Joan Redmont died Sunday, August 7, 2016, three weeks before her 98th birthday, at the Orchard Cove retirement community in Canton.
Born and raised in New York, Joan was a daughter of William and Melanie Tokaji Rothenberg, founding directors of Camp Kokosing, one of the first private interracial summer camps in the U.S.
She was a member of the first cohort of sociology majors at Hunter College, New York City, and received her BA in sociology and early childhood education in 1939. She also studied at the New School for Social Research. Joan lived in Washington, DC, Mexico, Argentina, France, and the Soviet Union and traveled to many other countries with her husband, foreign correspondent, journalist, and educator Bernard S. Redmont, Dean Emeritus of Boston University’s College of Communication. A lifelong student of languages and cultures, she earned certificates in French language and civilization at the Sorbonne and the Alliance Française. She returned to academic studies during the 1970s, earning a Master’s in American Studies from the University of Paris, with a thesis on the Ford and Danforth Foundations’ efforts in urban renewal. She translated Alain Cuenot’s book, The Herschel Grynszpan Case, from French into English and co-edited the English-language guide book Welcome to Moscow.
A vegetarian for most of her adult life, Joan Redmont was a fervent environmentalist and community builder. She founded French-American and international women’s groups in Paris and was active as a host to international students at Boston University. In her seventies and eighties, she volunteered with ODWIN Learning Center in Dorchester as a tutor, board member, and board chair. She chaired the Conservation Committee at the Orchard Cove retirement community.
Joan founded the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship in Paris with her husband and more recently was a member of First Parish, Unitarian Universalist in Brookline, and of First Parish, Unitarian Universalist in Canton.
In addition to her husband, she leaves her children, Dennis F. Redmont and Zeynep Tinaz Redmont of Rome and Istanbul, and Jane Carol Redmont of Boston; her grandchildren, Michael Andrew Redmont and Isabel Prates Redmont of Carcavelos, Portugal, and Rodrigo Redmont and Antonella Di Tonno of Loreto Aprutino, Italy; and great-grandchildren Michael Anthony, Beatriz, Gaia, and Matteo. She is also survived by a brother, Richard Rothenberg of Rockville, Maryland and a cousin, Carolyn Arbiter, of Tucson, Arizona; by a large and loving extended family of nieces and nephews and their partners and children; and by friends of all ages on both sides of the Atlantic.
A memorial service will be held at First Parish, UU in Canton on Monday, September 19 at 11:00 a.m.
A further celebration of Joan’s life will be held in Vermont in the summer of 2017. Donations in Joan’s memory may be made to the Boston Children’s Chorus or the Natural Resources Defense Council.