Deanna Lee French

Deanna Lee French, of Hyde Park, Vermont, passed from this world on the afternoon of November 10, listening to the song that brought back memories of her mother and surrounded in love with her children at her bedside. She was 79.  

Born to Corrine Adams-Morse and Hugh Morse in the town of Waterbury. Deanna was a bright and vivacious woman who would grow to be as comfortable in the stands of Centennial Park, cheering on her home state's local baseball team with a soda in one hand and one, or perhaps several, of her beloved grandchildren in the other, as she was among the quiet files and stacks of Green Mountain history; to be found perusing through town clerk's offices and libraries alike, those same hands finding the pages and spines of books of names, ages, and date of births forgotten by the common memory but to whom she spent her entire life dedicated to recovering and commemorating. 

Widowed young from her husband, Archie Aaron French, Deanna would spend the next forty years of her life with the father of her daughter, Donna, one Ernest Glen Emerson; in him she would find a man not only as kind and true to herself and their child as she was herself, but a partner who received his wife's previous four children with equal love and compassion, becoming known as the"Uncle" to three generations of family to follow. Survived by her 5 children, David, Deborah, Aaron, Duane and Donna; grandchildren; Keith, Shylo, Corey, Jacob, Sadie, Dagan, Salina & Lilly along with 20 great grandchildren.

With little capable of dissuading her from a task that she set once she set it. Deanna's greatest joys could be found in the dust-strewn archives of lost or forgotten local lore. Her work as a self-trained genealogist and amateur historian not only gave direction and purpose through the evening hours of her life, but allowed her to shine a light on many a family separated by time and circumstance. There was a spark to be found in not only tracing her own family's lineage throughout the winding years but also in doing so for others, in reuniting brothers and sisters, mothers and husbands and cousins lost to each other through time. As dedicated to the Lamoille Valley as the land of her birth would become to her, Deanna was passionately involved in all manner of local charities, school sports teams and the Boy and Girl Scouts troops that came to know her to be as much of a mother to them as she was to her own beloved children. Somewhere between restoring the history of Sterling Township and chronicling the lives of those Vermonters who gave their lives over in this country's Civil War; alongside her tireless efforts to restore Morrisville's own memorial monument to those long-ago battles, Deanna somehow found the time to raise a family that spanned not only her own children, but theirs and even theirs as well. Grandkids and great-grandkids alike found a home in Grammy and Grampy’s place; books could be read, hurts could be tended to, and love would be given to any and all of the disparate leaves that clung to the branches of that great tree that Deanna discovered.

The names and ages, commemorations and memorialization of the past that she held so dear were featured most prominently in that great and sprawling family maple, and to her last breath there was a smile on her lips to say those names over and over again; she is survived by us who had the great joy in knowing this woman as Mom, or Grandma, or Nana and whatever else we needed her to be throughout the years.

Faith Funeral Home is assisting the family. Online condolences may be made by visiting faithfh.net.