Robert Hoover Whitmore of Manhattan, a summer and weekend resident of Southampton for almost 45 years, died in his sleep at his Southampton residence on September 17, after a lengthy illness. He was 77 and the cause of death was heart failure.
Mr. Whitmore, known as “Bob,” was born in Hinton, West Virginia, to Frances Hoover and Robert M. Whitmore on July 8, 1938, and was raised in Lynchburg, Virginia. A graduate of Lynchburg College with letters in swimming and soccer, class of 1959, and a veteran of the U.S. Navy, serving from 1959 to 1961, he held a master’s degree from the University of Virginia and a doctorate from Columbia (1978).
He was a college teacher at Queens College, Stony Brook University, and Montclair State, and an accomplished athlete and mentor. One of his many achievements was as a founder and longtime leader of the New York Ramblers Soccer Club, the first gay-oriented soccer team in the country, which now boasts more than 150 members. The team nurtured similar teams in most other large U.S. cities and was instrumental in forming the international Federation of Gay/Lesbian Football Association, which has thousands of participants worldwide with teams on all continents.
On February 19, 2011, Mr. Whitmore and his partner of 38 years, Alan Koral, were married in the Unitarian Universalist Church of Stamford, Connecticut. Besides his husband, he is survived by a sister, Sherry Whitmore of Florida; nephews, Steven Johnson and his sons, Tyler and Brandon, and Robert Brooks and wife Annette of Virginia; and his in-laws, Marianne and Robert B. Smythe of Maryland and their daughters Katherine Newman and husband Robert and Sarah Lane and husband Mark and their respective children; and a host of friends.
A memorial service will be held at the Brockett Funeral Home in Southampton on Saturday, October 31, at 3:30 p.m., to be followed by a Halloween party at his home. Costumes are encouraged at both events. Guest are asked to confirm their attendance to Alan Koral at amkoral@aol.com. A memorial will also be held in Manhattan on November 9.
Memorial donations may be made to the New York Ramblers, www.newyorkramblers.org, or by check to Ramblers Soccer New York, via mail to P.O. Box 230330, New York, NY 10023.
on Oct 6, 2015