Katrina's Lives Lost:	Roy Tidwell, 1923-2005; Rosalie Tidwell, 1922-2005
Submitted By: 		N.O.V.A December 2005
Source:			Times Picayune 11-11-2005

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To his daughters Gayle Tidwell and Dana Caruso, Roy Tidwell was "Super Dad."

Born in Slocomb, Ala., "he looked like Gregory Peck," Gayle said. He and his
two brothers served in the Navy during World War II; Tidwell was awarded the
Purple Heart after he was wounded at Pearl Harbor, where he lost his hearing
in one ear. Three other medals included ones for the Asiatic-Pacific
Campaign and European-African-Middle East Campaign.

He met their mother, Jewell Lawless, in Virginia when he was posted there
and married her in 1945. After the war, they moved to New Orleans, where he
worked for Gordon's Transport, Caruso said, "delivering merchandise of all
sorts to many local businesses and malls. He was always smiling, wishing
everyone well. He had a lot of friends. I remember one Christmas he came
home with six wallets, all gifts from his customers. My aunts and uncles
could always count on my dad to help them with family emergencies."

"Everybody called him 'Lucky,' " Tidwell said. "He'd come home with all
kinds of things, saying, 'Look what I found walking down the street today.'
"

She remembers "a life filled with animals . . . . My father raised
parakeets, Chihuahuas and for a time, rabbits. He loved horses and when we
were small, he took us to Jefferson Downs."

In 1964, when Dana was 13 and Gayle 17, their mother died of Crohn's
disease, from which she had been suffering for five years.

"He stayed single and raised us," Caruso said. "He brought me to school
every day, saying, 'There you go, Peanut.' My husband calls me that, too. He
struggled financially, but tried never to let us know that. It wasn't until
my sister and I had finished school and got married that he started going
out. Six months after I got married, he met and married my stepmom, Rosalie
Foti.

"Sheriff (now state Attorney General) Charles Foti was her nephew," Tidwell
said, "and she was, as they say, a pepper."

"My stepmom, a feisty little Italian lady, worked at the cosmetics counter
at Krauss," Caruso said. "She would tell funny stories about how many
customers would wait in line to have 'Miss Lillie' help them pick out just
the right color lipstick.

"They both loved to work alongside each other at their summer home in
Waveland, Miss. Planting tomatoes was one of my dad's favorite things to do.
He meticulously cared for over an acre there for 25 years.

"They had to sell their home in Waveland after my stepmother had a pacemaker
installed. My stepmother teasingly said that my dad got jealous so he had to
get one, too. They lived in a modest home in Gentilly. They never wanted to
leave their home, or their dog, King."

And that's where they were when Katrina came ashore and the levees breached,
inundating their Gentilly home. They drowned in the house together.

On Aug. 30, Caruso said, "He would have been married to her for 32 years."