Elizabeth P. Carlisle

It is with great sadness that we announce the death at 97 years of Elizabeth Winning Carlisle, beloved mother, grandmother and great- grandmother, not to mention matriarch of the Carlisle family. 

Betsy lived for 59 joyous years in the family homestead in Leverett MA, with her adoring and much adored husband, Arthur Elliott Carlisle who died in 2017 after a magical marriage of 68 years. She leaves behind a raucous clan of five children, Cynthia of Monterrey, Mexico, Christopher and wife Nathalie of North Leverett, MA, Mark and wife Susan of Ashburnham, MA, Elizabeth of Kansas City, Missouri and Timothy and wife Karen of Rye, New York, along with 14 much-loved grandchildren and 15 adored great-grandchildren with one more on the way.

Betsy began her life adventure in Gardner, MA on March 23, 1928. Her family moved to Utica, New York when she was little, on to Defiance, Ohio and then to Toledo, Ohio, where her adventure as an adult began. She attended Smith College in Northampton where she developed a profound and lasting affinity with New England. On graduating, she married the love of her life and moved to Windsor, Ontario and then to a tiny town outside Windsor, Tecumseh. In her unquenchable thirst for knowledge and culture, she took graduate English Literature courses at the University of Michigan where Elliott was getting his MBA. Their love of knowledge and education led them to pack up the clan and move to Ann Arbor, where she obtained her Master’s Degree in English.

Upon Elliot obtaining a position at the University of Massachusetts, Betsy returned to her beloved New England where she taught at UMass and Amherst Regional High School. But never one to stay still long, she wasted no time in pursuing another of her passions—art history, obtaining her MA and EdD, focusing on the value of medieval cathedral friezes in the education of an illiterate population. She was then inspired to write a history of the Pioneer Valley’s Porter Phelps family as recorded through the letters of their matriarch, Elizabeth Porter Phelps. Earthbound and Heavenbent was published by Scribner Books in 2007.

As a wife and mother, she was unparalleled, constantly looking for new adventures, new horizons, and a way to add to the joy in her own life, that of her family, and of the people around her. Her unquenchable love of travel led her to embark on innumerable adventures with Elliott and many times with the whole crew, to experience life abroad in a way in which few people have had the luxury. She was tough, determined, and at the same time, of the most gentle and generous spirit. She will be sorely missed.

A celebration of her life will be held on Saturday, September 27, 2025 at St. John’s Episcopal Church in Ashfield, MA