Carolyn "Betty" Beach

HAMDEN - Carolyn "Betty" Beach, 90, went to be with her Lord and Savior while at the Delaware Valley Hospital in Walton on February 17, 2015. She was born in the town of Colchester, on July 24, 1924 to the late Herbert and Maude (Rogers) Sibley.

In 1942 Betty married PFC Mahlon I. Beach and together they raised 10 children on their dairy farm in Masonville, NY. She attended the Parker Hollow one-room school and then Sidney High School, class of '41. After her husband's death in 1980, Betty moved to Hamden with her daughter and son-in-law, Marian and Stub Ploutz, Jr. on the Octagon Farm. She was an avid member of the New Hope Community Church in Walton.

Betty loved life and loved her family. She loved all her children and grandchildren the same. Even though she didn't get to spend as much time with some of them as she wanted, she was always thinking of them and would mention different ones and wonder how they were doing if she hadn't seen them in a while. She knew all their birthdays and took time to send cards and make phone calls. She loved all babies and loved animals. She enjoyed watching the birds at the feeders on the porch. No one else could get close to her wild and crazy cat, Smokey, who came around to be fed occasionally.

She got up early and made the best and most of every day. She always wanted to be a part of whatever was going on around her and wanted to contribute to the betterment of the day. Betty loved flowers and in the springtime, she enjoyed working in the greenhouse with all the beautiful hanging baskets and bedding plants. Her favorite flowers were old fashioned daffodils, lilacs and wildflowers. When it warmed up enough to get outside, you could find her digging dandelion greens and wild leeks.

One of her favorite pastimes in the summertime was picking strawberries and blueberries. She loved going to yard sales and loved having yard sales at home with her family. She loved just going for a drive over back country roads that she hadn't been on before and looking for "short-cuts," especially in the autumn to see the beautiful foliage in the foothills of the Catskills. In the fall, she liked picking vegetables, picking cranberries back at the old homestead, and gathering princess pine and pinecones for making Christmas wreaths. She loved helping Marian make pies and breads for the farm stand, and she liked canning fruits and vegetables and making jams and pickles. She sewed little "stuffie" animals, aprons, pillows, pot-holders and quilts. Betty loved to hang wallpaper and did a lot of it in her lifetime with her mom and sisters and her daughters. She liked helping with the displays in the store and liked running the register, but mostly enjoyed visiting with the different people that came to shop at the Octagon Market. She loved helping and visiting with the hundreds of Bed and Breakfast guests at the Octagon House through the years. And more recently, she helped out at the Motor Lodge and got to visit with many of the guests as they came in the lobby.

But life wasn't all work and no play for Betty. She enjoyed all kinds of music all her life. Both of her parents played piano. She learned to play chords on the piano at an early age and loved to sing the older folk songs and hymns. Four of her children, Thelma, Bobbie, Marty, and Marian played country music professionally. Betty loved to go to the dances and was always out there dancing and having a good time, many times with her sisters Ruth and Grace. Her granddaughter Amanda played clarinet in the Walton High School Band, and Gramma rarely missed a concert or parade.

Betty was very interested in family history, collected a lot of material on the Sibley and Beach families over the years and, with Stub's help, put together a huge family tree. She loved to attend family reunions and share old pictures and stories. She loved to read and liked history books and stories of the Civil War. Several of her ancestors were in the military as well as many of her surviving relatives and their spouses.

Betty is survived by two sisters, Grace Fisher, Masonville and Ruth Butts, Nineveh; two sisters-in-law, Janet Cook, Bainbridge, and Helen Hamilton, Sidney. She is also survived by nine of her ten children: Thelma (& Hank) Shedd, Windsor; Roberta "Bobbie" (& Dave) Owens, Mallory; Edwin (& Sheree) Beach, Bloomville; Russell Beach, Butternuts; Mahlon (& Ellen) Beach, Jr., North Lawrence; Kathryn "Dolly" deVries, Ft. Myers, FL; Ernest Beach, Sidney; Marian (& Leland) Ploutz, Jr., Hamden; and Martin (& Jennifer) Beach, Sloansville. Betty is also survived by 32 grandchildren, 10 step-grandchildren, 53 great-grandchildren, 3 great-great-grandchildren, as well as several nieces, nephews and cousins.

Betty was pre-deceased by her parents Maude and Herbert Sibley; three brothers John Sibley, George Sibley and Donald Sibley; sister-in-law Ethel Sibley; two brothers-in-law Floyd Fisher and Glen Butts; her husband Mahlon Beach; her youngest son Nelson Beach; grandson Steven Cordner; daughter-in-law Cheyrl Beach, son-in-law, John DeVries and nephew; Tommy Sibley.

Friends and relatives are invited to call on Saturday, February 28, 2015 from 9 to 11 AM at the New Hope Community Church, 45 Stockton Ave., Walton where services will follow at 11 AM with Lay Minister John Clark, officiating.

Memorial contributions in Betty's memory may be made to New Hope Community Church or the National Parkinson Foundation,

Gift Processing Center, PO Box 5018 Hagerstown, MD 21741-5018.