Caitlin Ward Schuele
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Caitin Ward Schuele, born February 28, 1952, in Rockville Centre, New York, passed away on Tuesday, March 15th at her home in Sugar Hill, New Hampshire. She battled Lymphoma, an unwelcome guest, that developed unexpectedly.
Caitlin Schuele was reared in Princeton, New Jersey, a daughter of Elaine W. Schuele and Norman A. Schuele Jr. In her formative years she was educated there. Upon graduating from Princeton High School she matriculated with the Class of 1974 at Rollins College, Winter Park, Florida. Her studies were her pursuit and it had been said she was never seen without a book in hand.
Lawrence Thompson, the traveling companion and confidant of Robert Frost, and who was his Pulitzer Prize Biographer, became Caitlin's mentor saying she was the best read young lady he's ever come across while persuading her to transfer to the University of New Hampshire to major in English. He had been the Curator of Rare Books at The Princeton University Library.
After graduating from UNH Caitlin obtained a Masters Degree in Reading and the Language Arts from Rider College, Lawrenceville, NJ. Caitlin's dedication to mastering the English language
was her foundation for a noteworthy career in education. She became the Headmistress of the Princeton Academy, Princeton, New Jesrsey. Under her tutelage the Princeton Academy became Chartered by the State of New Jersey. It taught adolescents who were cognitively impaired with either visual impairments, a behavioral disorder causing an intellectual disability and / or an auditory deficiency. The role she undertook was to oversee that the school would advance the aspirations of each student by bettering their academic performance and social development.
Later Caitlin's career path was as a high school English teacher at Triton Regional High School in Runnemede, New Jersey. She also assisted coaching tennis. As at the Princeton Academy, her devotion to her students' well - being at Triton Regional, and in her success to teach them, shortly was recognized by the faculty, the parents and the Board of Education. In a high school that had more than 1,100 students enrolled, with the necessary support staff of educational professionals, Caitlin was awarded the recognition by the Board of Education as the Teacher of the Year.
Caitlin's career as an educator became sidelined due to family illness. Returning to her parents' home in Cornish, New Hampshire her intellectual interest to learn was not set aside. Under the auspices of the NH Vocational Rehabiliation, Dept. of Education, she learned Braille so that she might be helpful in future years. Meanwhile, Caitlin worked marketing her brother's antique
business. When she was in NYC being introduced to his contacts, she and George Soros entertained one another talking about things of the past, - period French antiques of the 17th and 18th Centuries. Antiques were to her an interesting reflection based on history, somewhat dormant though cast in heritage. Her appreciation of the present always was being enlivened by flowers, the composition of gardens and landscape architecture. Her flower gardens framed by built rock walls had been included at one point on the Cornish, NH garden tour.
Because the family home was sold Caitlin relocated to Ocala, Florida to associate herself with Jane Schuele Booth in her aunt's thoroughbred and realty businesses. When events caused change, she moved north to Pisgah Forest, North Carolina, southwest of Asheville. Here, on a mountainous landscape commanding an unobstructed panoramic vista with a 531' waterfall, Caitlin's pleasure to nurture nature's beauty created a contoured landscape using just shy of three hundred flowering shrubs. All these needed to be cultivated and watered for many years. However, after five years for various personal and business reasons she along with her English Setters went back to the state where she had been familiar, New Hampshire.
She is survived by one brother residing in Sugar Hill, NH and an older sister and brother-in-law who reside in Topeka, Kansas. First cousins live in Belmont, Mass., Buffalo, NY, Scottsdale, Arizona and Ventura County, California.
Services will be private.
To view an online memorial and/or send a message of condolence to the family, please visit, www.rand-wilson.com.