Remembrances
Rosalind Jane Cousins
BLUE HILL, MAINE—Rosalind Jane Cousins (aka Jane Cousins), 87, departed this earthly home on March 7, 2023, surrounded by her loving family, to join her Lord and Savior. She was born on November 21, 1935, in Ellsworth, the youngest child of Merle B. and Ethel E. (Robbins) Grindle Sr.
Splitting time between Ellsworth and their coastal home in South Blue Hill throughout her youth, Jane graduated from Ellsworth High School, the Class of 1954. She attended the Northern Conservatory of Music, the New England School of Theology and Bob Jones University, until a dashing local young man, just out of the Army, asked her out.
Jane married Raymond S. Cousins on September 27, 1958, and the two launched a wonderful, happy family life together. The consummate homemaker, Jane raised six strong-willed daughters and kept a spotless house—no easy task! She dedicated herself to her children, filling the home with music, laughter and love. She was also a seamstress, sans payment, making all of her own dresses. And could she cook sweet food! The counter was never without a plate of whoopie pies, date squares or her highly sought after chocolate cream pie. And once there was something for the family, she’d often turn around and cook something else to take to someone who was sick. She had a thoughtful, generous spirit.
Jane was an active member of the South Blue Hill Baptist Church. She frequently played the piano at the church over the years, cooked and cleaned for church suppers and events and co-led the church’s Missionary Group. Under her leadership, the group created a variety of crafts to take to area nursing homes, where they sang for the residents. She was fun-filled and even pulled the rare all-nighter for a Rock-a-thon fundraiser (involving rocking chairs). Throughout her life she was involved with Child Evangelism Fellowship in a variety of ways. Most recently, she was a dedicated member of the Ladies’ Bible Study group.
Jane is survived by her devoted husband, Raymond Cousins; her daughters, Martha Good and her husband, John of Greenville, S.C.; Beth Wartak and her husband, David of Easley, S.C.; Miriam Young-Studabaker and her husband, Steve of Stafford, Va.; Betsy Bewsey and her husband, Adam of Woolwich, Maine; Mary-Ellen Cousins of Yarmouth, Maine; Maria Woodward and her husband, Peter of Sedgwick, Maine; and 15 grandchildren and 25 great-grandchildren.
A funeral service was held at the South Blue Hill Baptist Church March 10, 2023, with visiting hour at 1 p.m. followed by a funeral service at 2 p.m. Gifts in Jane’s memory may be made to Child Evangelism Fellowship of Eastern Maine, 34 Harborview Drive, Sullivan, ME 04664, eastern@cefofmaine.org. Condolences may be expressed at jordanfernald.com.
Iris Anita (Webster) Hammond
LONDONDERRY, N.H.—Iris Anita (Webster) Hammond, 87, of Londonderry, N.H., passed away Thursday, March 9, 2023, at her residence after a lengthy illness. Iris was born June 14, 1935, in Blue Hill, Maine, and was a daughter of the late Everett and Jennie (Hooper) Webster. She attended George Stevens Academy, the University of Maine and Boston General Hospital where she received her nursing degree and met her husband, Sidney Hammond.
Iris was employed as a Registered Nurse and worked in many establishments and capacities over the course of her carrier. Iris enjoyed travel which started when her husband was in the Air Force. They lived in Japan for a time, where both of her sons were born. She also lived in many other places including Georgia, Vermont and New York, finally coming to New Hampshire to be near family. Just like the flower, Iris symbolized the beauty of family and friendship. She brought so much into the lives of friends and family and will be greatly missed.
Iris is survived by two sons, Victor Hammond and his wife, Linda, and Alan Hammond; five grandchildren, Kyle Hammond, Brent Hammond, Christine Rizzo, Angela Tucker and Adam Rizzo; seven great-grandchildren, Kaylee, Tasha, Aidan, Avery, Owen, Emma and Ava; her sister, Mabel Bamert and her partner, Monte Magoon; and two nieces, Alicia Eubanks and Christine Javery. Iris was predeceased by her husband Sidney E. Hammond in 1994.
After cremation, funeral services will be celebrated Saturday, March 18, 2023, at 10 a.m. in the Londonderry Baptist Church, 368 Mammoth Road, Londonderry, N.H. A spring burial is planned for the Vermont Veterans Memorial Cemetery in Randolph, Vt. In lieu of flowers, memorial donations may be made to Manchester VNA, 1070 Holt Avenue, Manchester, N.H. 03109, or Londonderry Baptist Church, 368 Mammoth Road, Londonderry, N.H. 03053.
The Peabody Funeral Homes and Crematorium of Derry and Londonderry is assisting with arrangements. To send a condolence, please visit peabodyfuneralhome.com.
Elaine “Lainie” Snow Porter
NOVA SCOTIA—Elaine “Lainie” Snow Porter, 82, of Heckman’s Island, Lunenburg, Nova Scotia, died March 6, 2023, at the QEII Health Sciences Centre in Halifax, Nova Scotia.
Born December 7, 1940, to Ward and Dorothy Snow of Blue Hill, Maine, Lainie graduated from George Stevens Academy (Blue Hill) in 1959 and went on to study at Gorham State Teachers College (Gorham, Maine). During her college years, she worked summers cooking on the Stephen Taber, a Camden, Maine-based passenger schooner captained by Edward “Ed” Porter. The cook and captain worked and played well together, thriving on one another’s company. At the end of the 1963 sailing season, they were married; the start of a constant loving partnership that would inspire and sustain them both for six decades.
The newlyweds moved to Norfolk, Va., where Ed worked at Old Dominion College and Lainie taught at the public elementary school until 1965 when they relocated to Pennsylvania, Lainie teaching at Chestnut Hill Academy, and Ed at the Philadelphia College of Art. Their sons Nathaniel (1967) and Aaron (1970) were born during their years in Pennsylvania, and Lainie left teaching to dedicate her time and talents to raising her boys.
In 1971 the young family moved to Canada, settling in an eccentric old coastal farm on Heckman’s Island in Lunenburg, Nova Scotia; Lainie’s home for the rest of her life. She took her new life in stride, weaving, knitting, and quilting; baking countless loaves of bread; stacking and carrying cords of firewood; growing and preserving fruit, berries, and vegetables; raising chickens and pigs; hauling groceries and animal feed on a toboggan from the end of the plowed public road through the winter months; and clearing water from the flooding root cellar and planting vast gardens come spring.
Most summers she spent with Ed and her sons on a series of family boats sailing anywhere from Maine to Newfoundland, often without the benefit of an engine, but always with a realist’s expectation, good humor, and a comforting tune on her lips. Lainie was the watch mate you wanted on deck with you from midnight to 4 a.m.
She was an unwavering and practical advocate for education, especially of the public variety. Confounded by the locked libraries in her sons’ schools, she helped to rally a group of volunteer parents to open the stacks to students again, organized a group of student librarians, and eventually secured a budget for new acquisitions. She also volunteered as a literacy tutor for students of any age.
Despite her reverence for formal education, Lainie was a collaborator in the sporadic truancy of her sons, pulling them from school in favor of bog walks, tidepool explorations, winter picnics, and multiday excursions with family and friends whenever she judged the learning opportunities outweighed those of the standard curriculum. Her time in the classroom had taught her that there was a lot to be learned outside of it. The natural world never ceased to fuel her sense of wonder at what was there to be discovered and her delight in sharing it.
Lainie possessed an effortlessly encyclopedic memory for poetry and song lyrics. “You’ll know this one,” she’d say before launching into a dozen verses of a grim Scottish ballad, a soothing lullaby, or some obscure ditty from the 1950s hit parade, all in her beautiful clear voice. When she wasn’t singing, she whistled, which made her easy to locate on a winding trail, down a school hallway, across a foggy harbor, or among the sheds and gardens on Heckman’s Island.
Her innate sense of justice steered her to shun elitism and made her a champion and comfort to any who had suffered misfortune or what she classified as “a raw deal.” The many mantras she lived by always included kindness. “What can I do for you?” was her reliable and genuine greeting to family and friends even into her last days. The answer: Almost anything.
Lainie is survived by her husband Ed; her son Nathaniel Porter, his wife Stephenie Sala, and children Elias and Amelia Porter, of Appleton, Maine; her son Aaron Porter and partner Kate Holden of Brooklin and Portland, Maine; and her sister Miriam Hamilton and husband Donald of Winterport, Maine.
There will be an informal gathering of Lainie’s friends to share time together and celebrate her life on Saturday, April 8, between 2 and 4 p.m. at the Dana L. Sweeny Funeral Home, 11213 Highway #3, Lunenburg, Nova Scotia.
In lieu of flowers memorial donations in Lainie’s memory may be given to SHAID Tree Animal Shelter, Doctors Without Borders, or to Nature Conservancy of Canada.
