Francis X.B. Pollock, 71, of Saylorsburg, PA, passed away surrounded by his loving family on Saturday, May 19, 2012, at Pocono Medical Center in East Stroudsburg.
Born in Yonkers, N.Y., on Dec. 5, 1940, Frank was the son of the late Sheldon L. and Frances (Xavier) Pollock. He was a 1962 graduate of St. Vincent’s College in Latrobe, Pa.
Frank was one of the earliest Peace Corps volunteers, spending a year in Liberia [1962-1963]. He continued his stay an additional year for the State Department in order to set up basketball programs for schools throughout the country.
Upon his return to the United States, he continued his education and received his master’s degree from Columbia University. He taught for two years at Cuyahoga Community College in Cleveland, Ohio. He also worked for Consumer’s Union and taught at the Graduate School of Journalism at Columbia University.
Frank continued his career as the public communications director for the Federal Trade Commission during the Carter administration. After this, he founded and edited a magazine called “Media and Consumer.”
In 1980, he returned to Rolling Hills Farm in Saylorsburg and began in earnest his career as a farmer, while continuing his journalistic career as an advertising director for Rodale’s “The New Farm” a magazine of Regenerative Agriculture.”
Frank also worked as a night copy editor at the Pocono Record in Stroudsburg.
His interest in locally grown produce led to his being one of the founders of the Pocono Garlic Fest. He was easily recognized at the Monroe County Farmers Market on Main Street in Stroudsburg, because of the huge garlic bulb replica on his truck. His aim was to grow fruits, vegetables and herbs that were tasty and grown without herbicides.
He was famous for his development of Rolling Hills Garlic Vinegar and Garlic Honey Vinegar, which is still being produced today. Gourmet chefs have acclaimed it as, “the very best garlic vinegar anywhere!” He sold his products locally and nationally, including to the White House and many renowned restaurants.
We have been blessed with the presence of Frank in our lives, and he will be deeply missed by his brother, Sheldon L. Pollock, and his wife, Ronnie, of Cheshire, Conn.; his sisters, Mary Joan Gaiotti and her husband, Joseph, of Saylorsburg, Frances A. Vaught and her husband, Andrew, and Eileen Holden and her husband, William, all of Savannah, Ga.; and many nieces and nephews.
A Mass of Christian Burial will be held at 10 a.m. Thursday, May 24, at Our Lady Queen of Peace Catholic Church in Gilbert. Family and friends are welcome to offer their condolences from 9:30 a.m. until the time of Mass. Internment will be at the family plot at the Gate of Heaven Cemetery in Hawthorne, N.Y.

In Memoriam
Remembering Lynn Bain
In Memory: Judee Blohm
Warren Leonard D’Azevedo, 1920 – 2014, Pioneer American Scholar of Liberia
WilliamSiegmann (RPCV-Liberia) 1943-2011
William Bablitch (RPCV-Liberia) 1942-2011
Beverlee Bruce – longtime member of FOL
Dr. Beverlee Bruce, a longtime member of the Board of Friends of Liberia, leader of the FOL delegation to monitor the 1997 Liberian election and former Peace Corps Liberia director, passed away Sept 13 in New York City. Her passion, insights and love for Liberia will be missed by all who knew her.
The following was posted by her sister in Whittier, Calif.: Shirlee Smith:
Big sister changed the world
My earliest memory of my big sister Beverlee Bruce is that of total trust, admiration and constantly being cheated out of my Chocoletto candies.
But with the telephone call last Sunday from NYPD precinct No. 32 that delivered that message that no one wants to get, the funny Chocoletto story, along with the trust and admiration, took on new meaning.
Beverlee Bruce – Pudge, as I called her – has passed away. Transitioned, as some refer to it. But no matter the phrasing, she isn’t with us anymore.
What happened? People from places all over the world, where she has traveled, are asking that question. We only know that she was found on the floor of her Harlem apartment.
Bruce, as I also called her, was in Pasadena last year and attended a Michelle Obama event.
Politics and academics were her lifelong forte. She began by being a favorite of her teachers in elementary school because she always worked hard and did well. Later, at Roosevelt High School in Los Angeles, she always held a student body office.
I tried to be the copycat little sister. Well, not when it came to working hard and doing well in school, and because of this teachers were extremely disappointed in what they must have thought should be a family tradition.
But when it came to school politics, I was a winning candidate on any ballot, simply, I confess, because the name Pickett (and it didn’t matter which one) was already established.
Copycat?
She got married. I got married. She had one kid, I had a houseful, and Beverlee Bruce- 1997 Liberia Election Observerthat’s when I became Shirlee and not Beverlee’s little sister. She went the academic route and I took the parenting path.
She’s gone too soon, many of her friends have said. Well, she did claim she would live to be 100, but it seems she missed her mark by 26 years. And as my mother would say, “Oh, not in charge, eh?”
Too soon? Not by Beverlee’s long list of accomplishments. The following is an excerpt from the tribute the International Rescue Committee she served on will place in The New York Times:
“Beverlee Bruce was a social anthropologist, development specialist and educator with significant experience in Africa and the Caribbean, where she designed, implemented and evaluated rural community development projects. She served in Liberia as U.S. Peace Corps director and as chief technical advisor for the United Nations Self-Help Village Development Project. She taught at the City University of New York, Temple, Harvard – where she earned her Ph.D. – Northeastern and Howard universities as well as at the University of Massachusetts, UCLA, the University of Liberia, Marymount Manhattan College and Wellesley College. She had also served as a program director at the Social Science Research Council. At the time of her death she was on leave from the Center for the Study of Ethnicity and Race at Columbia University.
“Beverlee joined the Women’s Commission Board in 1991. On becoming its chair in 1995, she joined the IRC board, serving until 2007, when she became an Overseer. She was for a number of years chair of the Program Committee, and in that role provided invaluable advice to members of the IRC’s program staff and frequently visited IRC programs around the world.

Francis X.B. Pollock
Frank Pollack – Peace Corps Liberia Group 1Francis X.B. Pollock, 71, of Saylorsburg, PA, passed away surrounded by his loving family on Saturday, May 19, 2012, at Pocono Medical Center in East Stroudsburg.
Born in Yonkers, N.Y., on Dec. 5, 1940, Frank was the son of the late Sheldon L. and Frances (Xavier) Pollock. He was a 1962 graduate of St. Vincent’s College in Latrobe, Pa.
Frank was one of the earliest Peace Corps volunteers, spending a year in Liberia [1962-1963]. He continued his stay an additional year for the State Department in order to set up basketball programs for schools throughout the country.
Upon his return to the United States, he continued his education and received his master’s degree from Columbia University. He taught for two years at Cuyahoga Community College in Cleveland, Ohio. He also worked for Consumer’s Union and taught at the Graduate School of Journalism at Columbia University.
Frank continued his career as the public communications director for the Federal Trade Commission during the Carter administration. After this, he founded and edited a magazine called “Media and Consumer.”
In 1980, he returned to Rolling Hills Farm in Saylorsburg and began in earnest his career as a farmer, while continuing his journalistic career as an advertising director for Rodale’s “The New Farm” a magazine of Regenerative Agriculture.”
Frank also worked as a night copy editor at the Pocono Record in Stroudsburg.
His interest in locally grown produce led to his being one of the founders of the Pocono Garlic Fest. He was easily recognized at the Monroe County Farmers Market on Main Street in Stroudsburg, because of the huge garlic bulb replica on his truck. His aim was to grow fruits, vegetables and herbs that were tasty and grown without herbicides.
He was famous for his development of Rolling Hills Garlic Vinegar and Garlic Honey Vinegar, which is still being produced today. Gourmet chefs have acclaimed it as, “the very best garlic vinegar anywhere!” He sold his products locally and nationally, including to the White House and many renowned restaurants.
We have been blessed with the presence of Frank in our lives, and he will be deeply missed by his brother, Sheldon L. Pollock, and his wife, Ronnie, of Cheshire, Conn.; his sisters, Mary Joan Gaiotti and her husband, Joseph, of Saylorsburg, Frances A. Vaught and her husband, Andrew, and Eileen Holden and her husband, William, all of Savannah, Ga.; and many nieces and nephews.
A Mass of Christian Burial will be held at 10 a.m. Thursday, May 24, at Our Lady Queen of Peace Catholic Church in Gilbert. Family and friends are welcome to offer their condolences from 9:30 a.m. until the time of Mass. Internment will be at the family plot at the Gate of Heaven Cemetery in Hawthorne, N.Y.
David Smith (RPCV- Liberia) 1940-2006
David Culver Swanston 1942-2006 (RPCV- Liberia 62-64, GROUP 1)
• David Culver Swanston, 64, an award-winning public relations executive, died of cancer June 4 at Capital Hospice in Arlington. He was a resident of McLean. Mr. Swanston was born in Denver and grew up in Pueblo, Colo. He served as a Peace Corps volunteer from 1962 to 1964, working as a high school teacher in the Republic of Liberia before attending San Francisco State College.He worked as a reporter for the San Francisco Chronicle from 1966 to 1969, covering higher education, Vietnam War protests, political campaigns and local politics. Afterwards, he began a career of public service and public relations.Mr. Swanston moved to Washington, and from 1969 to 1971 managed public information for Peace Corps programs throughout Asia and the Middle East.In 1972, he became special assistant to and speechwriter for Sen. Alan Cranston (D-Calif.).He worked for two years as a manager of program publicity to help launch the new Public Broadcasting Service in the early 1970s. In 1974 he opened his own public relations firm, David Swanston and Associates Inc. In 1984, TMP Worldwide Advertising & Communications, a global human resources and communications firm based in Tysons Corner, purchased his firm.As managing director of public relations, Mr. Swanston established and directed a multi-office public relations division that provided services for U.S. and international clients. They included the Consumer Electronics Association, Howard University, SuperComm, Apple Computer, MCI, Boeing and the U.S. Department of Labor. He retired in 2005.During his career, Mr. Swanston earned five Silver Anvil Awards, the highest award given annually by the Public Relations Society of America, for “successfully addressing a contemporary issue with exemplary professional skill, creativity and resourcefulness.”He served two terms as president of the National Capital Public Relations Society of America, served on the board of directors and helped to write the public relations society’s ethics policy.He was elected to the National Capital Public Relations Society Hall of Fame in 1995. For the last 10 years, Mr. Swanston taught public relations and ethics classes at American University and the University of Virginia Northern Virginia Center.He competed in five Marine Corps marathons, beginning in 1990. For more than 20 years, he rode in the Colorado 500 Invitational Charity Dirt Bike Ride, a 500-mile, off-road ride across the Colorado Rockies to raise money for local Colorado charities. Survivors include his wife, Walterene “Walt” Swanston of McLean; two children, Matthew C. Swanston of Arlington and Rachel A. Breegle of Brambleton, Va.; and three grandchildren.