Janet Elliott Whitehill Gibbons of Oak Bluffs died Dec. 19 at the Martha’s Vineyard Hospital after a brief illness. She was 91.

Janet was born in Watertown on April 6, 1916, the only child of James D. and Louise Paine Elliott. She grew up in Newton, graduated from Newton High School in 1934 and attended the Boston University home economics program.

The Depression sent Janet to work as a clerk at the Come and See Shop. There she met her future mother in law who suggested her son would be willing to teach Janet how to ski. While she learned to ski, it was never her favorite activity. It didn’t stop her from marrying her ski instructor, Duncan K. Whitehill, in July 1942 while he was in dental school. The following year she followed him around the country as he prepared to go overseas courtesy of the Army. When he returned from the war, they lived in several communities, including Natick, Framingham and Holliston while Dr. Duncan practiced dentistry in Wellesley Hills and finally Plymouth, N.H. She served as his receptionist for many years.

In 1956, they purchased a little old country house in Campton, N.H., appropriately named Camp Siberia after the Pogo cartoon strip where gangs of Cheerful Charlies, friends and relatives congregated for hiking and skiing.

In 1984, Janet and Duncan retired to Hendersonville, N.C. Duncan died shortly after their move. While attending a Hospice support group, Janet met her second husband, Edward P. Gibbons. They were married in 1988. Mr. Gibbons subsequently died in 1993.

Janet returned to New England after the September 11 attacks to be closer to her family. She lived in Providence, R.I., for several months and then relocated to Woodside Village on the Vineyard in 2002.

Janet was creative and artistic. She enjoyed painting, called herself a frustrated architect, and designed doll houses including electrical wiring, shingling, making the furniture based on antique construction, and designing the interiors. She taught herself how to sew and made many of her own clothes on a sewing machine that only went forward. She was also an accomplished organist, taking lessons as an adult, and faithfully playing for services at the Assembly of God in Plymouth, N.H.

While on the Vineyard, Janet became a member of the Vineyard Assembly of God, attended a weekly prayer meeting, and spent two days a week at The Anchors’ supportive day program.

Survivors include her two daughters, Julie Whitehill and her husband Tony Scheller of Oak Bluffs, and Laurie Whitehill Chong and her husband, Stanford Chong of Pawtucket, R.I.; four grandchildren, Leah Lyons and her husband Tom Lyons of Bangor, Me., Seth Coleman of Boston, Benjamin Steinsieck of South Portland, Me., and Bethany McGreevy and her husband, Gregg of Oakland, Calif.; and four great-grandsons, Timothy Wildanger, Anthony Moore, Trey Lyons 3rd and Finn McGreevy.

Donations may be made in her memory to The Anchors’ Supportive Day Program in care of Island Council on Aging, P.O. Box 1729, Vineyard Haven, MA 02568.