2011.02.24: February 24, 2011: Obituary for Philippines RPCV Dodie Captiva

Peace Corps Online: Directory: Philippines: Peace Corps Philippines: Peace Corps Philippines: Newest Stories: 2011.02.24: February 24, 2011: Obituary for Philippines RPCV Dodie Captiva

By Admin1 (admin) (70.254.224.177) on Wednesday, June 29, 2011 - 2:08 pm: Edit Post

Obituary for Philippines RPCV Dodie Captiva

Obituary for Philippines RPCV Dodie Captiva

Married three times, she also was an early lover of the writer John Cheever in New York's Greenwich Village. As a VISTA volunteer, she was a teacher and social worker in Oklahoma in her 50s and then traveled to the Philippines with the Peace Corps in her 60s. "My mother was nomadic in her relationships and her jobs,'' said her daughter, Noa Hall of Cambridge. "That's just the way her life was, and she was very open to any experience that came up.'' Unconcerned with money and material goods, Ms. Captiva made enough to get by through teaching and office jobs. She worked diligently, but gave as much or more of her time and spirit to toiling on Gallops Island, volunteering at the Boston Athenaeum, and participating in medical studies. "She loved lending herself to good causes,'' her daughter said, "and medical research was high on the list.'' At 68, Ms. Captiva volunteered for a clinical trial in 1983 that tested how various drugs were metabolized by the body. In exchange, she received $40 a day, transportation, meals, and quiet hours with her books. "It's a wonderful way to make money,'' she told the Globe that year. "I take a book and lie down. . . . Everyone should be so lucky to get paid to read all day.'' Ms. Captiva "read more of my library than I've read,'' said Williams, a literary agent and lawyer. She never strayed from nonfiction, though, despite her romance with Cheever, who is considered one of America's best short story writers.

Obituary for Philippines RPCV Dodie Captiva

Dodie Captiva, 96; free spirit modeled her life after Emerson

Thrice married and the mother of four, Dodie Captiva nevertheless maintained a lifelong independence.
Thrice married and the mother of four, Dodie Captiva nevertheless maintained a lifelong independence.

By Bryan Marquard

Globe Staff / February 24, 2011


The still photograph of stability that represents home for many held no allure for Dodie Captiva, whose life was a spooling newsreel of adventures that took her from New York City to Cape Cod, Mississippi, Maine, Boston, around the world, and back again.

Married three times, she also was an early lover of the writer John Cheever in New York's Greenwich Village. As a VISTA volunteer, she was a teacher and social worker in Oklahoma in her 50s and then traveled to the Philippines with the Peace Corps in her 60s.

"My mother was nomadic in her relationships and her jobs,'' said her daughter, Noa Hall of Cambridge. "That's just the way her life was, and she was very open to any experience that came up.''

A devotee of Ralph Waldo Emerson, the Concord transcendentalist, Ms. Captiva camped and cleared brush on Gallops Island in Boston Harbor into her early 80s, sustained by the satisfactions of sun and physical labor. Then a year ago, she fell, broke a knee, and was unable to regain much independence.

Peace Corps Online

Sight and hearing failing, unable to read books she had once devoured one after another, she decided earlier this month to stop eating and taking fluids. Ms. Captiva died Friday in Emerson Village nursing home in Watertown. She was 96 and had previously lived in Cambridge, Brookline, the Back Bay, and on Cape Cod.

"Dodie was a bridge to this great bohemian world, long gone,'' said her son-in-law Ike Williams, who is married to Hall. "She was always very antiwar, very secular. She had no interest in religion, only Emerson; he was her god.''

Unconcerned with money and material goods, Ms. Captiva made enough to get by through teaching and office jobs. She worked diligently, but gave as much or more of her time and spirit to toiling on Gallops Island, volunteering at the Boston Athenaeum, and participating in medical studies.

"She loved lending herself to good causes,'' her daughter said, "and medical research was high on the list.''

At 68, Ms. Captiva volunteered for a clinical trial in 1983 that tested how various drugs were metabolized by the body. In exchange, she received $40 a day, transportation, meals, and quiet hours with her books.

"It's a wonderful way to make money,'' she told the Globe that year. "I take a book and lie down. . . . Everyone should be so lucky to get paid to read all day.''

Ms. Captiva "read more of my library than I've read,'' said Williams, a literary agent and lawyer. She never strayed from nonfiction, though, despite her romance with Cheever, who is considered one of America's best short story writers.

At 19, she possessed the kind of beauty that made her a sought-after model for artists in New York when she started her relationship with Cheever, who "didn't communicate by eye,'' she told Blake Bailey for his 2009 biography "Cheever: A Life.''

"He looked at you straightforwardly enough, but his eyes were opaque,'' she told Bailey in June 2005. "You got the impression he was thinking about his writing.''

Born Dodie Merwin, she was the younger of two daughters and lived for a while in Wappingers Falls, N.Y., north of New York City. She moved to the upper peninsula of Michigan when her parents split and entered a Catholic boarding school in New Jersey when she was 5.

"She became very self-reliant and independent and sort of a maverick and really had not much to do with her family after that,'' her daughter said.

"My mother was always a good girl, was always doing what was expected of her,'' she said. "That repression went underground and became rebellion later on in a quiet way. I think her childhood made it difficult for her to maintain a family life with her husbands and children.''

An able student and voracious reader, Ms. Captiva was 16 when she graduated in 1931 from the Academy of the Holy Angels in Fort Lee, N.J. Having exhausted the high school's course offerings, she took junior college classes her last year.

Moving to Greenwich Village, she took graduate courses in progressive education nearby at Bank Street College.

While visiting Cape Cod she met John Hughes Hall. They married, had three children, and lived on the Cape until she left him for Francis Captiva, Hall said.

The Captivas moved to the coast of Mississippi so he could work in aquatic animal research. They married, had a daughter, and for a time all Ms. Captiva's children lived there, but she eventually found family life too confining, Hall said. Ms. Captiva eased out of that marriage by spending a couple of summers at a progressive summer camp for children in Maine.

D'Arcy Marsh of Arlington was 17 and a counselor at the camp near Tenants Harbor when he met Ms. Captiva, who was in her early 40s.

"She really was a free spirit,'' he said. "She was full of adventure, and we would just go off and explore places. She captured my imagination somehow.''

In the 1960s, Ms. Captiva briefly was married to Gordon Gwynne, whom she had known when she was young. All three marriages ended in divorce, and Ms. Captiva legally used her second husband's surname because that was the one she had the longest.

"She was not built for mothering,'' Williams said. "When she left the husband, she left the children and the toothbrush. She left everything. It wasn't that she didn't love them; she'd just been abandoned herself.''

Ms. Captiva, her daughter said, seemed to connect more easily with her grandchildren and great-grandchildren. Sometimes when Ms. Captiva camped on Gallops Island, she would share breakfast on the beach with a grandson who was a park ranger.

"She still had phenomenal energy and could outwalk everybody,'' her daughter said. "She always had a sort of light spirit.''

A service will be announced for Ms. Captiva, who in addition to her daughter Noa leaves a son, Darius Hall of Decatur, Ala.; two other daughters, Katrina Hall of Hancock, N.H., and Johanna Captiva of St. Louis; nine grandchildren; and nine great-grandchildren.

Some people Ms. Captiva met in her travels, such as Marsh, became friends for life, even if a decade or more passed between encounters.

"It was probably a lot easier to be her friend than her family,'' Marsh said. "In the last three or four years, I went to see her because I thought she needed company, but it turned out I was enjoying it as much as she was. I think the wonder of it was that I never had any sense of someone who was older than me.''

Bryan Marquard can be reached at bmarquard@globe.com.




Links to Related Topics (Tags):

Headlines: February, 2011; Peace Corps Philippines; Directory of Philippines RPCVs; Messages and Announcements for Philippines RPCVs; Obituaries





When this story was posted in June 2011, this was on the front page of PCOL:




Peace Corps Online The Independent News Forum serving Returned Peace Corps Volunteers RSS Feed

 Site Index Search PCOL with Google Contact PCOL Recent Posts Bulletin Board Open Discussion RPCV Directory Register

May 26, 2011: The RPCV in the White House Date: May 26 2011 No: 1522 May 26, 2011: The RPCV in the White House
The RPCV in the White House 8 Apr
Peace Corps Recruiter Remembers Thomas Maresco 2 Mar
Robbie Schwartz writes: How would my life have been different? 2 Mar
Rajiv Joseph is a fresh and compelling voice in theater 5 Mar
Robert Textor Releases Peace Corps Classic 13 Mar
Chris Matthews writes: What's the Real Mission In Libya? 22 Mar
Peace Corps Faces Budget Ax in FY2012 23 Mar
Brendan Moroso writes: Revolution comes to North Africa 23 Mar
Jessica Moon Bernstein has exhibition "Ourrubberos" 26 Mar
Joshua Stern Founds Envaya to Provide Interent Access 26 Mar
Richard Sitler Photographs PCVs around the world 27 Mar
Scott Lacy is Executive Director of African Sky 29 Mar
American Sailor Accused of Raping PCV in Uganda 24 Apr
Scott Koepke Shares his Love for Dirt 26 Apr
Jane Wolkowicz tried to be Strict Vegetarian in Kazakhstan 27 Apr
George Packer Writes: Bin Laden: Better Late Than Never 2 May
Clare Major Screens Film "Feast & Sacrifice" 4 May
Steve Kruse and Salifu Mansaray met 40 years ago 4 May
SuZanne Kimbrell Rocks in Dallas 12 May
Nancy Sathre-Vogel writes:A Long Path to Nowhere 15 May
Gal Beckerman writes: What is Peace Corps for? 15 May
Katie Dyer Founded Fair Trade Folk Art Gallery 17 May
Henry Wilhelm Honored for his Photography 25 May

Congressional Hearings on Sexual Assault Date: June 3 2011 No: 1523 Congressional Hearings on Sexual Assault
Congress held hearings on the sexual assault of Peace Corps volunteers. Read the testimony of RPCVs on how the problem is still ongoing, and not limited to any particular country or region. Director Williams says that "it has become apparent to me that the Peace Corps has not always been sufficiently responsive or sensitive to victims of crime and their families. I sincerely regret that." Read what the Peace Corps is doing to address the issue. Latest: Background on sexual assault of PCVs.

Peace Corps: The Next Fifty Years Date: March 8 2011 No: 1513 Peace Corps: The Next Fifty Years
As we move into the Peace Corps' second fifty years, what single improvement would most benefit the mission of the Peace Corps? Read our op-ed about the creation of a private charitable non-profit corporation, independent of the US government, whose focus would be to provide support and funding for third goal activities. Returned Volunteers need President Obama to support the enabling legislation, already written and vetted, to create the Peace Corps Foundation. RPCVs will do the rest.

How Volunteers Remember Sarge Date: January 18 2011 No: 1487 How Volunteers Remember Sarge
As the Peace Corps' Founding Director Sargent Shriver laid the foundations for the most lasting accomplishment of the Kennedy presidency. Shriver spoke to returned volunteers at the Peace Vigil at Lincoln Memorial in September, 2001 for the Peace Corps 40th. "The challenge I believe is simple - simple to express but difficult to fulfill. That challenge is expressed in these words: PCV's - stay as you are. Be servants of peace. Work at home as you have worked abroad. Humbly, persistently, intelligently. Weep with those who are sorrowful, Care for those who are sick. Serve your wives, serve your husbands, serve your families, serve your neighbors, serve your cities, serve the poor, join others who also serve," said Shriver. "Serve, Serve, Serve. That's the answer, that's the objective, that's the challenge."

PCV Murder Investigated Date: January 18 2011 No: 1477 PCV Murder Investigated
ABC News has investigated the murder of Benin PCV Kate Puzey. Read our original coverage of the crime, comments on Peace Corps actions, the email Puzey sent her country director about sexual incidents with Puzey's students and with another PCV, the backstory on how RPCVs helped the Puzey family, and Peace Corps' official statement. PCOL Editorial: One major shortcoming that the Puzey murder highlights is that Peace Corps does not have a good procedure in place for death notifications.

Join Us Mr. President! Date: June 26 2009 No: 1380 Join Us Mr. President!
"We will double the size of the Peace Corps by its 50th anniversary in 2011. And we'll reach out to other nations to engage their young people in similar programs, so that we work side by side to take on the common challenges that confront all humanity," said Barack Obama during his campaign. Returned Volunteers rally and and march to the White House to support a bold new Peace Corps for a new age. Latest: Senator Dodd introduces Peace Corps Improvement and Expansion Act of 2009 .



Read the stories and leave your comments.








Some postings on Peace Corps Online are provided to the individual members of this group without permission of the copyright owner for the non-profit purposes of criticism, comment, education, scholarship, and research under the "Fair Use" provisions of U.S. Government copyright laws and they may not be distributed further without permission of the copyright owner. Peace Corps Online does not vouch for the accuracy of the content of the postings, which is the sole responsibility of the copyright holder.

Story Source: Boston Globe

This story has been posted in the following forums: : Headlines; COS - Philippines; Obituaries

PCOL46866
11


Add a Message


This is a public posting area. Enter your username and password if you have an account. Otherwise, enter your full name as your username and leave the password blank. Your e-mail address is optional.
Username:  
Password:
E-mail: