professor, he gave students great latitude in choosing how to structure classes, Mr. Wilt said.

Mr. Hitchcock continued playing tennis until his health made it difficult; he had played at Southampton College at the age of 34 against 14-year-old Paul Annacone, who was already a star.

Mr. Wilt survives. On Dec. 3, an informal lunch will be held in his honor at the Springs Community Church at noon. A celebration of his life will take place on Dec. 15 at 2 p.m. at Cathedral Village, 600 Cathedral Road, Philadelphia 19128, with a reception to follow. Those wishing to attend can R.S.V.P. to Mr. Wilt at 215-984-8795. Donations have been suggested for Peace Action at peaceaction.org.

She “had a six-year battle with breast cancer and fought heroically,” but Ann Elizabeth Rasmussen “never let the disease get the better of her,” her husband, George Fontanals, wrote. 

Ms. Rasmussen, a freelance writer, wrote a blog throughout her illness, sharing her physical and emotional ups and downs and her day-to-day observations as she coped with the disease and treatments. “Readers say they laughed, they cried, they were inspired. I don’t know,” Ms. Ras­mussen wrote on her website, “I just wrote from the heart and hoped people would like it and maybe learn something.”

Ms. Rasmussen died at home on Fresh Pond Road in Amagansett on Sunday. She was 51. 

“Believe it or not there is a sweetness to cancer, whether it’s the kindness and goodness that it brings out in others, or the kindness and goodness you start giving to yourself,” she wrote on her website, annrassmussenwriter.com. 

Ms. Rasmussen had her work published in The East Hampton Star and The East Hampton Press, where she wrote about the local real estate market. Also a real estate broker and developer, she split her time between Amagansett and Manhattan. 

She was born on the Chanute Air Force Base in Illinois on Oct. 17, 1967, to Paul T. Rasmussen and the former Joan Daly, both of whom survive. She grew up in New York City and Schenectady, N.Y., earning her undergraduate degree from Hamilton College and her master’s degree from New York University. 

Ms. Rasmussen was married to Mr. Fontanals on Sept. 17, 2004. 

She taught history and English at the Professional Children’s School in Manhattan and the Ross School in East Hampton before entering real estate. 

She enjoyed the outdoors, writing in July, “I hope and pray I can do all the physical things I love again like paddleboard, cross-country ski, and bike riding.” 

In addition to her husband and parents, who live in Schenectady, she is survived by three siblings, Tod Rasmussen of Boston, Sarah Eapen of San Francisco, and Alicia Weiner of Maryland. 

A service will be held at St. Luke’s Episcopal Church in East Hampton on Dec. 8 at noon. 

Her husband has suggested contributions to the cancer advocacy organization Fighting Chance, P.O. Box 1358, Sag Harbor 11963

Denyse E. Reid, who aided the allied forces in Belgium during World War II and was a community activist after settling in Princeton, N.J., in 1955, died on Nov. 14 at the Acorn Glen Assisted Living Facility in Princeton, where she had lived for eight years.

Mrs. Reid often said her favorite memories of the war were seeing the Belgian flag flying for the first time on a British tank rolling down one of Brussels’ main boulevards after five years of German occupation, and answering the door at home after the liberation to find her father standing there.  

She was born in Brussels in 1922 to the former Germaine Gontier and Jacques Van Hove, a career soldier who eventually became a colonel in the King’s Regiment in Belgium, having survived five years in a prison camp. She studied clothes design in Brussels before and during the war.

Mrs. Reid met her American-born husband, John Reid, at an officer’s club in Brussels two months before the Battle of the Bulge. He was at the time an air aide to the Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force, which Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower commanded throughout the war. He and Mrs. Reid, who spoke perfect English, talked over dinner, and the attraction was instant, her family said.

“The next day they went dancing, and my father visited her every day at their home right in the middle of Brussels after that,” said Mrs. Reid’s eldest son, Archibald Reid. “My mother always laughed and said he had two things they hadn’t seen in years: He had Life Buoy soap. They had no soap during the war, except this lye and tallow soap that was awful. And he had cans of fruit cocktail. They couldn’t believe it. They hadn’t seen any fruit in five years, either.”

Mr. and Mrs. Reid were married on July 24, 1949, and lived in Charlotte, N.C., and East Hampton, where their two children spent every summer, as Mr. Reid had as a child, then settling in Princeton. 

There, Mrs. Reid was active as the chairwoman of several international festivals, and as a forceful environmental advocate. Her family said she became known in Princeton as “The Sewer Lady” after her knowledge of the Federal Clean Water Act prompted her to serve for many years on a site plan review advisory committee, which helped establish a regional sewage plant.

In East Hampton, where she lived on Egypt Lane, Mrs. Reid was a member of the Maidstone Club and Ladies Village Improvement Society and enjoyed long days at the beach with her children, grandchildren, and friends. She was also a patron of a composer and several local artists.

She was predeceased by her husband, who died on Dec. 19, 1990, and a daughter, Anne Denyse Reid, who died in 1976. She is survived by her sons, John Reid of East Hampton and Archibald Reid of Princeton, and by two grandsons, William Howell Reid and John Reid, who spent summer breaks visiting his grandmother at Acorn Glen to read to her.

One of Mrs. Reid’s final acts of public service was donating her body to Robert Wood Johnson Hospital in Brunswick, N.J., for medical research. She will eventually be cremated, and the ashes will be returned to her family.

Joan Alice Croan of Sag Harbor, a real estate broker, died on Nov. 9 at the Hamptons Center for Rehabilitation and Nursing in Southampton. She was 89 and had been in failing health.

As a young woman, Ms. Croan lived through the blitz of London in World War II before emigrating with two children, Louise Strada Grinsell and Michael Strada, to this country in 1953 on the S.S. Flandre. She became a sewing teacher for the Singer Sewing Machine Company in Westbury and later privately in Sag Harbor, where, in the 1970s, she met and married Peter Croan, known as Jerry, who survives.

She was born in Baldock, Hertsfordshire, England, on Oct. 15, 1929, the daughter of Reginald Close and the former Gladys Geary. She grew up there and excelled at competitive swimming  while at school, winning many country and regional trophies.

According to Joanne Shumski of Sag Harbor, her third child, her mother was most proud of her career in real estate. She worked at one time for Meadow Realty in Southampton and for Corcoran, Prudential, and Brown Harris Stevens, from which she retired in 2010.

When she was not working or spending time with her family, Ms. Croan loved to garden in Sag Harbor, where she “brought a little bit of Merry Old England in creating the quintessential English garden at their home,” her daughter said. She also had an extreme love of Noyac Bay and the nature surrounding it.

Ms. Grinsell, who lives in Yaphank, survives, as does Ms. Shumski, Timothy M. Croan, her late husband's son, and two grandchildren. Her son, Michael Strada, died as an adolescent.

Ms. Croan wished there to be a celebration of life party after her death. Accordingly, the family will receive visitors at the Yardley and Pino Funeral Home in Sag Harbor from 2 to 4 p.m. on Sunday, followed by a  cocktail party at Ms. Shumski’s house.

The family has welcomed memorial plants and flowers, and it has been suggested that donations in her name be made to the Animal Rescue Fund of the Hamptons, P.O. Box 901, Wainscott 11975.

Ms. Shumski said friends would remember her mother as “an elegant, smart, classy woman.”

Joan T. Card, a lifelong resident of Amagansett and East Hampton, who was said to delight in local seafood, including lobster, scallops, and clams, died of pulmonary disease at her home in East Hampton on Nov. 11. She was 86. 

Born on Feb. 9, 1932, in Southampton to the former Elizabeth Casey and Leonard Scott, Ms. Card grew up on Oak Lane in Amagansett and attended the hamlet’s grade school, where her father was custodian, and then East Hampton High School. She worked as a waitress at Ma Bergman’s red-sauce  Italian restaurant in East Hampton, where Nick and Toni’s is today, and the former Sonny’s Diner in Amagansett. Her mother had been a cook at the Dennistoun Bell estate in Amagansett. 

In 1962, she married Robert Card, who died in 2008. The couple, who had four children, enjoyed camping in the Pennsylvania mountains. Ms. Card also

loved country and western music.

Her brother, Thomas Scott of Amagansett, and her children, Barbara Trebowski of Fort Myers, Fla., and Colleen Fennell and Douglas Card, both of East Hampton, survive, as do nine grandchildren, seven great-grandchildren, and 15 nieces and nephews. A son, Robbie Card, died before her, as did a sister, Gail Weaver.

Ms. Card was buried at Cedar Lawn Cemetery in East Hampton. A memorial service will be held in May. The family has suggested contributions to East End Hospice, P.O. Box 1048, Westhampton Beach 11978.