HILDA PIPER BURNHAM

SOUTH ROYALTON — Hilda Piper Burnham of South Royalton passed away at Woodridge Health & Rehabilitation on Sept. 9, 2024, with family surrounding her. Hilda was born behind the pot belly stove in the Piper family farmhouse on Nov. 27, 1934, the youngest of eight to Walter and Dorothy Piper. They raised their family on a small farm on Broad Brook Road in South Royalton.

Hilda attended the Little Red School House right over the hill for grade school and South Royalton High School. While riding a horse along Broad Brook as a teenage girl, she met her beau and future husband, George Burnham Jr. They were married before George entered the Army. While he was deployed, Hilda lived with her sister Ginny and husband Woody Roberts and family in Contoocook, N.H. Little Woody couldn’t say Aunt Hilda, so her first nickname was ‘Hoho.’ She received telephone operator training while living in New Hampshire. Upon George’s return they spent a few years on the Burnham family farm in South Royalton. With two young sons, Jeff and Denny, they moved to Cornwall and grew their family with three more boys, Barry, Craig and Stacy. Along with raising their family in Cornwall they grew their business, Burnham Builders.

One can only imagine how much food Hilda made with five sons and all the neighborhood friends stopping in as their second home. She was in her glory baking bread and ‘cookies’; many, many loaves of bread were consumed. Besides cooking for her family, Hilda held many jobs. Housewife and mom were tops but during those early years she also worked as a telephone operator at New England Telephone in Bethel and then Middlebury. It was at Bethel Telephone Hilda met her lifelong best friend, Judy Sanders. Other jobs later were at Cinchpac, and as a waitress at Rosie’s, Waybury Inn, and Woodstock Inn. She loved crafts, making berry bowls every fall for Christmas presents, and dried flower arrangements from her own flowers as well as those she picked on the roadside. Hilda loved spring and would go fiddlehead picking wherever she could find them. She loved music and square dancing, which she and George did weekly with their group of friends. Any type of dancing was her favorite as she got older.

Hilda and George participated in the Fresh Air Program, where inner-city children came to their home to play in the dirt instead of on the concrete. They supported the boys in all the sports, football, wrestling, softball, you name it. She was presented with an award by Friends of Middlebury Football. Even as young adults the support continued with Burnham Builders sponsoring a men’s softball team for many years. She loved meeting people and made friends quite easily, especially through yard sales and flea marketing. She bought a Dodge van and set it up for these activities, taking grandchildren with her occasionally. Her grandsons gave her the name ‘Hot Rod Gram’ because of her van. This nickname stuck with her the rest of her life. She loved snowmobiling, hunting and fishing, anything outdoors, from the time she was a little girl, and she was usually barefoot. Her grandsons believe she’s the only grandmother to take her grandsons fishing or hunting at 4 a.m. She wanted them to learn, and they were eager to follow along.

Even though Hilda loved Cornwall her heart never left Broad Brook. She always said it was God’s country. Following the death of her eldest son Jeff in 1979, on a small piece of the Piper farm, her sons, family, and friends, built Hilda her own piece of heaven known as ‘camp.’ She loved being there, having family, friends and neighbors stop by, sitting by the pond and listening to the brook.

Hilda was a member of the Cornwall Congregational Church where, in memory of Jeff, she would place her handmade Christmas wreaths on the two front doors before the Sunday after Thanksgiving for the holiday season, until just a few years ago.

Following a mishap in 2015, Hilda returned to Cornwall. It was then that she started attending Elderly Services in Middlebury. She so enjoyed her time there, especially when there was live music, her toes would start tapping. The activities and social time, the staff and their care and devotion of Hilda, and all their attendees, are priceless to the Addison County community.

When you asked her what she was most proud of she would first say being a Piper, second would be that she was a mother of five sons, grandmother to five grandsons, and great-grandmother to six great-grandsons and one great-granddaughter.

Hilda was predeceased by her eldest son, Jeff in 1979, and all seven of her siblings, Dean, Virginia, Norman, Malcolm, Elaine, Regis and Beverly.

Hilda is survived by four sons, Denny (Cheryl) of Cornwall, Barry (April) of Middlebury, Craig of Cornwall, and Stacy (Linda) of Phoenix, Ariz.; her grandsons, Jackson (Amanda) of Cornwall, Coleman (Lily Bliss) of Sheridan, Wyo., Evan of South Royalton, Cliff (Jennifer) of Cape Coral, Fla., and Rayce (Jessica) of Shoreham; and her great-grandchildren George, Montgomery, Milo, Emerson, Alexis, Logan and Miles, and many nieces and nephews.

Special thanks to the staff at Woodridge for their love and respect of Hilda.

Hilda Piper Burnham will be laid to rest at camp, her piece of heaven, on Sunday, May 25, 2025, Memorial Day weekend. Details to follow. In lieu of flowers, please consider donating to Elderly Services, Inc., 112 Exchange St., Middlebury, VT, 05753 in memory of Hilda. ◊