Mrs. Frieda M. Hale was born to Mr. and Mrs. Fleming E. and Sedonia Rotan Alexander on April 2, 1925 in Fayetteville, West Virginia, and died on October 6, 2015 at the Beth Abraham Centerlight Health Care Center on Allerton Avenue in the Bronx, New York.
She and her siblings grew up in Virginia, where she married and gave birth to two sons. Later she moved to Boston, Massachusetts and, eventually, to the Bronx. Music was her passion, and she pursued it, first as a career singing jazz tunes, and then as ministry, adding contemporary hymns, several of which were original compositions of words and music, such as the copyrighted My Morning Prayer, Follow Thou Me, and Glory Glory.
Alongside her music career, she studied in the City University of New York and, at Lehman College, where she earned degrees for certification as an English teacher in the New York City Public Schools. She taught at high schools in the Bronx and was known for such success with students that colleagues expressed amazement and disbelief at the quality of the writing they produced after a relatively short time in her classes. She had a way of teaching writing that was efficient and effective, even among students who had not had prior success in language arts. Later, she taught as an adjunct professor at Lehman College.
In mid-life, she came into a personal relationship with Jesus Christ as her Lord and Savior, influenced by the spiritual conversion of her younger son, Kenneth, who predeceased her on August 30, 2015 at the age of 70. She became a member of Bronx Bethany Church of the Nazarene after listening closely to and embracing the message of holiness as taught by Founding Pastor, Dr. V. Seymour Cole. He encouraged her singing ministry and invited her to sing her original compositions in church worship services. At other times, she served in the choir of Riverdale Presbyterian Church and at other churches in the Bronx. She is remembered by her Bronx Bethany Church family for her singing, as well as for her genteel manner and words of encouragement and wisdom, which she demonstrated until her final days. She was widely respected and loved in the Bronx neighborhood where she lived before moving to a series of senior care facilities. At her 90th birthday party in April, organized at her nursing home as a surprise by her Bronx Bethany church family, she was still able to sing one of her original songs, to the amazement of staff and fellow residents.
Those left to cherish her memory are her son Jojief, of Tracy, California, her sister, Mrs. Claudia A. Whitworth of Roanoke, Virginia; brother, Mr. Fleming E. Alexander, Jr. of Maine; a granddaughter, Rebekah Sparks of Boston, Massachusetts; and many other relatives and friends, including her church family at Bronx Bethany and staffs at the Split Rock Rehabilitation Center and Beth Abraham Health Center, where she lived in recent years and brought much sunshine into the lives of many of us.