A memorial service remembering Kay Smith will be held at 12:30 p.m. on Saturday, March 30 at the Unitarian Universalist Church of Cherry Hill.
Katherine Keen Smith (Kay) of Moorestown, age 86, passed away peacefully on Friday, Feb. 22, surrounded by her loving family. She was a devoted mother, lifelong learner, enthusiastic educator and environmentalist.
Born in Philadelphia in 1932, Kay was the daughter of Anne Francis (Weedon) and Daniel Franklin Keen. She grew up in Yeadon, Pa.; graduated from Temple University in 1954 and began her family in Willow Grove before moving to Moorestown in 1966. She became active in community and environmental issues while raising her three children. Ready to return to work, Kay continued her education with a masters in biology and was soon teaching undergraduate students at Rutgers University in Camden and Philadelphia Community College.
She married her college sweetheart, Allan M. Smith Sr. He was a principal engineer in electronics at RCA (later GE) in Camden. They enjoyed a devoted and easy-going relationship for fifty years that began one afternoon with her affirmative response to his casual “Tennis, anyone?”
Kay and Al shared a wide range of outdoor interests such as walking, biking, birding and canoeing. Travel and family vacations were comprised of camping trips to national and state parks. Later on, Grandma Kay and Grandpa Al extended to each of their grandchildren special educational experiences via Elderhostels throughout the United States. Summers were often spent with extended family at the Jersey shore.
Kay’s indoor interests included reading and domestic crafts, creating intricate quilts for her family. Organizational activities ran the gamut of church-related and child-centered pursuits, along with the League of Women Voters. Her children now grown, Kay hit her stride with local environmental activities. A early member of Save The Environment in Moorestown (STEM), Kay became a tireless devotee of nature area cleanups, trail maintenance, local environmental studies and township advisory committees. It was here and also at the Unitarian Universalist Church of Cherry Hill that she formed deep and lasting friendships that sustained her after her husband passed away in 2004. In 2014, STEM established a Moorestown Township Public School scholarship in Kay’s honor.
Retaining her quiet, energetic determination into her later years, Kay gathered locally with friends for “Women’s Weekends” and also travelled with them internationally across the globe. Kay spent the last three years of her life at the Medford Leas retirement community, maintaining old and making new friendships and taking an active role on the Trails Committee and other activities.
Kay Smith is survived by her daughter, Rebecca Petrillo (Gerry); two sons, Allan M Smith Jr. (Michelle) and Daniel L. Smith (Karen); eight grandchildren (Stephanie (Nathan), James, Jeffrey, Allan III, Lauren, Nathan, Brandon and Jessica); two great-grandchildren (Aiden and Kylie); her sister Susan McMillan and sisters-in-law Phyllis Smith and Donna Korkes (Tom Jordan).
A memorial service remembering Kay Smith will be held at 12:30 p.m. on Saturday, March 30 at the Unitarian Universalist Church of Cherry Hill located at: 401 Kings Highway N., Cherry Hill, NJ 08034.
Memorial contributions may be given in her name to: (1) STEM, P.O.Box 704, Moorestown, NJ 08057 www.stemonline.org; or (2) The Nature Conservancy at www.nature.org, or The Nature Conservancy, Attn: Treasury, 4245 N. Fairfax Drive, Suite 100, Arlington, VA 22203 USA
