BEVERLY “BEV” (MARSHALL) LANDON

NEW HAVEN — Beverly “Bev” (Marshall) Landon, of New Haven, Vt., passed away July 19, 2026, at the age of 86.

Bev met adversity early and refused to be defined by it. Stricken with polio at age nine, she was bedridden for months and missed half of fourth grade, yet she went on to graduate from Beeman Academy as co-salutatorian. In 1957 she became a charter member of the Rainbow Girls. She studied accounting at Champlain College and spent five years at the Chittenden bank working as a teller, communications chief, and bookkeeper, building the skills she would later devote to her community for more than two decades.

Bev served the Town of New Haven as Town Auditor from 1969-1972, Town Treasurer from 1973 to 1996, Town Clerk from 1976 to 1996, and was a member of the Planning Commission from 2016-2026. She took enormous pride in the town records she kept — chronologically organized, thoroughly indexed, and produced first in her own careful handwriting, then on her personal typewriter, and finally on her own computer, always a step ahead of the tools the office provided. She created software called Clerk SuperWorks to manage town taxes and dog licenses that was adopted by many Vermont towns. Her reputation for steady, honest bookkeeping followed her in 1999 when she served neighboring Weybridge as Assistant Clerk for six years, returning twice more when needed.

All the while, Bev raised five children and a multitude of lambs. She worked beside her husband maintaining their dairy farm and in later years, at his side doing custom work for area farmers. She was a tireless caregiver, looking after both of her parents and her husband’s father while still working as clerk and treasurer, and later caring for her aunt Marjorie, her mother (Beatrice), her younger and only sister Marilyn, and finally her husband William, whom she cared for at home until his death.

A devoted historian and author, Bev became a recognized authority on silver overlay glass. She published three intricate catalogues of Silver City Glass and maintained the website SilverCityGlass.com. She compiled My Town Your Town about her years as New Haven’s clerk and treasurer, wrote New Haven’s Great Man J. B. Grinnell (Grinnell was born on her husband’s family’s North Street farm and later founded Grinnell College), and another about her whaling-captain ancestor, Francis B. Drew, who was part of the discovery of the Cook Islands, now known as Hawai’i. Beverly researched and in 2020 published in a leatherbound hardcover book the Fitts & Marshall Family Genealogies, completing the project first begun by both of her grandmothers.

Her service to local history ran just as deep. She served the New Haven Historical Society as secretary and treasurer for seven years and later as its president, assembled a book on the Spring Grove Campground, compiled the records of New Haven’s town-owned lands and its ancient roads, and produced a detailed history of the town’s zoning from its inception in 1969. She also served as secretary and treasurer of Evergreen Cemetery. Already a member of the General Society of Mayflower Descendants, in 2018 Beverly also joined the DAR side by side with her daughters Tracy and Lou-Bea and her granddaughter Sarah — three generations of women with successive membership numbers.

Beverly is survived by her children Cynthia, Tracy, Christoper, Billi Jo, and Lou-Bea. She is also survived by her grandchildren, Nathan, Owen, Calvin, Sarah, Max, Jakub, William, Chloe, Abbie, Boden, Katelyn, and Molly. She was predeceased by her husband, William (2011) and her sister, Marilyn.

Calling hours will be held at the Sanderson Funeral Home in Middlebury from noon-2 p.m., Saturday, July 25. A private burial will follow.

Bev asked for no “boo-hooing” when she was gone. She’d rather you put on Alexander’s Ragtime Band, Mack the Knife, or the Beer Barrel Polka — and be joyful. ◊