Assistant librarian, gardener
Phyllis Fredrick. (Courtesy photo)
A longtime resident of Harvard, Phyllis Dakin Fredrick died Sunday February 11 at her home of the past few years in Groton. She would have been 93 in April.
Born in Sandy Cove, Nova Scotia, she was a direct descendant of the Dakin family of Concord, whose loyalty to the Crown led to their resettlement in Nova Scotia after the Revolution. Proud of her Loyalist forebears, she grew up within an extended family, leading to her lifelong interest in genealogy and history.
Phyllis was the youngest of three children. She was a child at the beginning of the era of the automobile and electricity in rural Nova Scotia, and attended the one-room village school. Her vivid memory made her recollection of her early childhood particularly striking—she clearly remembered hearing the churchbells in the village ringing to celebrate the Armistice.
Her family emigrated to the United States in the 1920s, when family circumstances necessitated a return to the “Boston States.” A bright student, she attended Medford schools and graduated two years early, at the age of 16. When family circumstances did not permit her to attend college, she and her sister borrowed textbooks from a friend who was attending Tufts and followed the curriculum. She then took a course at Gibbs and worked as a secretary at M.I.T. during the war years. There she met and married Arden H. Fredrick, a graduate of CalTech, who had come to M.I.T. to develop radar instrumentation for the war effort.
Phyllis and “Fred” shared many interests—antiques and old houses, gardening, and English Country dancing. Mr. Fredrick’s job changes brought moves within Massachusetts and to New York State, then back to Massachusetts, where they eventually settled in Harvard in 1963. Tiny in stature but fiercely maternal, Phyllis was devoted to her children. Her other loves were her gardens (particularly her old-fashioned roses, English lavenders and herbs), her dogs, and her beloved old house on Old Schoolhouse Road. A stern grammarian, an avid reader and an accomplished writer, she worked for some time as an assistant librarian at the Harvard Public Library. She was a member of St. Andrew’s Church in Ayer, where she served on the altar guild. For many years, she belonged to the Harvard Garden club, helping to organize and run the plant sales on the Common.
Phyllis returned to her beloved Sandy Cove upon Mr. Fredrick’s retirement. They divided their time between the house in Harvard and their tiny Sandy Cove cottage. There, she designed wonderful rock gardens edged by stone walls made by her husband and full of her favorite heathers, lavenders, and thymes.
Phyllis was predeceased by her husband in 2006. She is survived by her three children: Jane Leibert of Preston, Connecticut, Hugh Fredrick of Boxborough, Martha Schwarzkopf of Lancaster, grandchildren, her nieces and nephews and their children. A funeral service will be held on Saturday February 24th at 2 p.m. at St. Andrew’s Church, 7 Faulkner Street, Ayer. Instead of flowers, memorial donations may be made to humanitarian or environmental nonprofit associations.
