Burnham Carter Jr.

Mr. Carter was born on Jan. 21, 1924, in Watertown. His first two years of schooling were at the German School in Havana, Cuba, where his father was with the American embassy. When the family moved to New York City, he attended Friends Seminary, returning to Old Lyme each summer. In 1940, he graduated from the Millbrook School in Millbrook, N.Y., and went on to Princeton. After Pearl Harbor, the college accelerated, and he graduated in 1943. During the war, he served as a Naval aviator with the rank of lieutenant (j.g.).

On May 5, 1945, Mr. Carter married Sue Holmes McLeod of Pittsburgh and Old Lyme, whom he had known since they were ten. Throughout their marriage they vacationed in Old Lyme whenever possible. In 1948, Mr. Carter received his M.A. from Colgate University and in 1955 his doctorate of philosophy from Stanford. He taught for ten years at Purdue University in Indiana, and then became the academic dean at Briarcliff College in Briarcliff Manor, N.Y., and in 1971 at Pine Manor College in Chestnut Hill, Mass. In 1977 he returned to teaching as the abercrombie professor of english. After retirement in 1996, he and his wife continued to live in Dedham, Mass., where he assisted Bride International Media in the production of CD-ROMs of Shakespeare's Macbeth and Romeo and Juliet, as well as one on the Transcendentalists, where he was the voice-over for Ralph Waldo Emerson.

After the death of his wife in 1999, he moved back to Old Lyme. He was active in the Old Lyme beach club, first as a director and then as president. From 1968 to 2007 he was a director of Berkshire Farm and Services for Youth, a school for boys in trouble in Canaan, N.Y., founded by his great-grandparents, Catharine and Frederick Gordon Burnham. In 2001, he published The Story-Teller, a life of his father, and in 2007 Legacies, a set of sonnets about his family. We will miss his love of literature and poetry, the Sunday crossword and UCONN women's basketball, and the beach and woods of Old Lyme.

Mr. Carter is predeceased by his wife of 55 years, Sue; and his brother, David.

He is survived by his sister, Alison Mitchell, of Old Lyme; three children, Jeffery Burnham Carter of Deep Gap, N.C., Elizabeth Edmonstone of Old Lyme, and Jane Cipoletti of Barrington, R.I.; eight grandchildren; and one great-grandchild.

A memorial service will be held at 1 p.m. on Saturday, Oct. 1, 2011 in the First Congregational Church of Old Lyme.

In lieu of flowers, please send a gift to the charity of your choice.

Fulton-Theroux Funeral Home, Old Lyme is handling the arrangements.

Please visit www.fultontherouxoldlyme.com for tributes and more service information.