It was the spring of 1949, and the dean of students at Emmanuel College in Boston was worried. Chester V. Sweatt, superintendent of the Martha’s Vineyard Public Schools, was sitting in the next room, waiting to interview graduating seniors for teacher vacancies on the Island that fall. And the dean had no candidates.

Rose Bufalo of Cohasset arrived at that moment to begin her student job in the dean’s office. She was to graduate in a few weeks with her bachelor’s degree in elementary education. The dean took her by the arm, and pushing her into the office where Mr. Sweatt was patiently waiting, said in a loud stage whisper, “Get in there.”

Until that moment, Rose had no idea where the Vineyard was. She emerged from the interview with a job teaching fifth grade at the Tisbury School.

Rose died on Sunday, Dec. 16, at her home in Vineyard Haven after a long illness. Her children were with her. 

Rose M. Bufalo was born on May 13, 1928 in Cohasset. She attended Cohasset schools and received her bachelor’s degree from Emmanuel College in 1949. She was married to George Anthony in March 1951. Mr. Anthony died in February 2000.

Rose began her life on the Vineyard on Sept. 1, 1949. She was driven to Woods Hole by a brother and mother Catherine. After arriving on the Island, they walked from the boat up to Daggett avenue to Art Swift’s boarding house, the first boarding house on the list provided by the Tisbury School. She joined three other teachers renting rooms, at $15 a week including meals (although Sunday dinner was always a cold buffet). She began teaching fifth grade at the Tisbury School a few days later, with Terry Hanley, Art Swift’s grandson, in her first class.

Less than two years later, she married George Anthony of Oak Bluffs, the handsome man with the wavy hair who worked for Carter’s Electric and installed at the boarding house what was the third television on the Vineyard. 

As she and George raised their growing family, first on Daggett avenue, then on Davis street and Skiff avenue in Vineyard Haven, she kept her hand in the school system by working as a substitute teacher. When her youngest, Iris, reached school age, Rose returned to full-time teaching as a reading and special needs teacher at Martha’s Vineyard Regional High School.

In the mid-1970s, commuting between the Island and Weston, she earned her master’s degree in learning disabilities from Regis College in 1977. She taught at the high school until her retirement in 1986.

Her devotion to education continued during and after her teaching career. She was a founding member of the Martha’s Vineyard Literacy Project, serving as literacy program coordinator for several years. She also organized the annual summer program benefit, recruiting well-known authors to read from their works for the benefit of the program. 

One of her lesser known activities was to act as a counselor and parent advocate to the public school system for families whose children were involved in special needs or learning disabilities programs. She kept in touch with those families throughout the years, as well as with families who took advantage of her summer tutoring services from the 1960s until only a few years ago.

She held a strong interest in the theatre, performing in high school and Emmanuel College theatrical productions. In the summer of 1949, she was a member of a Boston College summer theatre program, with a young and unknown Leonard Nimoy among her fellow students. She resumed her theatrical career with the Vineyard Playhouse, appearing as a juror in a production of Twelve Angry Men, although the title needed a slight alteration.

In the 1970s, she also managed Duffer’s Delight Miniature Golf, located on State Road behind her husband’s Island Electronics business. She recruited her older children to work there as well, and spent many evenings at the popular summer entertainment, greeting new visitors and returning families.

During her retirement, she pursued many interests. She belonged to a group of retired teachers called The Breakfast Club, meeting once a month for breakfast and conversation. She was also an active member of the Vineyard’s widows’ support group as well as an ostomy support group. When on her way to their meetings, she would announce she was off to her meeting with The Bag Ladies, and thought that a wildly funny joke. 

Using her gift for narrative, Rose was an early advocate of storytelling for both children and adults. She was a featured performer at the Second Vineyard Storytellers Festival sponsored by her friend Susan Klein of Oak Bluffs.

She was a weekly volunteer at the Chilmark Public Library and participated in the Island SHARE program. Reaching back many years, she felt strongly about supporting Island agriculture, with Nip ’n’ Tuck Farm supplying milk and Webb’s Farm of Oak Bluffs delivering eggs for her large family. In later years, she was a member of farm cooperative and sustainable farming programs.

In the past few years, Rose worked at the visitor information booth at the Vineyard Haven boat wharf although, when asked, she declined to give people directions to Nantucket.

Retirement also put her on the golf course, where she was a member of Mink Meadows Golf Club, as much to keep up with her husband as for the enjoyment of the game. Wednesday was her day off, and she could always be found at Mink Meadows with her friends Lois DeBettencourt and the late Jean Leonard.

Rose had many opportunities to travel the world. In 1975 she spent two weeks driving around Ireland with her husband, visiting surviving family members of her mother’s family in County Mayo. In 1982, she toured Venice, Rome, Sorrento and the Calabria region of Italy with her son Michael. Included in that trip was a memorable 12-course dinner with her father’s family in the mountain town of Dinami, Italy. She brought home many recipes from her cousin and master chef Veneranda Bufalo. She returned to Ireland in 1994 while her daughter Iris was living in Dublin.

Rose and George also spent 10 years wintering in Bermuda, both for the golf and the shopping. Many a Christmas present had been found in the thrift shops or fine stores of Hamilton, Bermuda. She was also devoted to the sun and sky of Gay Head, later Aquinnah, building two different summer homes near the Gay Head Baptist Church. She spent as much time as possible at the camp, enjoying the view of Moshup’s Trail and Nomans Land from her front deck, and breakfasting at the Aquinnah Shop.

Her last exploration was in May of this year, where she journeyed to Los Angeles to visit Iris, accompanied again by her son Michael and joined by daughter Janet. What was unusual about this trip was that they traveled to and from Los Angeles by Amtrak sleeper service. 

She was deeply committed to Island life. Town meetings were important, but so were Easter egg hunts at Viera Park in Oak Bluffs and at her friend Muriel Fisher’s Nip ’n’ Tuck Farm in West Tisbury. Each August the house was bustling with various projects and baking entries for the agricultural fair, until the car was loaded with kids and cookies to deliver entries and hope for blue ribbons. At Christmas, she led a family project to fill a Red Stocking for a child in need — something to eat, something to wear, something to play with were the guidelines. Rose would gather all the family together to wrap the gifts, helping her children understand Christmas was as much for giving to those in need as it was for the wild scramble down the stairs on Christmas morning. 

Baked beans for a widower, cookies for hospital patients, and serving as a bartender during cocktail hour at Windemere were all outlets for her giving heart.

Beach-going was a joy to Rose from the day she arrived in Vineyard Haven. With her young family on Daggett avenue, she found the small beach at Owen Little Way; as the family grew, they moved on to Owen Park beach, ending days in the water with a band concert. Later, summer nights ended with outings to the Joseph A. Sylvia State Beach in Oak Bluffs, where hamburgers and hot dogs on a grill over a hole in the sand was a happy supper — and no cleanup — for the family. Husband George would drive along the beach until he spotted the family car, then join in for a quick swim and a hot dog or two.

Rose was always deeply committed to St. Augustine’s Church, her parish since her arrival in 1949. She was shocked to learn that the Catholic community in Vineyard Haven was small enough then for St. Augustine’s to be designated a mission church.  She was a vibrant and active member of the parish, serving with the Ladies Guild, teaching Catholic education classes, and as recently as last year serving as a member of the Good Shepard Parish Advisory Council.

Rose was also a self-published author. Under the label of Rozay Press, she published and sold in Island bookstores her travel guide Things To Do with Children on Martha’s Vineyard, and An Island Primer, an alphabet book of Island places and people. She also co-authored Golf Is For You, an introduction to the rules and terms of the game, with Lois DeBettencourt and Jean Leonard. The three of them used the marketing of their book as a reason for forays off-Island to plush golf courses and country clubs they might not otherwise visit. 

Survivors include her nine children, Michael of Dorchester and his spouse Carlos Tejera, Catherine DeGeorge of Foxboro and her husband Jon, Timothy of Port St. Lucie, Fla., and his wife Susan, Janet Hathaway of Edgartown and her husband Doug, Rosemary of Scituate and her companion William Berry, Joel of West Tisbury and his wife Victoria, Annette of Oak Bluffs, Christine Anthony-Kurth of Oak Bluffs and Iris of Los Angeles, Calif.; her grandchildren Ethan and Matthew DeGeorge, Ashley and Ross Hathaway, Shelby Lavin, Luke Dunlap, Adam Clark and Jason David Kurth; her sister-in-law Alice Sadowski of New Bedford; many nieces and nephews of the Hurley, Sage, Bergeron and Sadowski families; her close friend Lois DeBettencourt of Oak Bluffs; countless other friends both on and off-Island; and relations in Ireland, Italy, Switzerland and Australia.

She is pre-deceased by her parents, four brothers and two sisters.

A funeral Mass was celebrated on Wednesday, Dec. 19 at Our Lady, Star of the Sea Catholic Church in Oak Bluffs, followed by interment at Oak Grove Cemetery in Vineyard Haven.

Donations may be made to Rachael V. Williams Memorial Scholarship, in care of Martha’s Vineyard Public Schools, RR2, P.O. Box 261, Vineyard Haven, MA 02568 or to the Island Food Pantry, P.O. Box 1874, Vineyard Haven, MA 02568.