Susan Whittlesey Wolf

Born October 25, 1938 in Pittsfield, Massachusetts, Susan was the eldest of four children of William Augustus Whittlesey III and Margaret Ballard Gage Crofut. She grew up in Pittsfield near cousins and grandparents who often gathered in summer on Good Harbor Beach in Gloucester, Massachusetts. In Pittsfield, she attended Dawes Elementary, Plunkett Junior High, and Miss Hall’s School, and graduated in 1960 from Smith College in Northampton, Massachusetts with a B.A. in English, focusing her senior thesis on the literary works of Virginia Woolf.

Susan published her first poem at age 12 and developed her love of writing during summer jobs at her hometown newspaper, The Berkshire Eagle. Naturally curious about other lands and cultures, Susan did a homestay in France at age 17 through the Experiment in International Living and later toured in Europe with the Smith College Singers, visiting many countries and winning a European choral competition. These experiences planted the seeds for many more cross-cultural adventures. In 1960 she was invited by the Bunkagakuin school in Tokyo to teach English to young adults, an experience that sparked a life-long interest in Japanese history and culture. She returned to the United States in 1961 via an around-the-world air ticket with memorable stops in Thailand and India.

In fall of 1961, Susan moved to Washington, DC to work for the newly formed Peace Corps and published books introducing the public to both the Peace Corps and the Volunteers in Service to America (VISTA) program. She lived in Georgetown with a group of young professional women who called themselves the “Water Street Girls,” after the unconventional location of their house underneath Key Bridge. The Water Street Girls remained close friends throughout their lives.

Continuing her writing career, Susan took a job as an editor with Readers Digest Condensed Books in New York, where she met her husband of 24 years (1969-1993), Tom Wolf, then an NYU PhD candidate. In 1971, Susan gave birth to her eldest child Toby, just before they moved for Tom’s work to West Berlin, Germany, where her second child Ted was born. After three impression-filled years in West Berlin, including travels to communist East Germany and Czechoslovakia and extended stays in Austria and Switzerland, Susan’s family moved briefly to Falls Church, Virginia then to Columbus, Ohio where Tom was an Economics professor at The Ohio State University from 1974-84.

In 1976 Susan gave birth to their third child, Caroline. During their time in Columbus, Susan continued to write and edit, contributing to non-fiction books and writing for The Columbus Dispatch about her experience as an expatriate and mother in Cold War West Berlin.

Susan and family moved to the Washington, D.C. area in 1984, living in Bethesda, Maryland and later in Northwest DC. Susan further expanded her writing and editing career publishing a romance novel that was translated into multiple languages and contributing to a non-fiction book on how to write romance fiction. She was editor of Fitting In magazine and later of Inside ED, a publication of the U.S. Department of Education. At the Department of Education, she worked with participants of the Japan Exchange and Teaching (JET) Program, as well as with programs focused on Native American educational initiatives in the U.S. Southwest. In her personal life, she hosted events to ease the transition for immigrants to the DC area and taught literacy to at-risk youth in the DC public school system. Susan also wrote freelance articles for The Washington Post, including her on-the-ground account of the 1991 Moscow coup attempt and the Post’s 1992 front-page Memorial Day story about her father’s cousin who died as a U.S. Marine at Guadalcanal 50 years before.

Upon retiring from the Department of Education in 1998, Susan moved to the seaside town of Gloucester, Massachusetts, where she fulfilled a long-time dream of living by the ocean. For a time, she had a regular column called “My View” in The Gloucester Times and continued with freelance writing and editing projects. While in Gloucester, she met Bill Wertenbaker of Rockport, Massachusetts, who was also a writer and travel enthusiast. They were partners for over 20 years and together traveled in Europe, Japan, and the United States.

In 2011, Susan and Bill relocated together to DC, where they lived in the Watergate apartment complex and enjoyed proximity to the Kennedy Center and the multi-cultural mix of the city. Bill passed away in 2020.

During her 14 years at the Watergate, Susan was an enthusiastic participant in community initiatives, including orientations for new residents, holiday events, and discussion groups. She supported local and international charities focused on multicultural learning, literacy, and the arts and continued to welcome newcomers to the United States. Until her last months, Susan focused much of her energy on organizing gatherings with her family and her friends and closely following her grandchildren’s activities.

Susan is survived by her three children, Toby Wolf (Tania), Ted Maris-Wolf (Rachel) and Caroline Wolf, siblings David Whittlesey (Regine) and Jane Whittlesey Winn (Bruce), and four grandchildren, whom she adored: Julia, Annika, Micah and Matthew.

A Celebration of Life for Susan was held at the Watergate in June. Family and friends will also gather to remember Susan at Pittsfield Cemetery on August 13 at 10:00 a.m. Please email [email protected] for further details.

For those wishing to make a donation in Susan’s honor, the family suggests World Learning (worldlearning.org), the non-profit operating the Experiment in International Living that gave Susan her first formative cross-cultural experience.