Around Town – October 7, 2021
Congratulations:
to Champlain Valley Union High School for being ranked among the top 10 Vermont public high schools by Niche.com, a school evaluation website. CVU ranked third behind South Burlington and Mount Mansfield. Charlotte Central School ranked 10th among public middle schools.
to Kathryn Blume of Charlotte who is one of three lead actresses in a play, The Suffragist Reenactment Society, that premiered Saturday at Main Street Landing’s Black Box Theater in Burlington. The play was written by another Vermonter Mary Beth McNulty. The three leads get together and vote on which famous moments in history they will remember and celebrate on Independence Day. Voting by women, suffragism, becomes the topic, and they quickly ask each other how to overcome people from trying to disenfranchise voters.
to Lydia Clemmons of Charlotte, who received the Arthur Williams Award for Service to the Arts. In addition, Lydia Clemmons received the Con Hogan Award for creative, entrepreneurial community leadership from the Vermont Community Foundation. The Hogan Award honors a community member who shows deep community involvement, generosity and enthusiasm in their work. Lydia is the steward of the Clemmons Family Farm off Greenbush Road where she teaches African culture through the farm site. Lydia has 35 years of community development experience, both here and in Africa. The Clemmons Family Farm is one of the 0.4 percent of farms in the U.S. that remains Black-owned, and its history remains an important teaching tool. Lydia’s father, Jackson Clemmons, grew up in southern Wisconsin before attending medical school. Lydia’s grandfather had been moved to Wisconsin from the deep south to integrate an otherwise all-white-staffed headquarters of the Fairbanks-Morse Power Corporation in Beloit, Wisconsin.
Sympathy:
is extended to family and friends of William E. Scott of Golden Valley, Arizona, who passed away at the age of 79. He was born in Burlington in 1942 and served as chief of the Charlotte Volunteer Fire Department in the 1960s. He was a well-known crane operator. who at one time in the 1980s hauled the Apollo 11 across the state of Vermont. The family urges those who wish to make a donation in Bill’s memory to consider a local humane society.
is extended to family and friends of Harriet S. Sherman of Pittsboro, North Carolina, who died Sept. 14 at the age of 71. Harriet spent most of her life as an educator, beginning her career at Charlotte Elementary School before moving to Hawaii. In lieu of flowers, please consider a donation to the SECU Bryan UNC Hospice Home in Pittsboro (go.unc.edu/UNChospice) or to the COR Food Pantry.
Marion Otis Handy McDougal Bausch
Maize Bausch, a.k.a. Marion Otis Handy McDougal Bausch, died peacefully on May 15, 2021, at Mayo Health & Continuing Care in Northfield, Vermont, aged 96 years.
Born in Greenwich, Connecticut, on March 16, 1925, Maize spent much of her childhood at family homes in Barnstable, Massachusetts, and Akron, Ohio. In Barnstable on Cape Cod, she grew up by the sea, sailing small boats with her brothers and sisters. After graduating from Vassar College, Maize explored her artistic inspiration at the Arts Students League in New York City, inspired initially by Van Gogh and later influenced by Kandinsky, Picasso and Pollock.
Maize was married to Edward D. McDougal III on his return from Europe at the close of World War II. Together they had three children: Nicholas, Charles and Jane. After the dissolution of this marriage, Maize departed Vermont in the late 1950s for Ajijic on Lake Chapala in Mexico. She set up a studio there and shared a home with sister Tinker, a.k.a. Virginia Handy Heffron. Then after brief stays in Stinson Beach, California, and New York City, Maize and family settled in Williston, Vermont, in 1960. She taught art at the Overlake Day School in Burlington for a decade. She was much loved by her students as they discovered the joy of artistic creativity Maize revealed to them.
During a summer camping trip with friends in the Adirondack Mountains, Maize met Carl L. Bausch Jr. whom she married in 1966. Together they built a house in Charlotte, where they both pursued their creative ambitions: Maize painting and Carl building canoes. Maize extended and deepened her commitment to her art, not only painting, but also making pottery from native clay. Refreshing their connection with nature, Maize and Carl explored Canada’s rivers and lakes on canoe trips together.
Maize created some of her best paintings late at night to the sounds of Bach, the Beatles, Monk and Coltrane. Her work was exhibited throughout Vermont and New England in the 1970s through 2000s, culminating in a retrospective at the Walkover Gallery in Bristol, Vermont, in 2013, Maize’s 88th year.
Maize encouraged her children to find their way in life by discovering the joy of creativity in art and personal relationships, saying “Become an artist of Life!”—Charlie and Nick in musical pursuits and Jane in her weaving. Though Jane was born with multiple disabilities, Maize’s devotion enables her to lead a full life beyond all expectations. Jane has been able to live independently, gainfully employed, while developing her own talents in fabric arts. After Carl’s death, and as her grandchildren were born, Maize showered them with love, spending hours together in play and in the garden, and also, reading and painting together in her studio.
Maize was predeceased by her parents, John Littlefield Handy and Virginia Seiberling Handy; sisters Virginia Handy Heffron and Annabelle Handy Kirby; her brother John L. Handy Jr.; and her husbands, Edward D. McDougal III and Carl L. Bausch Jr. She is survived by her children, Jane Otis McDougal, Charles Blayney McDougal and Nicholas Ulysses McDougal; grandchildren Nicholas Charles Arbuckle McDougal and Quincy Sinclair McDougal; her sister Sylvia Handy Bowman of Port Townsend, Washington; her brother Edward A. Handy of Cambridge, Massachusetts; and many nieces and nephews.
A memorial service will be announced at a future date.