Milestones October 2015

Deaths

Cadwallader—Thomas Sidney Cadwallader II, 100, on April 14, 2015, in Pennswood Village, Newtown, Pa. Sid was born on November 19, 1914, in Yardley, Pa., to Laura Parry and J. Augustus Cadwallader. He grew up on a farm, and Yardley remained the center of his orbit throughout life, although he traveled widely and loved spending time in the Poconos, Vermont, and the Maine woods. His parents gave him Quaker values that were reinforced at Fallsington Friends School; George School (class of 1932), where he joined a peace caravan sponsored by American Friends Service Committee (AFSC); and Swarthmore College (class of 1936), where he met his future wife, Carolyn Keys. After he graduated from University of Pennsylvania Law School, he and Carolyn married.

A conscientious objector during World War II, in the 1950s he worked with others to rejuvenate Yardley Meeting with efforts so successful that the meeting soon outgrew its space and ultimately built a new meetinghouse to accommodate its burgeoning membership and activities. Sid served on the board of William Penn House in Fallsington, Pa., and helped to defuse racial tensions when Levittown was being integrated. He was also among the first peace marchers in the symbolic Nazareth to Bethlehem walk held each Christmas season. Long before “social capital” became a catchphrase, he worked to strengthen the social fabric. President of the Bucks County Bar Association, he was active in prison reform and was a founding board member of the halfway house Good Friend. He and others pledged their homes for bond as a part of the Bucks County Bail Bond Project. Of all the things he did, he was perhaps proudest to have been a founding board member of Pennswood Village, a continuing care community where nearly 350 older adults live. He and Carolyn moved there in 1989.

He loved the camaraderie of the Yardley Lions Club and reveled in the capers of the historic Yardleyville Protective Association (for the Apprehension of Horse Thieves and Other Villains). He enjoyed the outdoors, seizing every chance he could to hike, skate, camp, swim, hunt, and play tennis. On a trip to Maine, he bought 300 acres of pristine woodlands on a remote lake and created a conservation association of like-minded families to share the joys of backcountry vacations.

Sid was predeceased by his parents, Laura Parry and J. Augustus Cadwallader; his daughter, Carolyn Bannerman; and his grandson, David Bannerman. He is survived by his wife of 76 years, Carolyn Keyes Cadwallader; three children, Thomas Cadwallader (Katherine), Leonard Cadwallader (Mary Ann), and Elizabeth Cadwallader (Terry Christensen); a son-in-law, William Bannerman (Christine); eight grandchildren; six great-grandchildren; and a sister, Laura Clappison. Memorial gifts may be made to the American Friends Service Committee, 1501 Cherry Street, Philadelphia, PA 19102, or to the charity of your choice.

Dickinson—Ruth Estle Strout Dickinson, 91, on March 20, 2015, at home in Lake

Worth, Fla. Ruth was born on October 12, 1923, in New London, Conn., to Sarah Emily Estle and Ralph Leighton Strout, both originally from Maine. She was educated at Williams Memorial Institute for Girls and the New London College of Business. During World War II she was a hostess at the New London USO, where she met her future husband, William E. Dickinson. After the war, they lived in GI housing on the campus of Wesleyan University, where William earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees and Ruth worked in the music department. Later they lived in small towns in central and southeastern Connecticut. William and Ruth divorced in the mid-1960s, and she worked as a reporter at the New London Day and as director of admissions at Oakwood Friends School in Poughkeepsie, N.Y. After spending several years in Penobscot, Maine, she moved to Lake Worth, Fla., in 1974, finding a spiritual home and wide circle of friends at Palm Beach Meeting in Lake Worth, which she joined in 1976. She retired in 1989 as office manager at Florida Legal Services, a nonprofit organization providing civil legal assistance to the poor. She served as clerk of Lake Worth Meeting in 1991–1994.

A talented poet, she often wrote poems that celebrate the natural world and recall with sharp humor her rural childhood in Quaker Hill, Conn. She was a tireless reader who loved the New Yorker and books by British and South Asian authors, and she was passionate about social justice and Florida’s disappearing wild places.

Ruth’s children, Ruth Emily Dickinson and David Ernest Dickinson, predeceased her. She is survived by a granddaughter, Beth Leary; a nephew, Philip Strout; two nieces, Lisa Strout and Andrea Strout; a grand-niece, Sara Strout; her long-time friend Javier del Sol; and many other friends at Palm Beach Meeting. Donations in her memory may be sent to Planned Parenthood, Palm Beach Meeting, or Friends Journal.

Hollingshead—Irving Hollingshead Jr., on February 28, 2015. Irv was the eldest son of Jean and Irving Hollingshead, growing up as a birthright Quaker in Moorestown (N.J.) Meeting and graduating from Moorestown Friends School in 1945. He attended Haverford College, serving with an American Friends Service Committee summer workcamp in Scandinavia. There he met Professor Jack Hoyland from Woodbrooke College in England, who influenced him to study Quakerism at Woodbrooke. He enrolled in the fall of 1948 and met Jennifer Polge, who shared his Quaker faith with its commitment to nonviolence, social justice, and the belief in that of God in everyone. Irv and Jennifer also found a unity and common purpose in their love for farming and desire to raise a family. They married at Moorestown Meeting in 1950. Irv earned a bachelor’s Phi Beta Kappa with honors from Haverford, also in 1950, and a doctorate in education from Rutgers University in 1964. After teaching math at Friends Select School in 1951–56; Riverside High School in 1956–58; Rancocas Valley Regional High School in 1958–66; and University College in Nairobi, Kenya, with a USAID team, he taught at Kutztown University in 1969–86.

A member of Unami Meeting in Pennsburg, Pa., after he retired, he served on the board of United Friends School, worked to stop the manufacture of nuclear weapons, established and ran the Berks County Solar Center, co-founded Sister Cities of Boyertown, volunteered at the local recycling effort and Meals on Wheels, and wrote letters for Amnesty International and to his representatives in Congress. An individualist who supported pacifism, social justice, and a simple life that reached out to others, he took guidance from words in Micah 6:8: “What doth the Lord require of thee but to do justly, love mercy, and walk humbly with thy God?”

Irv is survived by his wife, Jennifer Polge Hollingshead; four children, Lynne Mary Hollingshead Rosansky, Jennifer Joan Hollingshead, Christopher David Hollingshead, and Deborah Jean Hollingshead; eight grandchildren; five great-grandchildren; a sister, Nancy Elsbree; and a brother, Paul Hollingshead. Irv requested that anyone wishing to acknowledge his passing do so with a donation to Friends Committee on National Legislation (FCNL), 245 Second St. NE, Washington, DC 20002.

Hyde—Lorena Estlow Hyde, 91, longtime resident of Yellow Springs, Ohio, on April 17, 2015, at Greene Memorial Hospital in Xenia, Ohio. Lorena was born on December 21, 1924, in Fruita, Colo., where her father, the Reverend G. Walker Estlow, was a Methodist minister. As a child she played piano for her father’s church. Her family moved east, and she was raised in New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and upstate New York, although some part of her heart stayed in the Colorado mountains. During World War II, she worked at two war supply factories, saving enough money to pay for college. She attended Antioch College, graduating in 1949, and spent a month in a Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) workshop to support integrating racially segregated public facilities in Washington, D.C. She also worked at a summer camp for disadvantaged urban children from Cincinnati and taught profoundly mentally disabled children in Chicago, becoming a regular attender at Fifty-seventh Street Meeting in Chicago. She married fellow Antiochian Dr. Carl Hyde under the care of Cleveland (Ohio) Meeting in 1950, and they settled in Yellow Springs in 1954 and joined Yellow Springs Meeting.

She was a member of the Yellow Springs Community Chorus for many years and was also an appreciative concert-goer, unhesitatingly taking her four-year-old daughter along with her to string quartet concerts. She loved nature and enjoyed hiking in Glen Helen Nature Preserve and visiting nature preserves. She was an avid and highly knowledgeable birdwatcher, able to identify many species by sight or song.

Lorena is survived by her husband, Carl Hyde; her children, David Hyde (Susan), Rachel Hyde (Kevin McCarthy), Martha Hyde (Earl Whitted), and Sarah Hyde; eight grandchildren; and a brother, Edward W. Estlow.

Mangelsdorf—Paul Christof Mangelsdorf Jr., 90, on March 6, 2015, in Newtown Square, Pa. Paul was born on January 31, 1925, in New Haven, Conn., to Helen Parker and Paul Mangelsdorf Sr. and grew up in College Station, Tex., and Newton, Mass. The trumpet, which he learned to play as a boy, became a lifelong hobby, bringing him much joy. He graduated from Swarthmore College, where he met his future wife, Mary Burnside, and earned a doctorate from Harvard University. Raised in a non-religious household, he became interested in Quakerism as a young man, finding it a religious experience he could share with Mary that did not conflict with his understanding of science. He and Mary joined Fifty-seventh Street Meeting in Chicago, Ill., in the 1950s. He taught physics at Swarthmore for 29 years and was a research associate at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, where he worked many summers, sabbaticals, and vacations; thus he lived in both Swarthmore, Pa., and Falmouth, Mass. At Woods Hole he studied the chemical composition of the oceans and ocean sediment. Research trips took him across the Atlantic and Pacific oceans, to the Indian Ocean, and up the Amazon River.

In 1975 he and Mary were part of a small group that re-opened the then-dormant West Falmouth (Mass.) Preparative Meeting, first gathered in 1685. For many years he and Mary ran the bookstore at New England Yearly Meeting, and Paul served a term on its permanent board. For a time he was special advisor to then general secretary Jonathan Vogel-Borne. He was active as well in Swarthmore Meeting, where he was often called upon to explain Quaker worship at weddings and memorial services when many non-Quakers were present, and he prepared and served a simple breakfast to Swarthmore students before meeting for worship.

He represented Friends General Conference (FGC) to a World Council of Churches meeting in Boston, Mass., served on the committee that produced the FGC hymnal Worship in Song, which included his detailed historical notes about the hymns, was a founding member of Friends Association for Higher Education, and served for years on the board of Pendle Hill, the Quaker study and retreat center. After retirement he volunteered one day a week at the FGC office.

Paul loved music, especially classical music and Dixieland jazz. He played trumpet in many venues, including more than 20 years with the Falmouth Town Band. Some Friends will remember the Dixieland group at New England Yearly Meeting’s sessions. A lifelong learner who found the world fascinating, whether the subject was Portuguese, geology, calligraphy, mushroom collecting, sailing, musicology, or local history, he was always educating himself.

Paul is survived by his wife of 69 years, Mary Burnside Mangelsdorf; four children, Helen Mangelsdorf (Roman Tybinko), Sarah Mangelsdorf (Karl Rosengren),Paul Christof Mangelsdorf III (Laurice), and Martha Mangelsdorf (Roy Peabody); five grandchildren; a brother, Clark Mangelsdorf (Peggy); and nine nieces and nephews. In addition to a memorial service held in the spring at Swarthmore Meeting, another service was held in the summer at West Falmouth Meeting, where his ashes were buried.

Tjossem—Wilmer Luverne Tjossem, 92, on May 1, 2015, in Indianola, Iowa, as a result of injuries from a fall at his retirement community. Wilmer was born on July 15, 1922, in Ackworth, Iowa, to Ellen Lydia Moffitt and Merle Omer Tjossem. He grew up on the family farm in the Mapleside Community outside Paullina, Iowa, where his Norwegian Quaker ancestors had helped establish Paullina Meeting, affiliated with Iowa Yearly Meeting (Conservative). Wilmer attended Paullina community schools into his early high school years, when he transferred to Olney Friends School in Barnesville, Ohio, graduating in 1940 and immediately entering William Penn University, working as an admissions recruiter to help finance his college education. During a short Christmas leave in 1943, while serving in Civilian Public Service, he married Joan Eloise Hammerly, daughter of Lucille and Lawrence Hammerly of Newton, Iowa, whom he had met at William Penn. He received a bachelor’s from William Penn in 1949.

His long Midwestern Quaker background led to an offer from American Friends Service Committee (AFSC) for a job as the finance secretary of the newly created north central regional office of AFSC in Des Moines, Iowa. He was an early supporter of Des Moines Valley Meeting in Des Moines, serving as its clerk, and engaged in relief work in post-war Germany. He spent the rest of his career raising funds for the worldwide work of AFSC. He helped open and manage a branch office in Denver, Colo., where he was a member of Mountainview Meeting, and transferred in 1966 to the national office in Philadelphia, Pa., joining Media (Pa.) Meeting, for which he served as clerk. He remained in the national office until he retired, establishing summer Youth World Affairs Conferences, leading a service workcamp in rural Mexico for college-age youth, traveling to post-war Vietnam to support Quaker relief work projects, and directing several summer Quaker family camps in Minnesota and Colorado. He also served on the boards of Scattergood Friends School, Olney Friends School, and Quakerdale. and provided years of voluntary service to the alumni and development offices of William Penn.

Wilmer and Joan returned to live in Newton and in 2002 moved to the Village in Indianola. Wilmer’s fondest memories were of the thousands of people from all walks of life he had been fortunate to meet in his fundraising work. In retirement he found time to serve on the board of Friends Journal and publish a book on his Norwegian ancestors titled Quaker Sloopers. Wilmer and Joan traveled widely, advocated for peace and social justice, and maintained close ties with their extended families.

Wilmer is survived by his wife of 72 years, Joan Hammerly Tjossem; two children, Norman Tjossem (Betty) and Bradley Tjossem (Susie); a brother, Lawrence Tjossem (Kathryn); two sisters, Mary Ellen Barnett (Robert) and Ardith Tjossem; and two grandchildren.