Mother of Harvard woman, nurtured family, Norwegian roots
Naomi Hamilton (Courtesy photo)
M. Naomi Lee Hamilton, 89, died Saturday, Sept. 7, 2013, at The Overlook in Charlton, where she had resided for the past several years.
Mrs. Hamilton was born in Brooklyn, NY, July 2, 1924, to Mabel Maren (Johnsen) Lee and Peter Emmanuel Lee, and grew up in what was the Scandinavian section on Carroll and Hoyt streets. She attended the Katharine Gibbs School in Manhattan and loved the culture, museums, libraries, and neighborhoods of the city. Though she raised her family in the New Jersey countryside, she made sure her children experienced the cultural richness of New York City.
After her 1948 marriage to Kenneth L. Hamilton, she worked to support her husband’s medical education and training in Albany, New York City, and Greenwich, Conn. She also worked at Cinema 5 in New York City and at the architectural firm of Bruce Campbell Graham Associates. She was especially proud to have worked for the Polio Foundation when the cure was found.
Her branch of the family was established in America when her father ran away from Norway at 16 and settled in the United States. She lovingly maintained her connections with cousins there, last visiting when she was 82 years old. With the same pioneering spirit as her father, she moved at age 60 to Nova Scotia to a home overlooking the sea in East Green Harbour, where she lived until 2010 with the support of Kevin Enslow. Throughout her life she was an avid reader of literature, history, and current events, and was a member of the Religious Society of Friends.
Mrs. Hamilton was predeceased by her husband in 1974 and by her brother, Robert Emmanuel Lee, in 1937. She leaves three sons, Andrew Lee Hamilton of Jamaica Plain, Peter Lee Hamilton of Mass. and N.Y., and Thomas Erskine Lee Hamilton of Vallejo, Calif. She also leaves a daughter, Elisabeth L. Karotkin and her husband Fred Karotkin, both of Harvard. Mrs. Hamilton was also Nana to Katharine Emma Louise Hamilton and Joseph Andrew Hamilton, and Mor-Mor (mother’s mother) to Lena Marin Karotkin. She leaves many cousins in Olso and Lillehammer, Norway.
The family is grateful for the care and love she received at The Overlook, where her caregivers, especially Jessie Cannon and many others, treated Mrs. Hamilton with respect and dignity.
A memorial gathering will be held, after which she will go home to Norway, according to her wishes, to a lovely place called Verdens Ende in Nøtterøy.
