Catherine Billings

Cathy was born in Indiana to Wallace and Evelyn Firestone on February 16, 1939. She spent her early years in Shiloh, Ohio, where her father was the school principal. The family relocated to Coral Gables, Florida, and she attended Ponce de Leon Junior High and Coral Gables High School. She earned her Bachelor's in English from the University of Miami, her Master's in English from the College of William and Mary, and her Educational Doctorate from the University of Missouri. She married her high school sweetheart, Thomas Billings, on June 22, 1963.

Cathy was passionate about literature. She was a lifelong educator, a career English teacher who had a line of poetry ready for every occasion. She taught in Florida, California, and finally in Missouri, where she served on the faculty of Hickman High School for over 30 years. She also briefly attended law school in her early thirties. She divided her time between Columbia, Missouri, and her house in Lakeside Marblehead, Ohio. She loved being on the water, Jimmy Buffet, and “Lake Life.” She was a voracious reader who read widely, and although she was certainly versed in literary classics, murder mysteries were her guilty pleasure, and she read about one a day. She was a devoted teacher, an attentive mother, a caring daughter, and a supportive wife. She was a celebrator, and planned gifts and family occasions months, sometimes years, in advance. In both her professional and her personal life, she demonstrated passion, determination, and brilliance. She was an extraordinary person, to borrow a quote from Elia Kazan on Blanche Dubois “colorful, varied…witty, imaginative, of her own integrity.”

She is preceded in death by her husband, Thomas Elwood Billings, and her parents, Evelyn and Wallace Firestone. She is survived by her daughter, Laura Billings Karpowicz (Jim); her brother, Jack Firestone (Kit); her two grandchildren, Megan and Daniel Quick (Katie); and her caretaker and friend, Stacy Marquez.