Stuart Prickett Coleman

1955 - 2014
Stuart Coleman: Chemist, Singer, Outdoorsman Dies at 58
December 1, 1955 – October 12, 2014

Stuart Prickett Coleman was born in Denver, Colorado, on December 1, 1955 to his joyful parents, Mary Catherine Prickett and Charles Mosby Coleman, on their fourth wedding anniversary. Stuart married his beloved wife Elmira Azadeh, a virtuoso pianist, August 31, 1980 while a student of opera in New York. In 1997, they moved to Orange, Connecticut making their home with their beautiful daughter Leyla amidst bucolic grounds and gardens. Stuart left this earthly life for the next at Connecticut Hospice in Branford where on Sunday evening October 12th, he finished his battle with cancer surrounded by his cherished Elmira, Leyla, and extended family.

Stuart lived with intense curiosity. As a child, he began his stratospheric inquiries into chemistry with a successful miniature rocket-building (and launching) club. Stuart's dedication to learning - about everything - led him to experience in less than six decades more than one would hope for in ten! Stuart was fully engaged and delighted with our magnificent world, and yes, that meant taking a few years to study ballet as well as some Mandarin Chinese; he was Renaissance man in the best sense of the word. Naturalist, chemist, entrepreneur, (an expert in mass spectrometry at Bayer and eventually in his own laboratory); he was also an accomplished musician. A skilled French horn player in high school, he switched to voice in college; his deep baritone solos graced churches in New York and New Haven. Eventually, his home choir and home church became the Center Church on the Green in New Haven - where he read Scripture for the Sunday services. As a lay reader, he pursued the meaning of The Word with characteristic vigor and became renewed in his Christian Faith.

Stuart was an athlete, and his love of the wilderness led him to undertake exquisite adventures. He hiked the Appalachian Trail, explored Quebec's Gaspé Peninsula, trekked through Iceland; camped along the Pacific coast, and canoed through Canada and New England. Even after the onset of pancreatic cancer earlier this year, he continued hiking and swimming, and he returned to his favorite area, the Connecticut River Valley and his grandparents' Vermont home. Stuart embraced challenges, chose the road less traveled, and allowed music to buoy his soul. He was a lover of beauty, a lover of his family, and a lover of God.

All are welcome to services: Saturday's Funeral November 1st at 2:00 P.M. St. George's Church, 209 East 16th Street at Rutherford Place NYC 10003; Sunday's Memorial Service, November 2nd at Noon, Center Church on the Green, 311 Temple Street, New Haven, CT 06511. In addition to his wife, daughter, and parents, Stuart is survived by his four siblings: Mary Vernon Blackwell Coleman, John Wilgar Coleman, Anna Mosby Coleman, Patty Glenn Coleman Selker; his cousins including first cousins: Edward, David, and Peter Eyes; Pricketts': Mary, Elaine, JoAnna, and John; treasured in-laws, Tayeb, Leyla, Assef, Aydin, Marie, Richard; and dearest nieces and nephews.