Copyright © 2003, The Associated Press
June 11, 2003

NEW HAVEN, Conn. -- A father who spent the final months of his life searching for a home for his four children has died after an 18-month fight against Lou Gehrig's disease.

Felix Del Valle was 46.

"He didn't have anything that I would have considered the typical breaks in life," said friend Fred Hartman. "He was abandoned, he was orphaned, he was raised in an orphanage, he was poor ... and he came through it with such a positive outlook."

Lori and David Burgess, a Hamden couple Del Valle met through his church, adopted three of his children, 11-year-old Kyia, 8-year-old Felix Jr. and 7-year-old Crystal. His daughter Janet, 10, who struggled with emotional problems, is living with another family friend.

The couple volunteered to take the children shortly after Del Valle became ill, after sitting down with their own children and deciding they would open their home.

"I know they need a home," Lori told him. "I know they need to stay together."

Del Valle won sole custody of his children from their abusive, drug-addicted mother three years ago.

In the months before Del Valle died Thursday, the community mobilized to organize numerous fund raisers. The family took a trip to Disney World, when Del Valle could still walk. A Yale professor took on his legal case to draft a long-term guardianship agreement.

And Hartman and Clarks Dairy, where Del Valle worked as a sandwich-maker, raised $4,000 to rent a van so he could take trips with his children.

"We had a few forays to the movies," said Hartman, adding that Del Valle had ordered popcorn and hot dogs, against the warnings of his doctors.

Del Valle saw his children for the last time a week before his death, during a party for Crystal's 7th birthday. There, he played a joke on partygoers by pretending to choke, then nipping the finger of the friend who tried to help him.

"It was really a good thing that the kids had that morning to spend with him," said Cynthia Teixeira, who attends St. Martin de Porres Church with the family. "It was a time that I think was really, truly beautiful."

Funeral services are scheduled for 11 a.m. Thursday at St. Martin de Porres on 136 Dixwell Ave.

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