Albert Rashford Burgess

Albert Rashford Burgess

12/07/1919 — 5/31/2015

Albert Rashford Burgess passed away May 31, 2015 at 96 years old at the Howard County Hospital in Maryland. He had lived for 10 years in Columbia, Maryland with a cousin, Julie Hazel, and her mother, Jackie George, now deceased, after relocating from New Orleans during Hurricane Katrina.

Al was the first-born son of Milicent Rashford Burgess and Crystal Francis Brown Burgess of 970 Rondo, St. Paul, Minnesota, and the former husband of Glenna Leslie Burgess of New Orleans. His sisters Millicent Burgess Marshall and Crystal Burgess Marmon, both of whom predeceased him, had lived in San Francisco and were also St. Paul natives.

Mr. Burgess’s profession was in the fields of data processing and accounting. A graduate of St. Paul Central High School, he attended the University of Minnesota but dropped out shortly before graduation to serve as a flight navigator in Tuskegee, Alabama during World War II. After the war he moved to Chicago, then lived in Durham/Raleigh before moving to New Orleans in 1955.

Albert Burgess lived a longer life than any of the male relatives in his family dating back to the era of slavery and perhaps beyond. He remarkably survived a triple heart bypass in 1988 and was never stricken with dementia.

Mr. Burgess was known for his cool, detached temperament and for being a voracious reader with a surprisingly savvy grasp of innuendo, metaphor, satire and the subtleties of ironically clever humor. He was a generous stepfather, uncle and cousin, serving time as chauffeur, moral overseer, and financial provider.

A descendant of founders of Saint James African Methodist Episcopal Church in St. Paul, Mr. Burgess is now a part of our history.