- Date Of Birth: October 15, 1921
- Date Of Death: May 22, 2015
- State: Connecticut
Elizabeth “Betty” (Bushnell) Nichols, died peacefully on Friday, May 22, 2015 after a short illness. Born in New Haven on October 15, 1921 to Emerson Blake Bushnell and Annie (Brindley) Bushnell, she was a direct descendent of one of three Bushnell brothers who came to this country from England in the late 1630’s and settled in CT. She grew up with her family in Shrewsbury, MA graduating from Shrewsbury High School in 1939 as valedictorian and a member of the National Honor Society. In 1943, she graduated from Massachusetts State College (now UMass) with a Bachelor of Science Degree in Home Economics. Instead of teaching as planned, she accepted a job at Aetna Casualty Insurance Company in Hartford, in the Special Risk Casualty Underwriting Department in September, 1943 after she and her college roommate spent the summer cooking for 40 people at a boys’ and girls’ music camp in western Massachusetts. She worked at the Aetna until she and Merrill A. Nichols of Hartford were married on June 28, 1947 at Immanuel Congregational Church in Hartford, which she had joined in 1943 and had taught Sunday school there. When their two children were young, she worked two stints at the Aetna on the Housewife’s shift (6 p.m. to 10 p.m. weekday evenings) in the Group Experience Rating Department. When their children were in high school and college, she returned to the Aetna to work full time days in the same department, from which she retired with 15 and a half years’ service. In 1954, she and her family moved from Hartford to Newington, where she and her husband lived until moving to Avery Heights in Hartford in 2005. Upon joining the Church of Christ, Congregational in Newington in 1954, she taught Sunday school. She was the Leader of Circle 1 of the Women’s Fellowship, Chairman of the Board of Deaconesses, Secretary of the Diaconate, Vice Chairman of the Board of Trustees and Chairman of the Nominating Committee. She also was Leader, Secretary and Treasurer of the Business and Professional Women’s group of the church. She was a member of the Newington Historical Society & Trust and Treasurer of the Newington Republicans’ Women’s Club. She served as Den Mother for a group of Cub Scouts when her son was a Cub Scout, and a Brownie and Girl Scout Leader when her daughter was a Brownie and Girl Scout. She and her husband were members of, and at one time co-Presidents of, the Rip Snorters Square Dance Club at the Elmwood Community Church, West Hartford. Upon moving to Avery Heights, she became Assistant Treasurer of the Avery Heights Auxiliary, Inc. She and her husband owned a summer cottage built by her husband at Quassett Lake in South Woodstock, in 1951. For several years, she was Treasurer of the Quassett Lake Association. They were also campers, first in a tent, then a tent trailer and finally a travel-trailer and belonged to the Traveleers Chapter (of which she was Treasurer for two years) of the National Campers and Hikers Association. They traveled across the country three times with their trailer, visiting all of the 48 contiguous states. In later life, they were seasonal campers for 6 years at Prospect Mountain Campground in Granville, MA. Besides her husband Merrill, she leaves her son, Ken Nichols and his wife, Fausta Esguerra, of Union, and her daughter Margery Nichols of Lebanon; her niece, Carol and husband Thomas Sargent and their three sons; niece Sandra and her husband Andrew Fournier and their two daughters and nephew, Robert E. Bushnell and wife, Helen and their two daughters and several great grandnieces and nephews. She was predeceased by her brother and sister-in-law, Edward B. and Phyllis Bushnell.
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