Herbert Heilman grew up an orphan at Mooseheart, the children’s residential community near Aurora run by the Moose International fraternal organization, and then spent most of his life serving the group that had given him a home for nine years after his parents died.
Mr. Heilman, a longtime resident of Batavia and Montgomery, died Wednesday in Tuscon, Ariz., of complications from Alzheimer’s disease. He was 79.
An executive at Moose International since 1948, Mr. Heilman became the fifth director general of the 1.7 million-member organization in May 1974. He served in that post for nearly 10 years, until his retirement in January 1984.
After his mother and father died while he was in elementary school, Mr. Heilman and his two brothers moved to Mooseheart.
“That was his home. He had great love for the Moose and the Mooseheart,” his wife, Carolyn, said Saturday in a telephone interview from Tuscon, where she and her husband moved about three years ago. “It meant everything to him.”
As Alzheimer’s took its toll on Mr. Heilman, he still continued to think about Moosehart, his wife said.
“Even in the stage he was in, his thoughts always went back to Mooseheart,” she said.
Mr. Heilman and his wife of 53 years lived in Batavia for 35 years and in Montgomery for five years before moving to Arizona to be closer to their children, she said.
Mr. Heilman was born on Nov. 12, 1914, in Tiffin, Ohio. During World War II, Mr. Heilman served in the Navy as a physical therapist and rose to the rank of lieutenant.
Other survivors include a son, Richard; a daughter, Nancy Fetgatter; five grandchildren; and one great-grandchild.
A memorial service will be held at 10:30 a.m. Aug. 27 in the House of God at Mooseheart.
