Chelsey Remington

Chelsey Carrier Remington of Cape Neddick, Maine, a lifelong community volunteer, died peacefully at home from the effects of frontotemporal dementia. She leaves her husband of 58 years, David F. Remington; daughter, Chelsey Remington, son-in-law Jonathan Dabora, and their son Samuel of Concord, Massachusetts; and son, Jay Remington, daughter-in-law Laura Remington, his daughter Tessa Fager of Essex, Maryland, and their sons Peter and Patrick Remington of Bedford, Massachusetts. Born in Hartford and raised in Glastonbury, Connecticut, Chelsey attended the Glastonbury public schools and received her A.B. from Pembroke College in Brown University in 1961. After Brown, she joined IBM as a Systems Engineer and remained with IBM until 1969.

Chelsey was an active and committed community volunteer for over 44 years, generally in the fields of education and community service, and within those fields in the areas of fundraising and governance. She began her volunteer activities in her then home town of Harvard, Massachusetts in 1973. She chaired the antique show for many years which benefited the Harvard Public Schools. She was President of the Harvard Garden Club, President of the Harvard Historical Society, a Governor of the Concord (Massachusetts) Museum and a Trustee of Fruitlands Museums in Harvard for eleven years.

For over fifteen years beginning in 1981, Chelsey was associated as President and as a board member with Concord Family Service, a family service agency founded in 1814 that offered a broad range of family counseling services including older adult services, adoption, pregnancy counseling, and employee assistance services in an eleven-town area.

Chelsey was especially effective in fundraising. After recognizing the agency’s urgent need for a signature annual fundraising event she originated a “tasting event” that she named “Tastes of our Towns,” a sit-down dinner for 400 that featured 35 chefs from area restaurants. Their offerings were judged by such culinary stars as Jasper White, Gordon Hammersley, Jody Adams and long-time food critic Gene Burns. During the dozen or so years of the life of the event it generated well over $1 million of unrestricted support for the agency’s family service programs.

Chelsey was appointed a Trustee of Brown in 1999. She was National Chair of the Brown Annual Fund for three years. She was Chair of the Pembroke Center Advisory Council and a long-time member of the University’s Facilities and Design Committee.

Chelsey served on the Ladies Committee of the Museum of Fine Arts (Boston), now the MFA Associates, for seven years. She chaired the MFA’s Patron Program for several years and she was a founding member of the museum’s planned giving committee. She was named an MFA Overseer in 1996 and was later appointed an Honorary Overseer.

Chelsey moved to York, Maine in 2005 where she served as a trustee of the York Land Trust. She was President of the Piscataqua Garden Club, and she joined the collections committee of the Ogunquit Museum of American Art. She was a member of the Chilton Club in Boston and the Reading Room in York Harbor, Maine.

Chelsey doted on her grandchildren whom she adored. Her favorite place in the world was her family’s cottage on Moody Beach, Maine that her parents built when she was eight years old. She loved watching the children play there and she walked the beach regularly in summer and winter when she was well into her seventies. The peaceful and reassuring sound of ocean waves rolling onto the sandy beach was never far from her mind; night or day wherever she was. Chelsey had a self-taught but keen appreciation for landscape design, interior design, art and architecture all of which she brought to bear on the design of her family’s shingle-style home on Maine’s rocky coast. She was also a superb cook and a creative flower arranger. She spent hours in her gardens which she designed and maintained herself.

In lieu of flowers, memorial contributions may be made to Brown University, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, or the York Land Trust in York, Maine.

A memorial service will be held at Manning Chapel on the Brown campus on Friday, September 17 at 4:00 p.m. The Glastonbury Funeral Home has been entrusted with the care of the funeral arrangements. For on-line expressions of sympathy to the family please visit glastonburyfuneral.com.