Obituary of Elizabeth Brown Eckman

Elizabeth Brown Eckman September 1, 1936 - November 12, 2010 Elizabeth Brown Eckman, born September 1, 1936 and raised up in Summersville, West Virginia, passed on from this life shortly before 4 o'clock on the morning of Friday, November 12, 2010. She was 74 years old. Her daughters, Elizabeth Eckman Davis and Anne K. Eckman, and her son-in-law David N. Schulman, to all of whom she was fiercely devoted, were by her bedside. A potent though unsung artist, her portrait of at least one former director of the Central Intelligence Agency was preferred by its subject to the official portrait commissioned by the U.S. government. In her day, she was also a beautiful skier who, against doctor's orders, took to the downhill slopes at Aspen, Colorado in her third trimester of pregnancy, to no ill effect. She grew up the daughter of a physician, Eugene Scott Brown, and his wife Louise Huddleston Brown, in Summersville, West Virginia. From the time she left to attend college, she had little desire to return to the life she had known there. Yet she carried from her upbringing both a graciousness and down-to-earthness that never left her. Her vivid, precise vocabulary included not infrequent turns of West Virginia phrase ("As sure as G-- made little green apples," "I say let her lie where Jesus flang her.") Her graciousness and gratitude remained until the end, continuing to impart the importance of good grammar and manners to her daughters, and unfailingly thanking those who provided any help large or small. After graduating from Carnegie Mellon University with a B.A. in Fine Arts, Elizabeth Brown Eckman spent a memorable, youthful year as a school teacher of art in Annapolis, Maryland, with her friend Jane Roche. They shared an apartment which was perfect in every respect, save the absence of a kitchen and the seemingly unsought-after attentions of the gallant midshipmen of Annapolis. She moved to California shortly thereafter, and in 1960 married Philip Keeley Eckman, whose employers included Jet Propulsion Laboratory and eventually the CIA. Her marriage of 27 years ended in divorce. During their time in California, she survived a car crash in Mexico of their new Porsche Carrera and enjoyed living first in a glass house that they built in the foothills of La Ca ñ ada and then in an old Spanish-style home on South Berkeley Avenue in Pasadena. In California, she also deepened her life-long love affair with the natural world - backpacking the High Sierra, camping the Southwest and Baja, and enjoying adventures with fellow folk dancers (the Mountain Dancers) and longtime friends Margery and Iain Nicolson. In California and then McLean, Virginia, Elizabeth raised two daughters Anne and Elizabeth, whose births she always referred to as the two greatest days of her life. Elizabeth Brown Eckman worked outside the home, and her favorite employment remained the period she served as a librarian at the Huntington Library in California. After moving to Virginia in 1978, she earned a real estate license and worked as a paralegal. She also returned to her art, focusing on drawing in colored pencil and receiving acclaim in juried shows at the Torpedo Factory. She claimed the Washington, DC area as her chosen home for the past 30-plus years, and took immense pleasure in living for the last 12 years of her life in Reston, Virginia, whose woods and birds she loved, whether outdoors for a walk or, in more recent years, sitting in her sunroom in her favorite chair, classical music on the radio and her cat Catherine nearby. She avidly loved the natural world; music (Yo-Yo Ma, George Jones); good food, wine and decadent desserts; Starbucks ("venti skim cappuccino, wet, 170"); and sports, especially tennis (Wimbledon and the US Open) and baseball (the Yankees). Thanks to her daughter Elizabeth and her late husband Russell Lloyd Davis of Atlanta, she late in life had a piece of her heart snatched by her red-headed grandson John Keeley Davis, now age three. A series of serious illnesses challenged the last fifteen years of her life. But supported by her daughters, son-in-law and close friends Valerie Bannister, Ana Bannister, and Ilse Williams, and cared for by a devoted team of health care providers, she prevailed again and again before a rogues gallery of medical conditions that included rheumatoid arthritis, lupus, fibromyalgia, polymiocitis, COPD, a severe retroperitoneal bleed, endometrial cancer and, most recently, two compression fractures of the vertebrae. She rarely complained, instead most often saying "I am doing very well" and, when not doing so well, still led with her keen sense of humor and relentless will to live her best life. On more than one occasion when hospitalized, she was known to ask a doctor, who would be making a note in her very thick chart, whether he or she were "still working on their memoirs." Elizabeth Brown Eckman began her last days at Fairfax Nursing Center, where she approached rehab for her second spinal fracture with the heart of an Olympic athlete. Her impressive progress, however, was cut short by a sudden, severe infection that turned to sepsis. Elizabeth Brown Eckman is survived by her daughters, Anne K. Eckman and Elizabeth Eckman Davis, her grandson John Keeley Davis, her son-in-law David N. Schulman, her brother Eugene Brown and sister Louise Weaver of California, her close friends and companions of Reston, Virginia, and her cat Catherine. According to her wishes, her remains will be scattered in the High Sierra Mountains of California, one of her favorite spots among the many on this earth she "did so enjoy." In lieu of flowers, those who wish might consider a gift in her memory to either Home Stretch Animal Rescue (checks made payable to Home Stretch Animal Rescue, 11195 Silentwood Lane, Reston, VA 20191) or the Sierra Club Foundation, http://www.sierraclub.org/foundation/.