Diana Duncan Hull

Diana Duncan Hull

(Dinny)

Diana Duncan Hull (Dinny), 66, died July 29, 2002, at her home in Kingston upon Thames, Surrey, England.

Dinny, as she was known in Akron, was born March 31, 1936, in Buffalo, N.Y., to Wayne Hull and Florence Schiller Hull. She attended Shumacher and Robinson grade schools. Dinny went to Washington, D.C., as the Beacon Journal's Spelling Bee champion and competitor in the National Spelling Bee, and was accompa nied by the Beacon's own Frances Murphey; they remained friends to Fran's dying day. Dinny attended Old Trail School, graduating in 1953. She participated in various Weathervane plays and shows through the encouragement of her mother and the love they shared for the theater. During high school, she visited her uncle's family in Germany. He took Dinny to London for a trip and thus was born her love of that city.

Dinny took her B.A. in music in 1957, and M.A. in musicology in 1960 from Smith College in Northampton, Mass. She spent the next two years working as a librarian in the music department of the North ampton Massachusetts Public Library before being hired by Smith to work in their music library, developing their first cataloguing system for records. In 1970 Dinny emigrated permanently to London.

Diana, as she was known in England, bartended for a time until she was hired by Mr. Patrick Saul, the founder and director of the British Institute for Recorded Sound. She served as a bartender there, too, for their fundraising affairs, as there was no money to hire a musicologist. She volunteered help with developing their cataloguing system at the Institute until funding became available and she was hired. Her dealings with Patrick took on a more personal note as they were wed in 1972. Her friends believed that, as she had received her deportation no tice, the marriage was but one of convenience. When asked in March, she replied, "Everyone thought it was just a `green card marriage,' . . . . but they didn't have a clue."

She continued at the BIRS and became involved in developing pro tocols for making audio descrip tions of various media for the blind and visually impaired. She made wonderful acquaintances and warm friendships there. She began ap pearing in theater around London during this time, rekindling her childhood love of the stage. She had only bit and chorus parts, but it set her to deciding what she want ed to do with her life.

The BIRS was absorbed into the British Library as the National Sound Archives in 1983. Diana retired from the National Sound Archives in September 1995 and immediately enrolled in the Acade my Drama School in London and took her certification as an actor. Thus began some of her happiest years, loving the theatre, the Acad emy, and the new friends she made there. She could not have found a kinder or more devoted collection of friends; they were her resident family in the last years of her life and it was because of their devotion that she was able to die as she wanted, at the home she loved so.

Shortly after Patrick died in 1999, Diana was diagnosed with throat cancer. She took treatment and got back to work in her second career. Last summer she found a secondary tumor that was inoperable and terminal. She was house bound, though not bedfast, only the last 10 days of her life. Last Sunday morning she did not awak en.

Diana was preceded in death by her husband of 25 years, Anthony Patrick Saul, O.B.E.; her parents, Wayne and Florence (Schiller) Hull; her uncles, Charles Winans, Melvin Schiller, John Hull, Richard Hull, George Hezzleton Simmons, and Clayton Hoffman; aunts, Bella Schiller, Agnes (Hull) Simmons, Margaret (Hull) Hoffman, and Fran ces (Zimmer) Hull; and cousin, Mary Beth Simmons. Diana is sur vived by her aunts, Mareta (Schil ler) Winans and Julia (Anich) Hull; cousins, Charles and Malinda Winans, Lynne and Bill Linder, George Simmons, Agnes and Edwin Bett ner, Susan and Robert Weirath, Richard and Margot Hull, Marianne and Edward Lappin, Martha Hoffman, John Hull, and Jane Hull; her daughter of the heart, Maria (hus band, Hani) Girgis, together with all of their children and grandchildren, and numerous friends, colleagues, and companions from Akron, Northampton, and England.

Diana's funeral procession will form at 2 p.m. at her home outside London on Aug. 9, 2002. A gathering in Dinny's memory will be held Aug. 31, 2002, at 11 a.m., at 305 Merriman Rd., Akron, Ohio. In lieu of flowers, please make a contribution to your local charity for the poor, in support of the arts, or to Visiting Nurses or a Hospice program. To her memory, drink cham pagne and sit in your garden. (Billow, FAIRLAWN, 330-867-4141.)

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