PENNY ALLDERDICE

Rancher. Cytogeneticist. Professor. Unitarian-Universalist Minister. Independent Thinker. January 5, 1932 – May 23, 2025 Dr. Penelope Witte Allderdice had an accomplished life as a cytogeneticist at Memorial University in St. John's, NL, before retiring and obtaining an M.Div degree at Meadville-Lombard in Chicago. She lived with fierce resolve right to the end. Her last wish expressed the courage of her convictions: suffering from debilitating illness and unable to continue living independently, she died at home with Medical Assistance with her son, Jacob, at her side. Penny grew up in a former Shaker Village in Harvard, Mass, where her family owned the "Square House," previous home of Mother Ann Lee, the founder of the Shaker Movement. The Witte family grew their own food, cooked, knit and sewed, and strove for self-sufficiency. Penny treasured raising animals, riding her bike, and exploring. As an adult, she would often credit her childhood in the Shaker Village for fostering her independence, curiosity, self-reliance, self-confidence, and love of nature. She also shared the Shaker belief in equality of the sexes. Penny earned an A.B. from the University of Chicago and landed in a Master's program in plant genetics at Utah State University in Logan, Utah. There, she met her future husband, William, a former cowboy. They married and bought a Montana cattle ranch. They taught in a one-room school, lived on venison Bill hunted, and raised what Penny always called her "finest crop:" their three children, Edward, Jacob, and Frances. They eventually made the hard choice to sell their below-subsistence-level ranch and returned to grad school in Bozeman, ending up at Columbia University, NYC. They were both hired at Memorial University of Newfoundland in 1973. Penny became a well-known professor at Memorial and the Janeway Children's Hospital, teaching cytogenetics to medical students, interns, and residents. Her research was widely published and she received many competitive research grants. She served on the National Research Council of Canada and other national bodies. She was best known for finding the cause of severe disabilities among residents of Sandy Point, NL (a "periocentric inversion on chromosome 3," a.k.a "Allderdice Syndrome"). Penny retired as Professor Emeritus in 1997. Penny's passion for learning and lifelong interest in the sacred (her maternal grandfather was a minister in Oak Park, Illinois) led her back to Chicago after retiring from MUN. As a Unitarian-Universalist chaplain, she worked in Buffalo, Hamilton, Toronto, and in St John's. But Penny's great passion was always her garden. In St. John's, she was known for her ducks, turkeys, and hens; her tulips, daffodils and scilla; and a forest of special trees: among them, beeches, lindens, acer griseum (and even a gingko, grown from a nut harvested in Toronto). Penny is survived by her son, Jacob (Sharon); daughter, Frances; and her five grandchildren: Jasper, Morgan, Celeste, Rowan, and Lillian. She was predeceased by her firstborn son, Edward (1981); and her husband, Bill (2017). A celebration of life will be scheduled for 2026.