Eleanora Kingman Valued Conversations with Friends

Eleanora Kingman died at her home in Millburn, N.J., on Sept. 13, two months before her 91st birthday.

Eleanora dearly loved the Vineyard - swimming, sailing and walking on the beach. Her connections with the Island go back many years. Her mother vacationed in Edgartown in the 1890s. When her children were young, she brought them every summer to the house which her brother, Grosvenor Blood, owned on Cottage street in Edgartown.

In 1969 Eleanora and her husband, Barclay Kingman, bought the house on Pease's Point Way where the family still comes as often as possible. She and Barclay were fixtures on the beach at the Bend in the Road every morning at 10 a.m. - rain or shine. Their beach time included conversations with the late Peg and Milt Knowles and also the late professor Valentine Giamatti from Mount Holyoke College. Professor Giamatti also came to their house for discussion on the Italian poet Dante. Another Vineyard connection is the Rev. Francis B. Sayre Jr. of Vineyard Haven, who was best man at her wedding. Mrs. James (Sonya) Norton of Vineyard Haven is a cousin.

Her husband predeceased her in December 1996. She is survived by her three children, the Rev. Perry Kingman of Webster, Elizabeth Costello of Andover and Daniel Kingman of Hartford, Conn., and six grandchildren.

Eleanora was interred in Rosedale Cemetery in West Orange, N.J.