Dorothy Ann Calhoun Fago

Randolph, Vt. — Sunday, Sept. 9, 2018, Dorothy Ann Calhoun Fago departed in peace, surrounded by love.

Born in Lexington, Ky., in 1917, last year as she approached her 100th birthday, she was asked what was the most wonderful thing in the nearly 36,500 days of her long life. Pausing a moment, she replied with a smile, “Being born.”

D’Ann was raised by her grandparents, Naunerle Campbell Norwood and Richard Downing Norwood. From childhood, they recognized and encouraged her artistic talent. Graduating the University of Kentucky Phi Beta Kappa before the age of 20, D’Ann taught art to school kids in the rough and tumble coal town of Hazard, Ky. Her grandparents encouraged her to explore the world beyond her southern roots. She left Kentucky in 1939 on an Isabella Stewart Gardner scholarship to study painting at the Boston Museum School.

That set the stage for unfolding chapters in Boston, New York, Rockland County and finally Vermont. Here for the last 50 years, she drew and painted everywhere she found herself. She taught in schools and prisons, and as director of the State Arts and Crafts Service from the 1960’s into the 1970’s, she produced monthly printed newsletters connecting over 3000 scattered “can’t get there from here” Vermont artists and crafts people. D‘Ann and husband Vin always nourished community.

In her last years – as “Artist-in-Residence” at the Menig Nursing Home – she made, exhibited, and demonstrated in the thousands of sketches of the community and staff, her continuing use of art to expand horizons. We are grateful for the caring and skilled Menig staff, and all good friends – departed and here – who made her “extra innings” good ones.

She is loved and missed by daughter Celie, son John, his wife Julie and her dear grandson Evan Mullen.