Obituary of Rebecca Jessup

Rebecca Jessup, 73, died February 24, 2023, in Hospice Care at Waldo County General Hospital. 

She was one of four children of John Knox and Eunice Jessup, niece to Robert Penn Warren and Eunice Clark, and cousin to Gabriel Warren and Rosanna Warren. Her children are Sheyna Goldstein-Weinstein of Israel, Justin Phelps of Sweden, Adam Goldstein of Colorado, and stepdaughter Amber Stamm of Killingworth, Connecticut, and eight grandchildren.

Rebecca was married to the Rev. Dr. Duncan Newcomer on the Winter Solstice 2022, at the hospital chapel. They had been together for twelve years and moved to Belfast in 2013. 

All of her children and many friends were able to be with her in her final weeks. 

Rebecca was a noted Latin teacher and an increasingly well-known poet. 

She was a sought-after Latin teacher for students from elementary school, students for home tutoring, and students in her Senior College classes. She and Juliet Baker have been an unbeatable teaching pair. 

Rebecca was a founding member of Ellen Sander's Woodshed poetry group as well as an active poet in Barbaria Maria's writing classes. Rebecca also became a vital teacher and actor in Ray and Patricia Estabrook's Game Loft Coming of Age in America as well as a contributor to the national program, The Idea of America Network.

The Old Professor's Atheneum and Shop Talks, as well as Unitarian Universalist church life, filled her spirits, rewarding her happy move with Duncan to Belfast. 

Rebecca came from an illustrious literary family and was a remarkable writer and poet herself.

She was a Phi Beta Kappa graduate in Classics at the University of Colorado in Boulder. She was a graduate of the Wykeham Rise School in Washington Connecticut where she was a drama major and President of her 1967 class.

She was a compassionate and skilled therapist making the best out of her years in the Church of Scientology and then mastering her recovery from that as a wise teacher, friend, and poet. Her poetry brings words to the essence of whatever came to her.

There will be a memorial service for her at the Unitarian Church in Belfast on Sunday, March 26th, at 3:00 pm. 

Memories and condolences may be shared with the family on her tribute wall.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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