Cynthia Heslen

WESTMINSTER WEST -- Cynthia “Snoo” Heslen, 50, of South Valley Road, died at Brattleboro Memorial Hospital on Saturday, July 9, 2005, after a long illness.

She was born on May 13, 1955, in Detroit, to Nancy B. Pullen and Robert F. Heslen. She was the firstborn of twins, entering the world an oft-noted two minutes before her brother Michael.

She left both high school and home at age 15, moving first to Cambridge, Mass., and then to Vermont. She worked at a variety of jobs during these youthful years, including maple sugaring, making leather clothes and shoulder bags, and working behind the counter at the Putney General Store.

In 1976, she decided to see whether she would benefit from a college education, wondering whether in the college environment she would be able to steer her own course.

Ms. Heslen began at Keene State College, and before long had made it into the Smith College Ada Comstock Scholars Program from which she was graduated cum laude with a degree in government in 1980. She was elected to Phi Beta Kappa.

She received her law degree from Northeastern University School of Law in 1983, and then served as a law clerk to the Hon. Herbert P. Wilkins, of the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, during the 1983-1984 court year.

She remained in Boston an additional two years working as an associate at the Palmer and Dodge law firm, and then happily took an 85 percent cut in pay in order to return to Vermont. “It's about having a pleasant life,” she said at the time.

While working for the environmental law firm of Anderson and Kreiger, she assisted a citizens group in their successful campaign to block the opening of a conglomerate big box store in Greenfield.

For a number of years, she worked for the Vermont District Attorney's office in Brattleboro. She put her legal training aside for a while to teach history at Springfield High School. She then took what became her favorite job as general counsel for Sovernet, Inc., in Bellows Falls.

Ms. Heslen was a warm and loving person. Each chapter of her life was populated by extensive groups of friends, and she knew how to maintain those relationships over vast stretches of years and miles.

She loved to travel, and has been to many distant places on the globe. She loved to cook and she especially loved hosting potluck and dinner parties where music was always a part of these gatherings. She loved sewing, specializing in quilt-making.

She is survived by her sister Tamara, of Fort Salonga, N.Y., and her niece, Sarah Scott, of Astoria, N.Y.

There will be a memorial service for Ms. Heslen on Saturday, July 16, at 2 p.m., at The United Church of Putney, followed by a pot-luck reception.

Contributions in her memory may be made to Sojourns Community Health Clinic of Westminster, or the Putney Public Library.u