Elaine Brown Norwood

July 24, 1925 – August 12, 2025
 
Elaine was born in Ann Arbor, Michigan on July 24, 1925 to Raymond and Adah Brown, the second of five children – Maxine, Elaine, Joann, Duane and Lynn. Growing up during the depression, she worked in an airplane factory during World War II. Later she joined the Women’s Army Corps where she met Joe Norwood at Mitchel Field in Long Island, New York. After the war they moved to Raleigh where Joe finished college at North Carolina State. After several moves, they relocated to Greenville, SC, where Elaine started studying art and became active in civil rights organizations. They spent many happy times at the beach with their family and enjoyed Elderhostel trips.

She is survived by her brother Duane, children Sue (Jim deceased), Joe (Gail deceased), and Mark (Susan), and grandchildren Greg (Eleanor) and Jonathan (Chrystal), and great grandchildren Charlotte, Caroline, Charlie, Lilly and Julia. She is predeceased by daughter, Kit, husband, Joe, and grandson Brent.

A service celebrating Elaine’s life was held at GUUF at 3:00pm on Saturday, October 18. The service was livestreamed here.

Elaine wrote the following herself in 2019:

I was born Elaine Grace Brown on July 25, 1924, in Ann Arbor, Michigan, the second of five children. My sister Dorothy was two years older, my brother Bob two years younger, followed by Mary and Bill. When I was two, we moved to Flint, Michigan, where my father worked for Buick Motor Co. as a tool and die maker. We lived in a small house with a big yard, full of gardens, fruit trees, chickens, rabbits, and even a cow for a while. Growing up during the Great Depression wasn’t easy, but we always had enough to eat thanks to our garden and my mother’s canning.

Life required a lot of hands-on work: shoveling coal into the furnace, carrying out ashes, hanging clothes on the line, and ironing with heavy irons heated on the stove. I attended Potter School and later Flint Central High School. After school and on Saturdays, I worked at Kresge’s 5 & 10 in the candy department for 25 cents an hour.

After graduating, I worked at AC Spark Plug in Flint making airplane parts, then moved to Detroit to work at the Dodge plant making tank parts while living with my aunt and uncle. I took art classes at the Detroit Institute of Arts, nurturing my love of drawing and painting. In 1944, I joined the Women’s Army Corps (WACs), trained in Des Moines, Iowa, and later worked in the motor pool at Fort Oglethorpe, Georgia, driving officers around the post.

It was at a dance at Fort Oglethorpe that I met Joe Norwood of the Army Air Corps. We married in 1945 and eventually settled in Asheville, North Carolina, where Joe studied on the GI Bill and became a teacher. We raised three children: Joe, Mark, and Sue. Our daughter Katherine (Kit) was born deaf and attended the School for the Deaf in Morganton, later Gallaudet College in Washington, DC. She married a deaf Chinese student, and they had a daughter, Lisa.

Throughout my life, I was active in the Unitarian Church and involved in civil rights work. There were little ways to push integration—Head Start, checking on housing unfairness, and the MLK Walk, where I once walked with Jesse Jackson. I met many interesting people along the way: Martin and Mable England, Sara Lowery, Bill (Gib) and Lettie Gibson, Marie Huggins, and others.

Gil Rowland formed a discussion group that met weekly at various homes, eventually leading us to the UU congregation where we felt at home. Our Humanist Group met there monthly.

Then came the abortion clinic incident, where I was arrested while helping a young girl enter the clinic. I bumped the leg of a woman blocking the door, was handcuffed and fingerprinted, and had a jury trial. Ruth Trippe testified that “God told her to stop all abortions.” She won, and I was fined $500, which friends generously covered.

We protested the Iraq and Afghanistan wars—without much effect, but we tried. Some of my happiest times were in Burnsville, painting with my two sisters. We spent two weeks in the spring and fall at a studio where we could paint anytime, usually with a model in the mornings and outdoor sessions in the afternoons, alongside about ten other artists.

Joe and I traveled widely through Elderhostel (now Road Scholars), visiting national parks, Alaska, Hawaii, and parts of Canada. After each program, we’d rent a car and explore further on our own.

We are fortunate to have our daughter Sue in Hendersonville and our son Mark in Asheville, both always ready to help. Our oldest son Joe and his wife Gail moved to Florida but visit several times a year and will come if needed.

So far, we’ve enjoyed good health and an interesting life. As Gil would say when asked, “Aren’t you afraid you won’t go to heaven?” — “No. I don’t like harp music.” Enough already!