Elizabeth "Betty" CURTIS

Elizabeth Curtis Stiles

Betty's 2011 Autobiography

It is Thursday evening, June 9, 2011 and at the last minutes before the deadline of June 10^th, I am writing my biography. I haven’t changed much. This biography is a lovely idea and an excuse to reflect over 50 years and the influence of friends and faculty of Staples High School.

After graduation, I moved to Brooklyn Heights to attend Pratt Institute for fashion design. I left to join the executive training program at Lord & Taylor. While at Pratt, I met my future husband Ted who graduated in Industrial Design in 1963. We married in 1964 and are still together( “still crazy after all these years”) and moved to Manhattan. What a time it was to be in New York. The War Protest, Hippies, the Peppermint Lounge, Gerdie’s Folk City, Blackouts. It was great.

In 1968, we moved to Basking Ridge, New Jersey and our son, Teddy was born, followed by a daughter, Tricia in 1970. How typical is this. I was a stay at home Mom and loved every minute. When Tricia went to kindergarten, I decided to go back to school. I always remembered Mr. Chalk, senior English, as the first person to take my intellect seriously and protested that I was going to art school and not liberal arts. I enrolled at Drew University in Madison, NJ and graduated summa cum laude with a major in Sociology and a certificate in Gerontology from the College of St. Elizabeth. I worked for the Office on Aging and later at the Visiting Nurse of Somerset Hills. It was a great time to work with the elderly. There was lots of need, funding, and I was able to start many new programs.

Ted and I and our family enjoy hiking, biking, boating, camping (RV with the dogs), travel, skiing, art, music and theatre.

I am now retired, with four grandchildren: two local in Tewksbury and two in New Hampshire. We have downsized and now have a home on a trout stream in Califon and a home overlooking the bird sanctuary on LBI. We are located 1 hour from NY and 1 hour from Phillie and love them both. “Life is good”.

Throughout these 50 years, I have maintained friendships with 4 dear friends, Dana Hinn Rodman, Betsy Foreman, Betty Flanagan Gaudreau and Laurie Gurney. (I have to admit that they are the ones who kept us together and I thank them). We missed the last reunion because Laurie had passed on and we therefore celebrated her life, humor and friendship among ourselves.

I am looking forward to this one. I must admit when I read some of the bios, the old intimidation I felt among my peers at Staples returns, but then I remember the wonderful influences that have shaped my life and I am very excited. Okay that’s all the good stuff: we did have the death of parents and the children acting out, but we’re still here. “Life is still good”.