Avid seamstress and gardener, community volunteer, secretary at Bromfield
Nancy Graham. (Courtesy photo)
Nancy Ellen Graham, daughter of the late Charles and Bernice (Munro) Phelps, died peacefully on Feb. 8, 2022. With her husband, John, Nancy was a longtime resident of Harvard, living since 1962 in the house John designed for her on Warren Avenue.
Nancy was born in Cambridge on Aug. 18, 1934. She graduated from Waltham High School in 1952. She completed secretarial school and met John while they were both working at Raytheon. Nancy and John were married in 1960, the start of a love affair that lasted 60 years.
Nancy worked at Cream Crock ice cream distributors in Harvard before becoming a secretary to the principal at the Bromfield School, a position she held for more than 15 years. She made lifelong friends in the school community. She was also a longtime member of the Congregational Church in Harvard, serving as deacon for several years and spearheading the church’s recycling efforts. She volunteered for many years at the Harvard Transfer Station and was an expert in the do’s and don’ts of Harvard’s recycling program. She loved traveling to Bermuda and Nantucket with her dear Harvard friends.
Nancy was dedicated to her family and immeasurably proud of her children and grandchildren. She met her grandchildren’s teachers, attended plays, musicals, and baseball games, and discovered each of their favorite cookie recipes. She was famous for her cookie-baking and proud to be called “the cookie lady.” She was an avid seamstress and quilter and loved to garden. She also made a mean fluffernutter. She served as assistant secretary and treasurer of John’s business, Lou’s Electric Supply, as recording secretary for the Genealogical Roundtable, and as purser for the North American Steamboat Association.
She and John traveled the Eastern Seaboard for more than two decades on the wooden steamboat John built, the Mary Seaver. Nancy and John found great joy on the water and became pillars of the community of steamers, who came to love and depend on Nancy’s chocolate mint cookies at every meet.
Nancy was known for her kind and welcoming spirit, her warm and gracious hospitality, her skill at gin rummy, and her ready laugh. She adored her children and grandchildren and always wanted each of them to know they were loved for their own unique self. She was deeply devoted to John.
Nancy was predeceased by her husband, John, and by her brother, Charles Phelps Jr. She is survived by her daughters, Heather of Cambridge and Amanda of Devens; her sons-in-law, Robert Downing and Clayton Hobart; and her grandchildren, Thomas Edward Downing, Elizabeth Graham Downing, and Finnegan John Graham Hobart.
Family and friends gathered to honor and remember Nancy on Feb. 14. Nancy’s funeral service was held Tuesday, Feb. 15, at the Congregational Church of Harvard.
In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to Ascentria Care Alliance, Development Office, 11 Shattuck Street, Worcester, MA 01605, ascentria.org/donate, or to Loaves & Fishes, 234 Barnum Road, Devens, MA 01434 (loavesfishespantry.org.)
To share a memory or offer a condolence visit www.badgerfuneral.com.
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