Kay Butterfield,
wife of former Wesleyan President Victor Butterfield, turned 100 July 27.
She celebrated the day with friends and family during a celebration at the
President’s House.
Kay has lived a life of idealism and service. She was born July 27, 1906
in Brooklyn, N.Y., the daughter of Philip Geyer and Sophie Westerman
Geyer. Her grandfather, Philip Geyer, Sr. had emigrated from Bavaria,
settling first in Newark, N.J, where he and his brothers established a
brewery. The family moved to Brooklyn, and Kay’s father followed his
father into the profession of Master Brewer, eventually owning Frank’s
Brewery.
 In
1919, the 18th Amendment to the Constitution, prohibition, caused a
reversal of fortune for the Geyer family, which had all its assets
invested in the family brewery. One result was that Kay would eventually
have to finance her own college education.
Kay graduated from Girls’ High School in Brooklyn in 1922, one month shy
of her 16th birthday. In the spring of her senior year, searching the
school bulletin board for employment opportunities, she spotted a notice
for a city-wide essay contest for a one-year scholarship to the Manhattan
Business School. She won the prize, attended in 1922-23, and then earned
enough money as a legal secretary on Wall Street to pay for her first year
of college.
In 1924, Kay entered Cornell University as a freshman. She was the
publicity manager for the Women’s Varsity Council; the women’s editor
for the Cornell Daily Sun, a varsity member of the women’s
basketball team; and president of Delta Gamma Sorority. She also was
involved in Alpha Chi Alpha, the honor society for journalism; Raven and
Serpent, the junior honor society; and Mortarboard, the senior honor
society.
During her junior year at Cornell, Kay met Victor Lloyd Butterfield at a
dance. The duo got married June 11, 1928. Two days later, Kay graduated
with a bachelor’s of art in English. She had paid her entire way through
college by working as a secretary and typing student papers, and as a
legal secretary in Manhattan during the summers.
The Butterfields moved to Deerfield, Mass. where Vic taught and coached at
Deerfield Academy and Kay taught fifth and sixth grade in a single
classroom in the Deerfield Elementary School. She called it “baptism by
fire.”
In 1929, Vic joined the faculty of the Riverdale Country School in the
Bronx. Kay taught mathematics to all grades at the Neighborhood School in
Riverdale. An apartment and meals were included at Riverdale, allowing
them to save all their earnings for graduate school for Vic. In 1931, the
couple moved to Cambridge, Mass., where Vic entered Harvard as a Ph.D
candidate. Kay became a door-to-door salesperson and typed doctoral theses
for extra income. Her habits of thrift and industry enabled Vic and Kay to
spend the summer of 1934 in Europe after Vic’s resident Ph.D work was
completed.
 Vic
was hired by Wesleyan as the dean of Admission from 1935 to 1941, and
worked as the associate dean from 1941 to 1942, acting president in 1942,
then president from 1943 to 1967.
In 1938, the Butterfields built their first house on a four-acre plot on
Randolph Road in Middletown. Kay cut all the studs and joists with a power
saw, cut rock wool into bats for the insulation, and secured them with
slats that she nailed in. They lived there until Vic’s appointment as
president in 1943 and, then moved to a brick house on High Street. When
the war ended, they moved into the President’s House at 269 High. After
Vic’s retirement, they went back to their beloved small house on
Randolph Road.
During the years of Vic’s presidency, Kay was heavily involved in
college life. She loved the seminars, conferences, concerts, and the
sporting events. She was a regular at games and matches, particularly
football, basketball, and wrestling. She volunteered for decades at the
Wesleyan Blood Drive, registering donors, as well as donating blood
herself.
Much of her energy went toward the job of entertaining at the
President’s House. Money was scarce in those days, and badly needed to
improve faculty salaries. So Kay economized by cooking and baking for
receptions and dinners for trustees, faculty, students and honorary degree
recipients. On one occasion, during a period of intense rivalry in
football between Trinity and Wesleyan, she even cooked and served dinner
for both varsity teams on the night before the big game.
Kay became involved early on in the Middletown community. Before her own
children were born, she was a Girl Scout leader. The YMCA was her earliest
and longest commitment. As a member of the Women’s Board, she help
nurture the girls’ club. She also raised large sums of money for the
YMCA through her chairmanship of the Y’s annual Tour of Homes. When the
women’s lounge needed new slipcovers, Kay and her fellow board members
brought their sewing machines for a bee, and made them all themselves. It
was through the “Y” that Kay was a long-time member of the Middletown
League of Women Voters, as well as its president from 1936-37. She was
also a member of the Board of Education (1952-1965), an annual campaigner
for the United Way, and a Board member of Connecticut Citizens for Public
Schools.
She also had a long connection with the Davison Art Center. In the early
1960s, Curator Heinrich Schwarz, hoping to add to the large print
collection left to Wesleyan by George W. class of 1892 and Harriet
Davison, proposed to Kay the idea of forming a “Friends of the Davison
Art Center” to raise money for acquisitions.
Kay has been the recipient of a number of awards for her service,
including the B’nai B’rith “Woman of the Year” award in the 1950s,
the Baldwin Medal for service to Wesleyan in 1982, and received an
honorary “Doctor of Humane Letters” from Wesleyan in 1997.
In the late 1960s, after Vic’s retirement from Wesleyan, Kay renewed her
ties to the First Church of Christ, Middletown, which she had joined in
the 1950s. Kay taught Sunday School until she was in her 90s, and after
the Vietnam War, she tutored children from Vietnam and Cambodia through
the church.
In the mid 1990s, she wrote a series of essays for the Middletown Press
on backyard bird-watching, on her particular pleasure in crows, on
Elderhostels, on her two hip replacements, and on her decision at the age
of 94 to leave her beloved Randolph Road home and move to One MacDonough
Place, where she now resides.
Another great love of Kay’s throughout her life has been music, and
particularly singing. She had a huge repertoire - everything from
Vaudeville to Negro Spirituals. Kay still loves singing - now with the One
MacDonough Singers.
In honor of her 100 years, the Governor’s Office proclaimed July 27 as
Kay Butterfield Day in the State of Connecticut, and the Mayor's Office
declared July 27 as Kay Butterfield Day in the City of Middletown. |
