Katherine "Kathy" Verde Martin

She was born on December 2, 1942 in Providence, RI, the daughter of the late Charles C. Verde and Katherine Higgins Verde.

Surviving is her Husband, Donald J. Martin, of North Topsail Beach, North Carolina; daughters Katherine Ann Martin and Elizabeth Jane Martin, both of Alexandria, Virginia; brothers, Charles T. Verde of Sarasota, Florida; William F. Verde of Canyon Lake, Texas; Thomas A. Verde of Pawcatuck, Connecticut, and sister, Nancy Verde Barr of Providence, Rhode Island; grandchildren, Maya Veney Martin and Gabrielle Katherine Martin, of Alexandria, Virginia.

Kathy was born the second of five children in Providence, Rhode Island. She attended the Convent of the Sacred Heart Elmhurst in Providence, Rhode Island where she distinguished herself at field hockey. Like her mother, also a graduate of Elmhurst, she developed a lifelong devotion to the Virgin Mary and remained active in the Elmhurst Alumnae Association, attending her 50th class reunion in 2011. After high school, she studied Elementary Education and Art at Rhode Island College in Providence, Rhode Island and then moved to Arlington, Virginia where she worked as a teller at Riggs National Bank. In Arlington, she met her future husband Don, at the time in the United States Army. The two were married in 1971 and moved to Alexandria, Virginia. From 1972 to 1977, they lived in Suffolk, England where Don was stationed at the RAF Mildenhall air base. During their years in England, the couple travelled throughout the UK and Europe. Kathy also avidly collected English antiques and visited numerous regional churches to rub memorial brasses with paper and wax crayon, including the seven-foot long, brass effigy of crusader Sir Roger de Trumpington in the church of SS Mary and Michael near Cambridge, the second oldest brass in the kingdom, dating to 1289, as well as the famed, life-size, 16th century brass of Thomas Goodryke, Bishop of Ely, at Ely Cathedral, one of the cathedral’s few memorial brasses to survive the destruction of the Reformation. Back in Alexandria, Kathy continued to pursue her interests in collecting and crafts, serving in the Virginia public schools as a volunteer and kindergarten paraprofessional, teaching pottery-making, basket-weaving, quilt-making and cross-stitching. Though she lived in the South for forty years, she never lost her distinctive, “r”-dropping New England accent which merged idiomatically over the years with the long-voweled languor of a southern drawl. Nor, upon crossing the Mason-Dixon Line, did she surrender her credentials as an active member of the Democratic Party, even as her husband, Don, served as mayor of North Topsail Beach from 2008 to 2009 in favorably Republican Onslow County. At the beach, she participated in several “turtle walks” to assist sea turtle hatchlings safely reach the ocean. She also continued to engage in her passions for photography, reading, travel, collectibles, arts and crafts, and quilting, at which she excelled. But above all she cherished being among family and friends, and loved nothing more than to invite people to “come on down” to North Topsail Beach, where she spent incalculable hours beachcombing for shells and other treasures while spending time with the joys of her later life, her grandchildren.

Services will be held Saturday, 11:00 a.m., August 18, 2018, All Saints Catholic Church, 420 N Topsail Dr., Surf City, NC 28445.

In lieu of flowers, donations may be made in Kathy’s name to METAvior.org or Stjude.org