Janet Campbell Amick

Janet Campbell Amick, a passionate gardener and enthusiastic volunteer, died Wednesday, January 28, 2009 in her apartment at the Nashua Crossings assisted living facility. She was 90.

From 1985 until last September, when she moved to Nashua, she lived in Grantham, NH. She was an avid gardener until her chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) made it difficult for her to get into the garden or to fulfill her other love-volunteering.

Mrs. Amick was a member of the Grantham Garden Club and the Grantham Democratic Town Committee. Always the consummate volunteer, she helped with numerous community and charitable causes, including raising funds for cancer research and designing arrangements from the flowers in her garden to donate for special events. For many years she served on the Eastman Council as a representative of the Greensward Special Place and on Eastman's Community Relations Committee and its Hospitality subcommittee. She also volunteered to help Eastman Recreation run such activities as the monthly Pot Luck Suppers and the weekly evening Bridge events. She thoroughly enjoyed playing bridge and the many friends she made while participating in several bridge groups.

Her volunteer activities spanned most of her adult life. While living in the suburbs of St. Louis, MO with her husband and three children, she became active in the St. Louis Chapter of the Engineers' Wives, an affiliation of the Missouri Society of Professional Engineers, and served for several years as its President. She is remembered for establishing the popular Engineer Wives Cookbooks, which were sold to raise many thousands of dollars for college scholarships. When her daughter, Carol, decided to run for the Massachusetts Legislature in the early 1970s and re-election to the Massachusetts Senate every two years through the late 1980s, Mrs. Amick left her home and her husband in Missouri to travel to Bedford, MA where she spent several months at a time volunteering in her daughter's numerous political campaigns.

Born in Glasgow, Scotland, Mrs. Amick came to the United States with her family when she was five, and settled in Schenectady, NY. She attended the State University of New York for two years but had to suspend her studies during the Great Depression. She worked for General Electric in Schenectady as the chief administrative assistant to the Vice President in charge of recruiting engineering graduates from universities across the U.S. It was through her work in this position that she met her husband, Charles L. Amick.

Mrs. Amick was predeceased by her husband and her son, Dr. Charles L. Amick. She is survived by two daughters, Joan Toomey of Carmel, IN and former Massachusetts Senator Carol Amick-Moonan of Bedford, MA; seven grandchildren, David and Christopher Toomey of Carmel, IN, Scott Toomey of Mason, OH, Janet Moonan of Somerville, MA, William Moonan of Tullahoma, TN and Alexandra and Charles Amick of Cambridge, England; and three great grandchildren.

Funeral arrangements have not been completed. In lieu of flowers, contributions may be made in her name to the Charles J. Amick Memorial Lectures in Applied Mathematics of the University of Chicago Department of Mathematics, 5734 S. University Avenue, Chicago, IL, 60637. To sign an online guestbook please visit www.chadwickfuneralservice.com.