Private Life

The Rev. George Charles Hoeh was a dynamic and well-loved Episcopal priest, a self-made millionaire and a thoroughly exuberant member of the human race. Even the detective investigating his murder remarked, "I haven't talked to anybody who didn't like him. " In his priestly life, Father Hoeh walked among the flock of his small, secure neighborhood parish in Brooklyn and served as confessor, comforter and social conscience. But he walked more dangerous paths in private life - on those frequent occasions when he abandoned Brooklyn for the relaxation of his commodious retreat in the affluent Sweetwater section of Mullica Township, N.J. It was there, on a Friday in June last year, that Father Hoeh, 58, carelessly invited home a stranger, a young man who called himself Paul and said he was from Minnesota.

With the Constitution's 200th birthday next year, it might be a good time to take a little more interest in Thomas Jefferson - even if Jefferson was in Europe the whole time the Constitution was being drawn up and adopted. Consider "Thomas Jefferson at Monticello," a permanent exhibit at Jefferson's home near Charlottesville, Va., that opened last month and is designed to offer a view of Jefferson's private life. It consists of nearly 400 objects and artifacts, many only recently dug up on the Monticello grounds.

Nancy Reagan confessed yesterday that leaving the White House had been a "wrenching experience" and that private life took some getting used to - especially when she needed a plumber. "I can't image what it's like to leave defeated - it must be painful," Reagan said. "Even leaving as we did it under the best of circumstances . . . it was a wrenching experience. " Reagan was back in Washington to promote her memoirs, which will be published this fall. Appearing at a panel discussion at the Library of Congress, Reagan described her book, My Turn, as her personal response to the "kiss and tell" books penned by members of her husband's administration.

I am not sure whether the smoke which recently filled the skies of the Delaware Valley was caused by the forest fires in the South or by the massive celebrations ignited by the withdrawal of Judge Douglas Ginsburg. Was Ginsburg's departure prompted by a legitimate concern or did we permit the smoke of his past to blind us from more legitmate concern? I did not support Ginsburg's nomination for Supreme Court. Although I am comfortable with Ginsburg's judicial conservatism, his short stint as a federal appeals court judge provided him with little, if any, of the experience necessary for nomination to the highest court of the land.

The assertion that a candidate can be one type of person in private and a different type of person in public is nothing more than a rationalization to justify immorality. The justifications Gary Hart tried to make for his behavior, and those made for him by others, were pathetic. Perhaps worst of all were the comments of former vice presidential candidate Geraldine Ferraro, who said on ABC's "Nightline" that Hart was strong where it really counted - on "women's issues. " Surely a critical "women's issue" for a married woman is whether her husband is faithful.

First there was his face. Until a week ago Sunday, the image of this man had been freeze-framed in a photograph blown up to the size of a heroic political poster. The phrase "Free Mandela" under this picture had been a slogan as much as a plea. Now, Nelson Mandela has walked out of prison, a dignified, gray-haired, 71-year-old elder. The face was not that of an icon, but a man. Then there were the hands. The news reports would say that Mandela and his wife were holding hands, but that wasn't quite right.

It was just another day at the office yesterday for Wilson Goode - in before 8 a.m., off to a public appearance, lunch at his desk, out way past 5 p.m. The location had changed, but the routine was the same. On the day when the city celebrated the inauguration of his successor as mayor, Edward G. Rendell, Goode worked his way through the transition from public to private life. Except for the two-hour inauguration ceremony at the Academy of Music, Goode spent the day ensconced in his new Center City high-rise office.

MOSCOW - Russian media from all sides of the political spectrum have reacted with unusual compassion to the announcement of President Vladimir Putin's divorce. Putin, 60, and his 55-year-old wife, Lyudmila, announced the end of their marriage less than two months shy of their 30th anniversary in an interview Thursday with Russian television. His spokesman Dmitry Peskov could not say when they would formally divorce. Divorce is common in Russia. Nearly 700,000 Russian couples dissolved their marriages in 2009, according to UNICEF.

THE Olsen Twins have moved to New York and they've already started spreading sunshine. According to the New York Post's Page Six, the pair showed up on Valentine's Day at Serafina and the girls' muscle tried to muscle the restaurant's co-owner, Fabio Granato. Eventually, Granato had one of his own security guys escort the Olsens' more annoying bodyguard out to the sidewalk. "[He] had to keep an eye on them from outside the restaurant," said Granato. Page Six suggests that the twins learn to tone down the diva behavior - when they're partying at Manhattan's hot spots conspicuous bodyguards are not cool.

She says she just wants to be recognized as Buddy Cianfrani's other daughter - the one who was not listed among his survivors and who, by her account, was excluded from participating in his funeral. Gabrielle is her name. Gabrielle Cianfrani. She is 26, with bouncy black hair and hazel-green eyes. She lives in South Jersey, and with her husband, Jim Clancy, is expecting her second child - Cianfrani's grandchild - any day. Cianfrani, a former state senator who was once among the most powerful people in Pennsylvania, died last week at age 79. He was a colorful figure with droopy eyelids and a gray mustache whose life story - going from power to prison and back to his old clout as a Democratic power broker - made him a local legend.

MOSCOW - Russian media from all sides of the political spectrum have reacted with unusual compassion to the announcement of President Vladimir Putin's divorce. Putin, 60, and his 55-year-old wife, Lyudmila, announced the end of their marriage less than two months shy of their 30th anniversary in an interview Thursday with Russian television. His spokesman Dmitry Peskov could not say when they would formally divorce. Divorce is common in Russia. Nearly 700,000 Russian couples dissolved their marriages in 2009, according to UNICEF.

MY OFFICE is situated in the heart of South Philly, between three funeral homes. Just this morning, I saw a coffin being placed into a hearse with black-clad mourners waiting in patient silence on the sidewalk. That is respect. But there are moments when we lose sight of our better angels and treat certain deaths as fodder for the gossip rags and cable trash bins of Nancy Grace and company. That happened this week when, to my dismay, the big news after Memorial Day was that Chuck Peruto's "girlfriend" had died.

John Mayer , whose tempestuous relationship with Taylor Swift inspired some of her nicest songs, is offering the same services to another A-list singer, Katy Perry . Mayer tells Rolling Stone he's a misunderstood dude. His love life, he says, has always been as serene as the sweetest spring zephyr ever to grace a John Keats poem. "I haven't had any trouble in my private life at all," John says. His thing with Perry, he insists, is sweet. "It's been . . . I mean, I'm quite happy.

Claude-Anne Lopez, 92, an author and scholar of Benjamin Franklin's papers, has died. Mrs. Lopez started her studies of Franklin's papers at Yale University with secretarial-type work and rose to a top editor's job. Her son, Larry Lopez, says she had Alzheimer's disease and died Friday at her New Haven, Conn., home. She spent years working on the Papers of Benjamin Franklin, a project at the university to collect, edit, and publish Franklin's writings. She specialized in Franklin's private life and wrote a handful of books about him. Former Yale colleague Jonathan Dull ranks Mrs. Lopez as one of the 20th century's great Franklin scholars.

NEW HAVEN, CONN. - Claude-Anne Lopez, author and scholar of Benjamin Franklin's papers, has died at age 92. Lopez started her studies of Franklin's papers at Yale University with secretarial-type work and rose to a top editor's job. Her son, Larry Lopez, said that she had Alzheimer's disease and died Friday at her New Haven home. Lopez spent years working on "The Papers of Benjamin Franklin," a project at the university to collect, edit and publish Franklin's writings. She specialized in the American founding father's private life, and wrote a handful of books about him. Former Yale colleague Jonathan Dull ranks Lopez as one of the 20th century's great Franklin scholars.

A FEW OF US entertainment writers had just left a Toronto International Film Festival screening of "Hyde Park on Hudson," and we were arguing about the film. How much of the relationship between President Franklin Delano Roosevelt and Margaret "Daisy" Suckley was true? Was it fair to take liberties with the parts that weren't? My feeling was that there are countless books that traffic in historical fiction. Why was it so taboo for a movie to play around with a historical event?

SOME PEOPLE DREAD turning 40 if they've got nothing but wrinkles to show for it. The same might be said for advocacy operations facing that milestone anniversary. Longevity is great, but it's even better if the organization has managed to transform the cause that stirred it to life in the first place. So it is with Women Organized Against Rape on the eve of its 40th birthday. Its advocacy has so changed the way victims of sexual violence are treated by law enforcement, the courts and the medical establishment, it's a shock to realize what life was like for victims before WOAR roared into existence in 1973.

DEAR ABBY: My 24-year-old daughter and 21-year-old son work as banquet servers at a local country club. Many of the receptions at which they serve include guests consuming large amounts of alcohol. If an intoxicated male guest made suggestive comments to my daughter or touched her, he would be asked to leave the facility. But what is my son supposed to do when an intoxicated woman, usually much older than he, pinches his backside and makes inappropriate comments or "invitations"?

At 6-foot-4 and with the physique of a basketball star, Charles Burwell has a presence that has been known to fool clients on occasion. But his passion fills an arena of a very different kind. He lives and breathes abstract art. Burwell, 57, a Pew Fellow and longtime fixture on the Philadelphia art scene, is acclaimed for his vibrant canvasses that translate a cornucopia of colors into carefully orchestrated geometric paintings. His work is cerebral, with systems found in math and science.

NEW YORK - Pioneering astronaut Sally Ride, who relished privacy as much as she did adventure, chose an appropriately discreet manner of coming out. At the end of an obituary that she cowrote with her partner, Tam O'Shaughnessy, they disclosed to the world their relationship of 27 years. That was it. As details trickled out after Ride's death Monday, it became clear that a circle of family, friends, and coworkers had long known of the relationship and embraced it. For millions of others, who admired Ride as the first American woman in space, it was a revelation - and it sparked a discussion about privacy vs. public candor in regard to sexual orientation.