The Tribune

DAPHNE Sears Lee, the last surviving offspring of Gladys and Captain Edward Sears, first Bahamian commissioner of police (then titled commodore), died quietly in her sleep in Austin, Texas on September 21. She was 92.

Mrs Lee was raised on Sears Road in Nassau during an age when children swam in Nassau Harbour, dove conch from Montagu Bay and were free to ride bikes across the island to Lyford Cay when there was little more than a horse stable. Like her friends, few of whom lived to be her age, she sailed, fished, danced and gave little thought to crime, riding with her dad in the police vehicle.

A graduate of Queen’s College in Nassau and The Royal Conservatory of Music in Toronto, she assisted the Bahamas Development Board with visitor hospitality services and worked as an airline hostess during World War II.

She married Huylar Lee, a geologist from Texas, now deceased, and the couple lived in several exotic countries, including Pakistan and Libya where his oil career took the family and where she often performed in local productions. After returning to the Bahamas, she sang with the St Andrew’s Presbyterian Kirk choir.

The couple had one child, Huylar Lee III, who predeceased Mrs Lee. She was also predeceased by her sister, Helen Phillips.

Mrs Lee is survived by her daughter-in-law, Dr Ann Hathcock-Lee, grandson Huylar Lee IV, Jon Adamo and wife Brittney, granddaughter Gabby and spouse Jordan Greenlee, great-grandchildren Brenlyn Adamo and Gia Greenlee, all of Texas, niece Anne Bruce and her husband, Graham Bruce nephews Lawrence ‘Larry’ Phillips and wife Diane Phillips, all of Nassau, and Richard Phillips and wife Dorothy ‘Dee’ Phillips of Cedar Point, NC, grandnieces Kirsten Seebald, Alexandra Callender, Tanya Molnar, Kelly Dodge and J Brooke Phillips. She also leaves behind close friends, including Barbara Robnett, Austin, Texas, and Skip Wrinkle, Linda Turtle and Brenda Bethell among many others in Nassau.