Kathryn E. Nelson, teacher, missionary, civic leader, college administrator and foundation executive, died Thursday night (January 26, 2006) in her sleep, according to a family spokesperson.
She was raised in Detroit and Memphis, and she graduated from LeMoyne-Owen College in Memphis with a degree in social science.
After earning a joint master’s degree in religious education from Columbia University Teachers College and Union Theological Seminary in New York, she was named director of Christian education for the Episcopal Missionary District in Haiti in the late 1940s.
She served in Haiti two years before she returned to the United States, married and had four children.
In 1960, she became a social worker at the Annie Malone Children’s Home.
She would later join the Forest Park Community College staff and serve there for more than 15 years.
In 1988, she joined the Danforth Foundation as a program director.
She had “retired” in 1993, but continued to work with the Danforth Foundation, St. Louis Public Library and the Forest Park Master Plan Committee.
Now known as Forest Park Forever, the organization honored Nelson last summer for her years of service.
She held an honorary doctorate from Saint Louis University, and throughout her career had been an advocate for St. Louis children. She was the 1995 recipient of the St. Louis American Salute to Excellence in Education Lifetime Achiever Award.
