First Mother of the Year Romeo dies

Tuesday, May 2, 2000 | 10:17 a.m.

Barbara L. Romeo, a retired longtime registered nurse and the first-ever Clark County Mother of the Year, died Sunday at Valley Hospital Medical Center. She was 70.

Services for Romeo, the wife of prominent local physician Dr. Donald Romeo and a Las Vegas resident of 40 years, will be 10 a.m. Wednesday in Christ the King Catholic Church, 4925 S. Torrey Pines Drive. Graveside services will follow.

Visitation will continue until 6 p.m. today, followed by a vigil at the church. Palm Mortuary is handling the arrangements.

Romeo, a mother of 11, was named the first Clark County Mother of the Year in 1969. It became an annual event.

In 1973 Romeo's fourth child, Terry, then a 16-year-old Bishop Gorman High School junior and Las Vegas Sun copy girl, was brutally slain. David Ray Bean is serving a life sentence without parole at the Ely State Prison for that crime.

Barbara's husband of 49 years, Donald, was the doctor at the county jail from 1960-78 and was the ringside physician at major professional boxing matches in Nevada from the 1960s through the '80s.

She was born on May 14, 1929, in Rawlins, Wyo.

In addition to her husband, Barbara is survived by six sons, Stephen Romeo of Pahrump, Michael Romeo of Elko and Thomas Romeo, Richard Romeo, Donald Romeo Jr. and Mark Romeo, all of Las Vegas; four daughters, Marcy Humm, Patty Romeo and Katie Jones, all of Las Vegas and Polly Becker of Germany; one sister, Jan Merendino of Denver; two brothers, Jack Byrnes of Newark, Ohio, and Thomas Byrnes of Cheyenne, Wyo.; and 15 grandchildren.