Grandma Dedafoe's Scrapbook
Former social services chief Houston dies
R. Bernard HOUSTON, former director of the State Social Services Department, died Wednesday of an apparent
heart attack while hunting near Marshall.
His son, Michael of Lansing, was among a large party of friends hunting with him at the time. Houston was
63.
HE HAD retired as director of the Social Services Department, the state's largest, in January, 1975,
and had been serving as public affairs consultant for the Michigan Hospital Association.
In a statement Wednesday afternoon, Dr. John Dempsey, Houston's successor as department director, noted that
two other high ranking department officals also had died at nearly the dame time. They were Paul J. Spata Sr., director of
the department training division in Lansing, and Robert Cordano, head of the Muskegon County Social Services.
In his nearly 12 years as department director, Houston presided over the department during on of its stormiest
periods and at a time when it was undergoing rapid expansion. It was a time of the growth of wefare rights groups and of
the broadening of medicare and medicaid services.
HOUSTON'S DEATH is "a great loss to the social services employes and clients," Dempsey said.
Houston was a graduate of Hillsdale College and earned a master's degree at George Washington University.
He had completed 40 years of public service when he retired and had served eight years as head of the huge Wayne County
Social Services Bureau before heading the state department.
In addition to his son, he is survived by his widow, Catherine, and two daughters, Mrs. Patti GUYSELMAN of
Lansing and Deborah at home.
SERVICES ARE 2 p.m. Friday at the Estes Leadley Funeral Home.
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