Milestones, January 2016

Marriages

Braun-Lindop—Natalie Braun and Aaron Lindop, on June 20, 2015, in Old Chatham, N.Y., under the loving care of Old Chatham (N.Y.) Meeting, where Natalie is a member.

Hildreth-Dietz—Rochelle Hildreth and David Dietz, under the care of York (Pa.) Meeting, in good order and with great joy on the twenty-ninth day of Eighth Month, 2015, forming their new family with their son, Gabriel.

Riley-Moles—Janet Riley and Oliver Moles, on September 12, 2015, under the joint care of Langley Hill Meeting in McLean, Va., and Sandy Spring (Md.) Meeting, in a joyful ceremony at the Sandy Spring meetinghouse. Oliver is a member of Langley Hill Meeting, and Janet is a member of Sandy Spring Meeting. The couple, who had met each other at Langley Hill Meeting 50 years ago, were blessed with the presence and support of their friends and families. The couple will live at Friends House Retirement Community in Sandy Spring.

 

Deaths

Darlington—Esther Collins Darlington, 79, formerly of Swarthmore, Pa., on July 10, 2015, at Cayuga Medical Center in Ithaca, N.Y. Esther was born on May 15, 1936, in Woodbury, N.J., to Eleanor and Charles Darlington, and grew up in Woodstown, N.J. She attended George School and Swarthmore College, later earning a master’s in counseling psychology from Immaculata College. With a lifelong affinity for her Quaker heritage, she was a member of Swarthmore (Pa.) and Media (Pa.) Meetings, and an avid researcher of local Quaker history. She served on many Quaker committees and boards of directors, including the board of directors of Pendle Hill Quaker Study Center in the 1970s. She edited her father’s autobiography, The Memoirs of Charles J. Darlington, adding historical photographs and having the book printed and distributed widely, and researched her and her children’s lineages, creating charts and records to document her findings. She was the director of The Harned, a small Quaker retirement home in Moylan, Pa., in the mid-1980s, and later worked as Philadelphia Yearly Meeting assistant librarian, using her encyclopedic knowledge to answer emailed questions about Quaker history. In 2004, she moved to Ithaca, N.Y., to live with the family of her daughter Ellie.

Esther was predeceased by her brothers, Roy Darlington and Robert Darlington. She is survived by four children, Ellie Rosenberg, Betsy Rosenberg, Amy Rosenberg, and Ken Rosenberg; three grandchildren; her ex-husband, Alburt Rosenberg; and two brothers, Jared Darlington and Richard B. Darlington.

Flagg—Marjorie Ann Wyman Flagg, 92, on October 15, 2014, in Tucson, Ariz. Marjorie was born on March 22, 1922, in Akron, Ohio, to Edith Craig and Harry Wyman. She grew up in Phoenix, Ariz., and attended Arizona State University, earning a degree in education. In 1945, she married metallurgist and mineral collector Richard W. Flagg, at Orange Grove Meeting in Pasadena, Calif.

Also in 1945, she joined Tucson Meeting. She continued her membership with Pima Meeting in Tucson on its establishment in 1960. Education always being important to her, she taught kindergarten and first grade until she started a family of her own. She was also an eager participant with Richard in setting up the exhibits at the Tucson Gem and Mineral Society’s annual show.

Marjorie and Richard were married for 68 years till his death in November of 2013. She is survived by two daughters, Barbara Moos (Stephen) and Carolyn Kerr (William); one granddaughter; and two sisters, Arlyn Uslan (David) and Marcella Merrill (Richard).

Ford—Betty Reid Ford, 91, in Grand Rapids, Mich., on August 6, 2015. Betty was born on July 21, 1924, in Toledo, Ohio; grew up in the Detroit, Mich., area; and graduated from Cooley High School in 1942. She met Steve Ford while attending Wayne State University. In 1946, they married, and she graduated with a degree in early childhood education. Betty and Steve attended Ann Arbor (Mich.) Meeting when he was working for University of Michigan. They lived in Baghdad in 1961–62, before moving their family to Grand Rapids when Steve became library director at Grand Valley State College. A local group of Friends was organizing at the time, and the Fords were there in 1962, when Grand Rapids Friends held its first meeting for worship.

A tireless advocate and supporter of Friends Committee on National Legislation (FCNL) and American Friends Service Committee (AFSC), she helped bring an AFSC office to Grand Rapids, and when AFSC closed the local office in 1981, she helped start the Institute for Global Education (IGE). For many years, she served on the board and as a volunteer for IGE, and was President of the Friends of Grand Rapids Library.

Above all, Betty was a teacher. During her 20-year teaching career, her classes included instruction in peace and justice education, conflict resolution, and global understanding. She helped organize Creative Response to Conflict Resolution, Circles of Peace, annual Children’s Peace Fairs, and Hiroshima-Nagasaki Memorial gatherings. She retired from Grand Rapids Public Schools in 1985. But she never left teaching. She wrote Educating for Peace: Curriculum Planning with a Global Perspective, published by IGE in 1997.

She was a regular at weekly peace vigils in Grand Rapids. An article in Grand Rapids Press in April 2008 begins, “Standing at a busy intersection in the heart of downtown, Betty Ford braced her 83-year-old frame against the blustery whirl of rush-hour traffic. In her hands was a sign: ‘Violence is Never Justified.’ As she did during the Vietnam War and the first Gulf War, she stood simply as a conduit of the Inner Light. ‘It’s just something I have to do,’ Ford said.”

A beloved member of Grand Rapids Meeting for over 50 years, she served in every capacity: as clerk, recording clerk, treasurer, newsletter editor, First-day school teacher, and convener of committees. She had a passion for maintaining meeting records and history. In 2006, she wrote a synopsis of the meeting’s development from Preparative Meeting in 1962 to 2006, which was used to guide the meeting’s fiftieth anniversary in 2012. She encouraged Quaker worship groups to form in the Holland, Fremont, and Traverse City areas, and she was active in Green Pastures Quarterly Meeting, Lake Erie Yearly Meeting, Friends General Conference, and the wider Society of Friends.

Friends recall that when Betty greeted people at meeting, she made them feel welcomed, appreciated, and loved. She often shared stories of how and when people had come to Friends. At the close of worship, she would say how grateful she was to be there, and how much she loved the meeting. The reply was always “We love you too, Betty.” After a lifetime of advocating for peace, she found eternal peace.

Betty was preceded in death by her brother, Robert Reid, in 1927, and by her husband, Stephen W. Ford, in 1999. Her sister, Roberta Nixon (James) died six days after her. She is survived by five children, Peter Ford (Aimee Conner), Christopher Ford (Dawn Castillo), Stephen Ford (Pamela Bazan), Miriam Geluso (Thomas), and Charles Ford (Laura Pickering); twelve grandchildren; and three great-grandchildren.

Foster—John H. Foster, 88, on June 5, 2015, in Leeds, Mass. John was born on July 1, 1926, in Warwick, R.I., to Thyra Jane Meyers and Henry Cope Foster, strongly Wilburite Quakers whose ancestors had become Quakers in 1750, and grew up on a 30-cow dairy farm. His grandparents wore plain dress, hats, and bonnets, and his family used plain language. He graduated in 1944 from Westtown Friends School and was given a farmer deferment when he applied for conscientious objector status. After earning a bachelor’s degree from Cornell University in 1950 and a master’s degree from Purdue University in 1951, he worked for two and a half years in a Gandhian-style village in central India for the British Quaker Rural Development Center on assignment by American Friends Service Committee, leading to a lifelong involvement with Indian farming and agriculture. In 1952, he met Georgana Falb, who was finishing a three-year term with a Methodist service project in Calcutta, at a square dance at an American school in the Himalayas. After a two-year courtship by letter, they married in 1954 under the care of Providence (R.I.) Meeting. John was the first man in seven generations of his family to marry out of meeting without being disowned.

After receiving a doctorate from Cornell in 1957, he taught at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst in the Department of Resource Economics (then Agriculture), serving six years as department chair. He brought Quaker practices of discernment and decision making to his teaching. His students nominated him for several Distinguished Teacher awards, and his colleagues say his careful listening aided collaboration among differing personalities. In 1960, John and Georgana moved into an 1806 farmhouse in Leverett, Mass. In addition to serving as clerk of Mt. Toby Meeting, he was recording clerk; treasurer; a member of Overseers, Ministry and Worship, Meetinghouse, Finance, Burial, and Land Use committees; Trustee of Greenfield (Mass.) Preparative Meeting; and a member of the Quaker United Nations Program Board of Governors and New England Yearly Meeting’s Permanent Board and Finance Committee. As clerk of Woolman Hill Quaker Conference Center in Deerfield, Mass., he helped to move to the conference center his childhood North Dartmouth (Mass.) quarterly meetinghouse.

In Leverett he served on the Planning Board, Personnel Board, and Historical Commission and as Selectman, chair of the Police Advisory Commission, and president and treasurer of the Historical Society. He chaired the committee that closed the landfill and built the transfer station and helped to bridge differences between townspeople and Buddhist monks in the building of the New England Peace Pagoda. He founded the Center for International Agriculture, and in addition to his work in India, taught about and researched rural development and land economics in other parts of the Third World and in the United States. His pioneering work in the economic valuation of wetlands enabled the passage of the wetlands conservation law in Massachusetts that became a model for national legislation. He retired from teaching in 1990. In 2013, the town named him and Georgana Citizens of the Year for their 48 years of service on town boards and committees.

Although he used to say that living in an old house was hobby enough, he gardened, built stone walls and walkways, made maple syrup, grew and ground White Flint Indian Corn, shelled black walnuts, and made apple cider and applesauce. Friends remember him as wise and informed, humble and kind, steadfast and faithful.

John is survived by his wife, Georgana Falb Foster; their children, Ethan Foster (Natalie Golden) and Joshua Foster; two grandsons; and a sister, Thera Hindmarsh.

Fuhrmann—David Scott Fuhrmann, 49, on January 5, 2015, in Seattle, Wash., peacefully, surrounded by family and dear friends. David was born on April 13, 1965, in Evanston, Ill., the first child of Barbara Simpson and Donald Edward Fuhrmann. From an early age David showed concern for others. He enjoyed puzzles and the outdoors, growing up in the woods with tree house and creek in Riverwoods, Ill., and spending summers on and in the waters of Ellison Bay, Wisc. Summers backpacking with his family in the Rocky Mountains led to a love for western mountains and large bodies of water, and he became an excellent skier, sailor, kayaker, mountain climber, bicyclist, and competitive swimmer. He felt most at peace with himself and with others in the outdoors.

Graduating in biology from Kenyon College, he installed composting toilets in Appalachia and studied and taught about salt marshes on the Massachusetts shore. Later he researched memory and brain development with chimps and baby chicks, and in 1995 he earned a medical degree from Loyola University in Chicago. His family practice residency was at University of New Mexico, and while he was there he met the love of his life, Catherine Rogers, also a resident there. But soon after his residency in 1998, he was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma.

After a round of chemotherapy in Albuquerque, he moved to Washington state, where in 1999 he was declared free of lymphoma after more chemotherapy; a stem cell transplant; and high dose radiation that damaged his spinal cord, created scar tissue in his lungs, and limited the use of one leg. He and Catherine joined medical practices in Seattle, and he looked forward to serving with warmth and compassion, made even stronger by his own illness. David and Catherine married in 2001 in Santa Fe, N.M., under the care of Lake Forest Meeting (Janice Domanik clerking).

Keeping his birthright membership in Lake Forest Meeting, which his grandparents Elizabeth Mills and William Simpson had help found, he avidly read Friends Journal and often discussed articles with his parents. He reached out to people in a direct, interested, and welcoming way, asking disarming questions with an intent gaze and a slight smile. His wry and subtle humor was often playful and childlike. He kept up with trends in both Western and Eastern medicine and enjoyed theater, folk music, books of all sorts, kayaking, hiking, skiing, long distance swimming, creating and sewing Halloween costumes, and small-plot vegetable and fruit gardening. He built a two-footed ski board with outrigger skis on poles to compensate for loss of strength in his leg, and while swimming primarily used his arms. Late in 2014 he told his family that the physical challenges he had created were to balance his emotional sensitivity.

His lung scar tissue had increased with the years, and in December of 2014 his cancerous right lung was removed. In the end infection and fluid in his other lung overtook him. Among the hundreds of people at the celebration of his life in Seattle, several of his son’s fifth grade friends spoke, including a non-Quaker who said that he had nothing prepared to say but would try to speak from his heart. And so he did. This is David’s legacy.

David is survived by his wife, Catherine Rogers; his son, Stuart Finley Fuhrmann, called Fin; his parents, Barbara Fuhrmann and Donald Fuhrmann; a brother, Robert Todd Fuhrmann (Jeanne Johnson); a sister, Kristin Elizabeth Clark (Steve); one niece; and one nephew.

Mulford—Stewart Furman Mulford, 95, on August 8, 2015, in Eugene, Ore. Stewart was born on February 12, 1920, in Berkeley, Calif., to Vera Wandling and Walter Mulford. From childhood he enjoyed hiking in parks and forests; exploring unfamiliar routes and areas; and tracing the highways and byways of his home state, becoming a veritable GPS navigator for it. He earned a bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering from University of California, Berkeley in 1940. When young he lived in Chicago, Ill., and Indianapolis, Ind., where he met Gertrude Laney, and they married under the care of Indianapolis Meeting in 1947. He brought Quaker practice into every part of his life, particularly in his service to the Urban League in the 1950s. He earned a master’s degree in engineering from University of California, Los Angeles in 1964. A registered mechanical engineer in California, he worked for the U.S. Department of Interior Office of Saline Water from 1966 to 1973, managing a prototype facility at Point Loma, Calif., to obtain fresh water from seawater and other saline waters. It went into production in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, to provide drinking water for a U.S. military installation, and the Department of the Interior awarded him its highest commendation for meritorious service. He then worked for Fluor Corporation, serving on a team that advised on desalination in Saudi Arabia, Israel, and Indonesia. He retired in 1983.

He and Trudy lived in several places in California, Indiana, Ohio, and Virginia. He belonged to La Jolla (Calif.) Meeting, Orange County (Calif.) Meeting, Grass Valley (Calif.) Meeting, and beginning in 1989 Eugene (Ore.) Meeting, becoming a beloved elder and traveling in the ministry as a Quakerism 101 facilitator.

In 1992–2005 he served as a board member of Friends of Buford Park (FBP) to enhance the Howard Buford Recreation Area, creating, chairing, and serving on the Trails Committee. His meticulous documentation of the trails led to the trail map now posted at each major trailhead in the park and to the county’s trail management plan. Trudy passed away in 1993.

In 2000, the Lane County Parks Advisory Committee chose him unanimously for their first Volunteer of the Year award for his work on the park trails. In 2007, he conducted a second trail survey and was a primary designer and builder of trail #7. Stewart and his friend Dave Preedick were the first members of Monday Morning Regulars (MMR), who work to restore the habitat and who consistently give the most annual volunteer hours of any FBP volunteer group. When Stewart was no longer able to safely work on the mountain, he faithfully served in the office, especially as historian, compiling a history of the FBP Native Plant Nursery.

Another lifelong hobby was railroading, both model and full-sized. He preferred traveling by train, taking several transcontinental train trips. He belonged to the Willamette Cascade Model Railroad Club and played trains twice a week with his son Walter on an elaborate model train layout. He married Jill Hoyenga in 2004 under the care of Eugene (Ore.) Meeting.

In the spring before his death he gave a series of courses about significant Quakers, and in May 2015 an article “Desalination: Drought Relief or Liability?” cited his co-authored technical report Effects of Waste Discharge from Point Loma Saline Water Conversion Plant on Intertidal Marine Life. Stewart is survived by his wife, Jill Hoyenga; four sons, Stephen Mulford, Walter Mulford, Kenneth Mulford, and Philip Mulford; five daughters-in-law (past and present); seven grandchildren; and five great-grandchildren. Memorial contributions may be sent to the Friends of Buford Park, PO Box 5266, Eugene, OR 97405.

Smith—Donna Davies Sublette Smith, 82, on July 8, 2015, at Broadmead in Cockeysville, Md. Donna was born on October 16, 1932, in Detroit, Mich., to Ruth Violet Buckle and Donald Jackson Sublette. Her non-religious parents sent her to church, and she cultivated a love of hymns, prayers, and the Bible.

She graduated from Wayne State University with a degree in special education and taught visually impaired children. In 1954, in Detroit, she married Cecil Randolph Smith Jr., whom she had met at a Methodist youth group. They moved to Glasgow, Scotland, for Cecil’s postdoctoral fellowship, and there they discovered Friends and began a lifelong commitment to Quakerism. They moved many times for Cecil’s work as a scientist for the U.S. Department of Agriculture but always found an anchor in Quaker meetings, large and small. From 1957 to 1998, they lived and worshiped in Peoria, Ill.; Kalamazoo, Mich.; Baton Rouge, La.; Paris, France; and Tempe, Ariz. Committed to meeting for worship, Donna would drive two or more hours to attend some meetings, packing a picnic lunch for the family’s trip home. She loved the community experience of Illinois Yearly Meeting, especially the camping. Both her work and her meeting activities manifested her love of children, who responded to her sincerity and warmth. She taught pre-kindergarten and kindergarten, directed a church preschool program, and engaged First-day school students with joy and purpose. During the 1960s and 1970s, she focused on the antiwar movement, becoming a fearless social activist with a strong concern for fair housing and civil rights. In 1986 Donna and Cecil moved to Arizona and Tempe Meeting, where she was instrumental in building the meetinghouse.

When they moved to Broadmead in 1998, she was an enthusiastic and engaged resident and served as president of the Residents’ Association. They settled into Gunpowder Meeting in Sparks, Md., where she revived the First-day school, serving as a beloved teacher. She also quietly took on the regular cleaning of the meetinghouse. In addition to doing committee work, including extensive contributions to the Child Safety Policy, she served as newsletter editor and publisher and unofficial Broadmead-Gunpowder shuttle driver. Her faithful, earnest participation in the Spiritual Formation program and Bible study enriched her and the meeting.

Well into her last decade, she continued camping with her grandchildren and Gunpowder Meeting children and taking part in marches, demonstrations, and vigils both locally and nationally. Donna’s approach to life was practical, purposeful, spiritual, and joyful. She cared patiently and lovingly for Cecil in his decline; quietly managed her own needs and concerns; attended to the lives of her beloved grandchildren; straightforwardly voiced passionate concerns on social justice issues; focused attentively on meeting business; shared deeply held beliefs, beloved hymns, and favorite Bible verses in meeting for worship and in Spiritual Formation; and on the last morning of her life, committed to finishing a project on her to-do list for the Broadmead sewing group. Her joy in all of these moments would overflow as she threw back her head and poured forth a ripple of hearty laughter.

Cecil preceded Donna in death in 2003. She is survived by three children, Stanley Edward Smith, David Russell Smith (Lora Chang), and Carolyn Elizabeth Smith-Brown (Earl William Raphael Brown); three grandchildren; a brother, Warren Jackson Sublette; a sister, Elaine Jewell Sublette Fischer; a nephew, Michael Steven Fischer; and a cousin, Frederick William Sublette.

Sorel—Nancy Caldwell Sorel, 80, on February 5, 2015, in New York, N.Y., from Lewy body dementia. Nancy was born on May 26, 1934, in Kansas City, Mo. She graduated in 1956 from Ohio Wesleyan University, where she majored in English literature, and also studied at University of Edinburgh and New York University, first meeting Friends when she lived briefly in London. In 1961 she volunteered for the United Nations Association International Service in Linz, Austria, building homes for World War II refugees who were still stateless 16 years after the end of war. Meeting artist Edward Sorel in 1963 at Morningside (N.Y.) Meeting, she later joined the meeting, and they married there in 1965, becoming active in the anti-Vietnam War movement and in 1967 carrying their infant daughter across the Peace Bridge to Canada in the (illegal) Easter Sunday pilgrimage to deliver medical supplies destined for both North and South Vietnam.

When the family moved to Putnam County, N.Y., Nancy cherished the time spent in nature with her children and Newfoundland dog. A music lover, she was instrumental in starting the Putnam Concert Society. The family transferred their membership to Bulls Head-Oswego (N.Y.) Meeting, and Nancy participated in a worship group at Green Haven Correctional Facility, as well as the Youth Program at Powell House. She lived her last 33 years primarily in New York City, where she relished doing research at the Morgan and New York Public Libraries and writing at one end of their Tribeca loft while Ed drew at the other. During those years, she attended Bulls Head-Oswego Meeting when she could, continued to attend New York Yearly Meeting sessions, and served on yearly meeting committees and as recording clerk. For a long time, she roomed with her good friend Marge Currie to be “close to the [yearly meeting] action.”

Nancy wrote the books The Women Who Wrote the War and Ever Since Eve: Personal Reflections of Childbirth and published essays in Esquire, The Atlantic, and New York Times book review. She collaborated with Ed on two books: Word People and First Encounters and used her interest in history to write for and edit Quaker Crosscurrents, a history of Quakers in New York State. From first to last her generous, kind, and loving spirit and her rare ability to speak truth from love emanated kindness, generosity, and warmth. Even as disease progressed, her grace and spirit prevailed. During her last meeting for worship near the end of her life, she gave moving vocal ministry and after meeting played joyfully with her youngest grandson. Nancy is survived by her husband, Edward Sorel; four beloved children and stepchildren, Jenny Sorel, Katherine Sorel, Madeline Sorel Kahn, and Leo Sorel; six grandchildren; and two sisters, Suzanne Smith and Virginia Craig.

Zarowin—Stanley Zarowin, 80, on May 30, 2015, in Westfield, Ind. Stan, originally called Shlomo, was born on April 17, 1935, in Jerusalem, Palestine, the younger of two sons of Bessie and Irving Zarowin, U.S. citizens who had visited family in Palestine and met, married, and settled there. When the war in Europe loomed, his family made a perilous journey to New York, hoping to avoid German ships and submarines. They made a safe journey, with the only casualty his broken nose, suffered when his older brother knocked him off the top bunk.

When he arrived in the United States, he changed his name to Stanley and began to learn English. The city streets were his playground, and his skill as a street fighter attracted the attention of the police, who invited him to join the Police Athletic League boxing team. Although he was a talented boxer, his horror at possibly having killed someone when he sent his opponent to the canvas in a fight for the Bronx championship led him to stop boxing for good. He graduated from Bronx High School of Science and City College of New York and went to Willoughby, Ohio, with his new wife, Jan Rose, to work on the daily paper there. After a couple of years, they moved to New Jersey, and he continued his career in a weekly paper and then moved on to The Wall Street Journal, making other stops at McGraw Hill Financial, The New York Times, the Boardroom Reports newsletter, Sylvia Porter, and Financial Times. He also freelanced and wrote an unpublished novel.

After his daughters grew up, he and Jan divorced. Sailing became his passion, and at times he lived aboard his boat, from which he courted Diane Bonner. The two married, and Diane introduced him to Quakers, transforming his life. Finding that this was where he belonged, he attended Brooklyn (N.Y.) Meeting; Staten Island (N.Y.) Meeting; and took part in New York Yearly Meeting, Alternatives to Violence, the New York American Friends Service Committee board, and Friend General Conference. His Quaker experience led to his getting in touch with his Jewish roots and traveling to Israel, where he met with Jewish Friends. After his marriage to Diane ended, he met Pat Barrows, who enticed him from the city to rural Indiana, and he became the stepfather to her 12 children. He joined North Meadow Circle of Friends in Indianapolis. But he found it hard to live with the differences between the Midwest meetings and Quakers from New York. The move was never a good fit for him, although he frequently attended meeting and took part in Ohio Valley Yearly Meeting activities. He loved Quakerism and had high expectations of Friends, frequently challenging them to grow.

Stan is survived by his beloved wife, Pat Barrows Zarowin; two daughters, Lisa Zarowin and Nicole Zarowin; 12 stepchildren; 17 grandchildren; one great-grandchild; and his former wife Diane Bonner. Contributions can be made to Alternatives to Violence Project at 1050 Selby Ave., St. Paul, MN 55104.