Catherine Merwin Mayhew (“Kay”) died peacefully after a long, fulfilling life, on the afternoon of Sunday, April 12, 2026.
Kay was born in 1939 in Torrington, Conn., and grew up in Winsted, Conn., daughter of Garwood and Marie Merwin. Marie was originally from England, instilling Kay with a strong sense of culture from “across the pond.” Kay graduated from the National Cathedral School in Washington, D.C.
She married Donald Gifford Mayhew, a native Islander, in Winsted in 1961. They lived in Providence, R.I., where she worked for Brown University, his alma mater, and later as private secretary to a local lawyer and state senator. The couple later moved to the D.C. area when her husband began work for the U.S. Government. There she was active in the League of Women Voters, and lobbied briefly in Congress for a presidential vote for D.C. residents.
They settled in Bowie, Md., a suburb of D.C., where they raised their children and where she worked for the Prince George’s County schools. Donald had always wanted to move back to the Vineyard where he was born, and after he took early retirement, they relocated to Vineyard Haven. He predeceased her in 2019.
During her first years on the Island, Kay became a member of the West Tisbury Congregational Church, in which Donald’s family had always been active, and where Kay participated in the annual Christmas fairs. She became good friends with the minister, the Rev. Cathlin Baker, who was very supportive of the family as they moved through the final weeks.
Soon after moving to the Island, Kay became a two-term president of the M.V. League of Women Voters, which is now included in the M.V. Chamber of Commerce phonebook. She was appointed and worked for years as a registrar of voters in Tisbury. She regularly met with a small group of Black and white women discussing solutions to problems faced by each group. She began to work for the Tisbury Business Association (TBA), bringing Santa to the Island, who gave out gingerbread cookies made by the M.V. Regional High School culinary arts students. Early on, for Christmas the TBA had suggested businesses use white lights, creating a winter fairyland in town, and began wagon rides between Main Street and the Tisbury Marketplace, and created the first chowder contest.
In the 1970s, Kay had done a great deal of genealogical work in Maryland. Once she moved to the Vineyard in the 1980s, she worked as an awardwinning genealogist for the M.V. Museum, then known as the Dukes County Historical Society. She was happy to connect off-Islanders to their Island ancestors, including a large Mayhew family in Alabama. She was an editor of the published “Luce Genealogy,” now available in the museum. She was a member of several genealogical societies, including the New England Historic Genealogical Society, the National Genealogical Society, and the Connecticut Society of Genealogists. She is also a member of the M.V. chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution. Her epitaph will read, “History Matters.”
While working at the Beach House, now at the corner of Main and Spring streets, she enjoyed the friends she made there, especially the owner, Jane Chandler, and her family. Of course, Kay also enjoyed the wonderful friends she made on this Island over the years, many of whom called and visited in her last weeks, when her room was always filled with bright-colored flowers and upbeat cards, and her calendar was filled with potential visitors. In her time on the Vineyard, Kay enjoyed meeting weekly with both a Tuesday and Thursday quilting group. The latter evolved into a summer “early supper on East Beach” gathering for many years. She was also a member of the Island’s Want to Know Club.
Kay later joined the meditation group at the Unitarian Church, which became very important in her life, and even more so during COVID. At that time our Vineyard Haven library commended her as a “most prolific reader,” because there were always more books she wanted to read. (Even at this writing, there are a very large number of books that need to be returned.) She participated in a writing group at the Oak Bluffs library. She enjoyed writing the Tisbury column for The M.V. Times for 39 years, which included her famous section, “Heard on Main Street.” The paper says that she was the longest-serving columnist at the paper thus far.
The family would like to thank Hospice of Martha’s Vineyard for providing materials, prescriptions, and equipment necessary to support peaceful end of life, and for their unwavering support, compassion, and empathy.
Kay leaves a daughter, Laurel Mayhew, and husband Kevin Olson of Chaplin, Conn.; and a son, Craig Mayhew, wife Laura, and two granddaughters, Rory and Fiona, of Westborough.
Donations may be made to the West Tisbury Congregational Church, online at wtcongregationalchurch.org/pledge-form, or the M.V. Museum, online at bit.ly/MVM_Donate, or to a place of your choice.
A memorial service will be held on Saturday, May 2, at 3 pm, at the West Tisbury Congregational Church.