Stay Tuned to This Space for Reunion Details!
How to Post Your Reunion Announcement
VIEW ALL REUNIONS

Class News

Today's Featured Biography

 
Jacquelyn Ling Austin

August 2015

I will begin why I am not enjoying the 60th reunion with all of you: I will instead be at the “Low Country Boil” held every other year on the Saturday after Labor Day. I would send a picture of me at the Boil, but I would most likely have blue crab and corn on my face. My son-in-law grew up in Georgia and started this traditional event at their home in Connecticut as a tribute to his upbringing - it is a large gathering with our combined families and dozens of friends.

I retired from Mount Vernon three years ago after working there for 11 years. Since then, I have adopted Freddy, my second Bedlington Terrier, who keeps me company and ‘guards’ my little townhouse (mostly from squirrels) when I am not working part-time at the Visitors’ Center here in Old Town Alexandria. Old Town’s 250 year old historic streets are perfect for my deep interest in colonial America. And the Visitors’ Center being just a mile from my home makes it easier to enjoy the Alexandria’s history, small town living, many dogs, and diverse residents.

I ran my own catering company in Atlanta for 5 years. This was a perfect job, since I love cooking. By the late 1980s with my children on their own, I moved back to the Washington, DC area where I have lived ever since. As there are too many loves, losses to go into detail about here, these have added up to give me a wonderful family, who are:

My eldest daughter, Lyn, and her family also live in Virginia about 55 miles away. She has a husband and two children who I was able to spend much time with as they grew up. My eldest grandchild, Christopher works in IT in the DC area. Lyn’s daughter, Jennifer is a senior at George Mason University studying Art History.

My middle daughter, Meg, and her husband, Steve, live in Connecticut with their two daughters Isabelle and Ansley. Freddy and I visit as much as we can; trying not to miss either Isabelle's ballet school's Nutcracker performance or Ansley's dance school's hip hop and jazz performances. Isabelle is headed to Loyola Chicago majoring in nursing this fall. And the youngest daughter, Ansley, will start high school.

And my son, Bradley, also lived in Washington DC before moving overseas to work with international organizations developing democracy and governance, mostly in Africa. He currently lives in Juba, the capital of the world’s newest country, South Sudan. I’ve been fortunate to visit him ‘in the field’ and saw the Big Five when on safari in the Maasai Mara, Kenya and years earlier visited him in Zambia and Malawi. Since I have collected Africa art for decades, it was special for me to see where some of my collection comes from.

I never get tired of travel and have been fortunate to visit other countries and much of the United States with friends and family. In 1986 when my daughter Lyn lived in Hawai’i I was there for the birth of my first grandchild. In 1988 I toured Europe with my mother. More recently, I attended a birthday party for a dear friend in Ireland in 2011.
I traveled to Italy in 2012 and Mexico in 2014 with my daughter Meg and her family.

Travel up the East Coast (I spend too many hours on the New Jersey Turnpike) allows me to share a love of musical theater and fashion with Jennifer. We saw the Punk Fashion exhibit at the Metropolitan Museum and Wicked on Broadway. Closer to home, we’ve gone to musicals at the Kennedy Center in Washington, DC. With both Jennifer and Lyn, I went to see the Downton Abbey fashion exhibit at the Winterthur Estate.

When at home and in my free time, I garden (while Freddy barks at squirrels), occasionally host dinner parties with friends, and am an avid reader in a book club.

VIEW ALL BIOGRAPHIES

U.S. Armed Forces

Class Poll

Featured Links

Visit Other Classes