FLORENCE — The Tuesday lunch gang at the Cathay Kitchen restaurant will be missing one of its members, and the city of Florence has lost its first lady.

        Evelyn Kalb, the mayor of Florence from 1991-1998, died Tuesday morning at St. Luke West Hospital. She had battled respiratory ailments for several years.

        “She ended up being the spirit of Florence,” said longtime friend and political activist Hannah Baird.

        “There was no doubt about the love she had for this area. In the spring, when people drive through the city and see the trees in bloom, I hope they think of Evelyn.”

        During her term, a large number of trees were planted in Florence.

        Mrs. Kalb, who would have been 75 on Thursday, was a tireless worker for what she thought was best for Florence, and was a strong advocate of women's rights.

        She was the city's first female mayor.

        “I hope everyone remembers her work for women's rights,” Ms. Baird said. “She was a mentor for many women, including (current Florence Mayor) Diane Whalen.”

        Mrs. Whalen, who was elected mayor when Mrs. Kalb retired, remembered her friend as someone who was always there to help, but was never shy about providing constructive criticism.

        “I first got to know Evelyn when she was elected to council in 1980, while my dad (Hop Ewing) was still mayor,” she recalled. “She was one of the major forces in my getting into public service. She led by example.”

        Mrs. Kalb, a widow with one daughter, Sharon, also of Florence, wasn't afraid to play on the same field as the big boys in Northern Kentucky politics and business. Most Tuesdays for many years, you could find her at a back table at Cathay Kitchen on Mall Road with some of the area's movers and shakers, including developers R.C. Durr, Dick Crist, and Jim Berling, businessman Ed Besseler, and retired state highway department official Joe Kearns. When she talked, they listened.

        “Evelyn Kalb was a wonderful person,” U.S. Congressman and former Florence councilman Ken Lucas said Tuesday. “She was a progressive mayor who did much to move the city of Florence forward. She had a lot of friends and supporters and I'm sure she will be greatly missed.”

        Ms. Baird said she and her family moved to Boone County in 1965 “and Evelyn and I became friends right away. We were close ... we've been through a lot together. We were like sisters. We were both appointed to the Kentucky Commission on Women by Gov. Julian Carroll in 1978. We were inseparable. We traveled a lot of miles together.” Mrs. Kalb, who worked for many years as an independent paralegal, pushed for council to purchase 15 acres in the middle of town to create the Florence Nature Park.

        “She worked very hard to make that park a reality, and she loved it,” Mrs. Whalen said. “She spent a lot of time there, until her health made it hard for her to get out.”

        Mrs. Kalb was a 1980 Enquirer Woman of the Year, the Northern Kentucky Municipal Government League's Public Official of the Year in 1997, Florence Rotary Club Citizen of the Year and Northern Kentucky Municipal League Public Official of the Year in 1998, and was honored last month by the Campbell County Democratic Women's Club for her years of service to the community and for women's rights.

        She was a member of the Northern Kentucky Area Development District from 1972-1979, chairperson of the Aviation Noise Abatement Committee, and a delegate to the White House Commission on Women during the Carter administration.

        She took the lead in changing Florence city council from 12 to six members in 1987, and pushed for employment of a city coordinator in 1981. She worked to develop Ewing Boulevard connecting Ky. 18 and Ky. 42, and was a prime mover in the building of the city government center.

        Stith Funeral Home is handling arrangements.
       

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