Erika Hales

Erika Sitte Hales, 86, pianist/composer, died April 20. Born in Vienna Feb. 13, 1924, she was evacuated to Britain in the 1939 Kindertransport for Jewish children. Erika was an air raid warden during the London Blitz, graduated from the Royal College of Music, edited film at the U.S. Office of War Information and married United Press correspondent Samuel Dale Hales. They lived in Kansas City, Mo., Fairway and Prairie Village from 1948. Mrs. Hales studied jazz with John Elliott, collaborated with bandleader Steve Miller on a 1970s radio jingle for the Greater Kansas City Chamber of Commerce, and taught piano. She was assistant to the dean of business and public administration at UMKC, worked on the development of Ward Parkway Center, and belonged to Old Mission Methodist Church, L. Cosmo and Daughters of the British Empire. Survivors include son Lee, daughter-in-law Pam, granddaughters Samantha Black and Michelle Grant, their husbands, and great granddaughter Hayden Black, all of Atlanta; daughter Linda Hales and son-in-law George Gudauskas of Washington DC, and half-sister Gisela Liebmann of Graz, Austria. Donations to a piano scholarship may be made to UMKC Conservatory of Music and Dance. Share a memory, sign an online guestbook, or express your condolences at www.overlandparkchapel.com Please start using this on all of our KC Star Obits.

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