Avis de décès de Mary-Lee Graves - Nécrologie - MesAieux.com

Mary Lee Graves Clinton, NY Mary Lee Graves, 101, died peacefully in her sleep on June 11, 2009, at the Lutheran Home, Clinton, NY. She was the daughter of Charles Lee Raper of High Point, NC, and Henrietta Frost Williams of Paterson, NJ. Born and raised in Chapel Hill, NC, on February 11, 1908, Mary Lee moved at age 12 to Syracuse, where her father ultimately became Dean of the School of Business Administration at Syracuse University. She graduated from Nottingham High School in Syracuse and attended Syracuse University where she was a member of Alpha Phi Sorority. Mary Lee married Kenneth Sloat Graves of Adams, NY, on July 6, 1929. She and Kenny, the boy next door, arranged for assignations by using signal lights between his fraternity house and her bedroom window. Mary Lee supported her husband in his career as an electrical engineer for the New York Telephone Company and raised their three sons in several upstate New York towns, including Syracuse, Geneva, Rome, Clinton, Delmar and New Hartford. A faithful and compassionate Christian, she dedicated a large portion of her adult life to Bible studies and teaching. In her early seventies, she learned Hebrew in order to read the Old Testament in its original language. She was an honorary member of the Utica Friends of the Neot Kedumim, The Gardens of Israel, and received a special citation in 1981 from this organization. Many of her friends can recall her reciting Psalms and various blessings in Hebrew. Mary Lee taught several generations of teenagers and adults in Bible classes at St. Stephens Episcopal Church in New Hartford where she was an active communicant for over 50 years. A number of her paintings, featuring various religious symbols, can be viewed at St. Stephens Parish Hall. In addition to caring for her family, she actively pursued her hobbies of gardening, flower arranging, painting, traveling to the Holy Land and sailing with her family and friends on the ketch Explorer on Chaumont Bay, Lake Ontario. Her family and close friends called her Muzz and will remember her gentle ways and her warm, wise and generous spirit. They will miss her dearly. She is survived by her sons: Thomas Freeman Graves, a retired architect in Severna Park, Maryland; Charles Lee Graves, Executive Director of Interfaith International in Geneva, Switzerland; and John Sheldon Graves, a physician in Denver, Colorado. She is also survived by her daughters-in-law, Joann (Thomas wife) and Sadako (Charles wife). She leaves five beloved grandchildren, Mark, Christopher, Clement, Anthony and Jessica, and four great-grandchildren, Erin, Zander, Robert and Jimmy. She also leaves a number of nieces, nephews, grandnieces and grandnephews. The Graves family wishes to extend heartfelt thanks to all of her dear friends, especially those from the St. Stephens community, her niece, Mary Haven of Cicero, and to the compassionate and caring nursing staff at the Lutheran Home for their many and selfless contributions to her attaining an advanced age with dignity. Contributions, in lieu of flowers, may be sent to the Mary Lee Graves Memorial Fund, St. Stephens Episcopal Church, 25 Oxford Rd., New Hartford. Memorial services with Holy Communion will be held at St. Stephens Church at 11 A.M., July 11, 2009. Mary Lee Graves