Louisa Collier

Louisa Pitzonka Collier, devoted wife of the late Thomas Austin Collier, Jr., died May 30, 2014, at Heartfields in Easton, MD. Born on March 16, 1922, near Bristol, PA., she was the daughter of Walter W. Pitzonka and Ruth Roberts Pitzonka. Louisa grew up on her family’s nearly 70-acre farm, the Pitzonka Pansy Farm and Nursery, outside of Bristol, where she developed a lifelong love of flowers and would return for many years. During the Great Depression, a representative from the George School, a private Quaker boarding school in Bucks County, knocked on the door of the pansy farm trying to drum up applications. Louisa enrolled soon after and continued on to Skidmore College where she graduated with a Bachelor of Science degree. Sharing a tradition important in her mother’s family, many of whom were Philadelphia Quakers going back to colonial times, she was always proud to have attended a Quaker high school. After meeting in early high school – their crowning moment, the kiss in the high school play – Louisa’s romance with Tom Collier would last for more than seventy years. Shortly before their marriage on February 24, 1944, her husband had joined the Navy as a lieutenant during World War II. After the war, they settled in Millersville, PA, where Louisa assisted her husband in his mechanical engineering business, and they raised a family. She was an accomplished seamstress, gardener, reader, and cook (her husband always claimed he got to eat at “the best restaurant in town” every night), and an active member in the American Association of University Women. Upon retirement, she and her husband moved to Oxford on the Eastern Shore of Maryland, where they spent many wonderful years together. Assisted by her talented partner Melissa Coleman, Mrs. Collier started The Sign of the Rudder, a shop that sold Melissa's handmade crafts and antiques, maps, and art about the Chesapeake Bay that Mrs. Collier and her husband purchased at auctions and from local dealers. Mrs. Collier had a passion for traveling with her husband and enjoyed many trips to Europe with him. Especially beloved were the many winters they spent together at the Hotel Albatroz overlooking the Bay of Cascais in Portugal. Mrs. Collier is survived by her son, Thomas Austin Collier III, MD, of Chestertown, MD; her daughter, Ruth Collier Manning of Madison, WI.; a sister, Katherine Frantz, of Montpelier, VT; a grandson, Russell Manning of Woodbury, MN.; four granddaughters, Emily Manning of Madrid, Spain, Ann Collier of Denver, CO, Katherine Spencer of Cambridge, MA, and Louisa Gehring of Cincinnati, OH; and four great-granddaughters, Robyn Manning, Caroline and Marianna Gehring, and Hattie Ray. She was preceded in death by her brother, Walter W. Pitzonka, Jr. A memorial service will be held at a later date.

Louisa Collier

March 16, 1922 - May 30, 2014