Elizabeth Audrey (Johnson) LeBeau, 79, died peacefully on Jan. 21, 2017, at McCarthy Care Center in Sandwich, after a fairly brief illness.
Beth fell in love with the Vineyard while spending summers at her grandmother’s gingerbread cottage as a young girl, and eventually made the Campground in Oak Bluffs her full-time residence upon retirement in 1994. She was born in Acushnet, and graduated from Dartmouth High School in 1955. She received a bachelor of textile chemistry from New Bedford Institute of Technology in 1959.
Beth taught science at Ayer Junior-Senior High in Ayer for more than 25 years. She was an enthusiastic member of the Business and Professional Women Foundation, traveled to Belize with NEMEI (Northeast Marine Environmental Institute) from Woods Hole and volunteered with Senior Environmental and AmeriCorps. She was very artistic, loved painting and creating scrimshaw, and various types of jewelry design. Grand Illumination was the highlight of the year for Beth, and she often invited anyone she met, on- or off-Island, to stop by the cottage and share in the night’s festivities.
Beth leaves behind her daughter, Dianne (LeBeau) Grant of Pepperell, and two grandchildren, Timothy Grant and Laura Grant; her sister, Joyce Swartz, with husband Russell of Edgartown, and their daughter, Amy Ellrodt, and husband Gregg from Boston, and their children Charles and Lilly; her sister, Judith Gifford, and her late husband Paul of Somerset, their daughter, Pamela Rodrigues, and her husband Bryan of Franklin and their children Emma, Natalie, and Elizabeth, and their son, Paul (P.J.) Gifford, and wife Carrie of Somerset and their children Alison, Vanesa, and Andrew.
If so inclined, please remember Beth with a gift to Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute, MS #40, 266 Woods Hole Road, Woods Hole, MA 02543-1050 or the Tabernacle Restoration Fund, MVCMA, P.O. 1685, Oak Bluffs, MA 02557.
A memorial service is being planned at the Tabernacle in Oak Bluffs for this spring.
