| Aantekeningen |
- Martha Van Schelven Hill, 89, died peacefully March 31, 2003 as friends were gathering to attend the Peace Circle she founded at Wyndham West of the Heritage Community. Born during the First World War, on April 24, 1913 in Chicago, Illinois, to Aagje and Cornelius Van Schelven, Martha was committed to peace all of her life. At the time of her death, Martha said that her only regret was that, in spite of all her efforts and those of her husband, the Rev. William S. Hill, the world was as far from peace today as it was the day of her birth. Martha had been a member of WAND, Women's Action for Nuclear Disarmament in Ann Arbor.
Born of immigrants from a war-weary Holland, Martha grew up in Virginia and in Atlanta, Georgia, where she attended Agnes Scott College. She met William when she was secretary of the Episcopal Cathedral in Atlanta. Married on April 17, 1941, they hoped to work with the Quakers during the Second World War, but when Martha became pregnant with their son, Christopher, they lived in Hopkinsville, Kentucky, where William was the rector of an Episcopal Church; and where, while a conscientious objector, William ministered to the troops stationed at Fort Campbell. At the end of the war, the family moved to Cranbrook, Michigan, where their daughter Pamela was born.
In 1948 the family moved to Uniontown, Pennsylvania where William was the rector of St. Peter's Episcopal Church and worked with coal miners and their families. The family moved to Wilkinsburgh, Pennsylvania in 1953; and in 1959, moved to Lansing, Michigan, where William was the rector of St. PaulÆs Episcopal Church until 1982. Martha helped to start a children's day care center at St. Paul's, and gave birthday parties for the children at the Michigan School of the Blind. As the secretary for the Spartan Cooperative Nursery School at Michigan State University, Martha became a lifelong champion for Head Start. When the Hills retired to Dexter, Michigan, they were members of the Interfaith Council for Peace and Justice in Ann Arbor, and Martha became active in WAND, Women's Action for Nuclear Disarmament.
Martha continued her work for peace after William died in 1992. When Martha moved to Wyndham Retirement Community in Kalamazoo in October, 1997, she became a member of the United Nations. Her greatest hope was that her grandchildren, Katrina
Hill Hardesty and Jonathan Hill, who illuminated her life, would grow up in a peaceful world. She was thrilled when Chris and Kate and Jon and Jay, KateÆs husband, participated in a Peace March in New York in February.
Martha is survived by her sister, Sylvia Van Schelven Mohr, her children and grandchildren, her son-in-law, Michael Bump, and her grandson-in-law, Jay Hardesty. At the end, Martha's family grew to include her friends and the caring staff of Wyndham West, Dr. Duranceau and his staff, Hospice, and the members of the Peace Circle, who gathered together to sing to her in her last moments, Let there be peace on earth, and let it begin with me. Martha is preceded in death by her husband, Bill, to whom she now returns with joy.
Friends are invited to a memorial service and celebration of Martha's life at St. Paul's Episcopal Church in Lansing, to be held on Friday, April 11th at 2:00 p.m. The family kindly asks that in lieu of flowers, memorials might be made to the Three Rivers Area Hospice or to the St. Paul's Episcopal Church Memorial Fund to help the homeless and the needy.
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1913 - 2003 (89 jaar)