An obituary was published
Rebecca Porteous Jackson Sargent
Rebecca Porteous Jackson Sargent departed this life on All Saints Day, Monday, November 1, 2010, 14 days shy of her 92nd birthday.
A woman of exceptional beauty, grace and intelligence, she was beloved by family and friends the world over. A New Englander by birth and in spirit, she had a grit and inner well of great personal fortitude that sustained her throughout her life. She had the highest standards in all things, especially herself. In many ways Becca was a product of her time period; she was formal in manner, yet extremely evolved and democratic in terms of her world view.
A graduate of Wellesley College, Becca met her future husband in 1940 on a remote lake in Maine. Invited to a wedding anniversary celebration there, she was taken aback to discover the "bridesmaids" were fully grown young men swathed in mosquito netting "tulle," with grapefruit "falsies," broccoli bouquets and ample applications of lipstick. One "bridesmaid" in particular, James Cunningham Sargent, a recent graduate of the University of Virginia Law School, was instantly smitten with the young woman from Winchester, Massachusetts and despite his get up was able to secure a date. He took her canoeing and when the canoe (accidentally-on-purpose) tipped over and she came up laughing, he knew he'd met his match. They were married three years later.
Directly after their wedding night spent at the Waldorf Astoria, the young couple moved to Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, where Jim was stationed at Olmstead Air Force Base. After Jim shipped out to the South Pacific, Becca joined the Waves, an active, selfless, idealistic decision, unsurprising given her character. After a two-year separation, during which time a foot lockers' worth of letters were exchanged, the couple was reunited and settled in New York City. Theirs was a true marriage of the minds. Though they assumed the traditional roles of the era, they shared the mutual respect of equals. And so after the birth of her two sons, Stephen Denny and James Cunningham, at Jim's urging, Becca returned to school, receiving her M.A. in English literature from Columbia University. The couple had another child while still in New York, Felicity Hale. Jim, who had been making a name for himself as a corporate lawyer eventually earned the distinction of being tapped by the Eisenhower Administration as a commissioner of the Securities and Exchange Commission. When the Senate confirmation came through, they rented out their brownstone on 84th Street and moved with their children to Washington, D.C.
It was here that their fourth child, Sarah Blanchard was born. Though Jim loved public office, the salary was insufficient to support four children in private schools and so after his term was up, the family moved back to New York City in 1960, so he could enter private practice. Though Becca never had a paying job during the years of her marriage, she was one of those women who threw herself into volunteer work. She was president for many years of the Chapin-Brearley Exchange, the consignment shop that benefited the Chapin and Brearley (her daughters' alma mater) schools' scholarship fund. She served for over 15 years as president of the Lincoln Fund, a charity established from the proceeds of the sale of the original Lincoln Hospital, one of the nation's first black teaching hospitals. Exhibiting great personal courage and integrity, she traveled throughout the four boroughs of New York vetting inner city educational organizations vying for grants. Toward the end of her time in New York she edited Columbia University's graduate schools newsletter.
In New York, Jim and Becca enjoyed an active social life. Avid dancers, they were members of New York's Waltz Series of which Becca was also president, the New York Assembly and the St. Andrew's Society. Becca was president of the Cosmopolitan Club in New York from 1988 until 1991.
Jim and Becca balanced their full urban lives with rustic summers spent in Maine at the family compound or camping in Canada. Whether it was tennis, hiking, white water canoeing, Becca was up for it all and she excelled at anything she put her hand to. She and Jim epitomized the notion of good sportsmanship.
Two notable trips were undertaken by the family. The first was a two-month camping trip by car across the United States and included an epic pack trip in the mountains of Montana. The second, in 1967, was a three-month grand tour of Europe. Jim's schedule dictated that he could only take a month off, but he persuaded Becca, who had never been to Europe, to proceed ahead of him with the children (three of whom were teenagers). On arrival in Luxembourg, via a 12-hour prop plane flight that stopped en route in Iceland, the family collected a brand new Volvo station wagon and set off armed only with an enormous AAA Triptic, but no booked-ahead accommodations to wend its way slowly to Venice and a reunion with pater familias. The trip proved to be a seminal experience for all four children. Not only as an introduction to Europe's cultural treasures, traveling at a time when there were few Americans abroad, but also in the example set by their mother who was game enough to step far out of her comfort zone to broaden her mind. Following that initial trip, she would return again and again, taking her daughters hiking in the Austrian Alps, touring Greece with Jim, exchanging a house with a family in Edinburgh, the spirit of adventure ignited within her.
After many years in New York, Jim and Becca sold their brownstone and moved to Charlottesville in 1997, where their two daughters were living and where they'd spent a good deal of time over the years attending law school events. During this time they continued their travels including two trips to Asia. In India in their late 80s, they made a special pilgrimage to that monument of conjugal love, the Taj Mahal.
In New York, Jim and Becca were members of the Church of Epiphany where Becca ran the rummage sale and worked in the soup kitchen. When she moved to Charlottesville she worked at the Loaves and Fishes soup kitchen through Christ Church, which she and Jim attended.
Jim died in 2008; Becca's family knows they are now reunited, "at play in the fields of the Lord."
In addition to her children, Becca leaves her sister, Nancy Pendleton Jackson Seiberling; former daughter-in-law, Julie Graham Sargent; daughter-in-law Paige Katherine Turner; son-in-law, Carroll Marbury Blundon; beloved and bereft grandchildren, Felicity Graham Sargent, Natalie Cunningham Sargent Clark and her husband, Cameron Sinclair Clark, Stephen Denny Sargent Jr., Katherine Chilcott Sargent, Peter Franchot Pendleton Sargent, Emma Jackson Sargent, William Bradford Sargent, Charles Carroll Blundon, Alexander Quarrier Blundon, Alida Cunningham Blundon; and a great-grandson, Cabel Sinclair Clark; devoted pets Tallulah and Darwin and many, many friends.
The family wishes to express its gratitude to her wonderful companions, Bob Stevens and Sally Cochran, Maria Gleason and Patricia Blue and caregivers, Kathy Roach and Kelly Frazier, all of whom accompanied her on this journey with love and respect.
A memorial celebration is planned for New York in Spring 2011.
In lieu of flowers, the family requests donations be made to the Hospice of the Piedmont or to the 2012 reelection campaign of Barack Obama in memory of this true patriot.
This obituary was originally published in the Daily Progress.
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