Diane Lake Northrop ’54

Diane Lake Northrop ’54, of Needham, Mass., formerly of Glastonbury, Conn.; Dec. 22. Her life was spent teaching mathematics and devoting more than 45 years of public service to Glastonbury and 72 years to Brown. She majored in actuarial mathematics at Brown and earned a master’s in education from the University of Hartford in 1970 and later studied taxation. After college, she worked as an actuarial clerk for New England Mutual Life and then at MIT Lincoln Laboratory as a staff mathematician. She stayed at home for 12 years raising her children and then taught math in the West Hartford Public Schools, retiring in 1992. She taught for nine years as a visiting lecturer in math at Trinity College in Hartford and volunteered in the Glastonbury High School math lab. She sang well into her 80s and was a former member of the Pembroke Glee Club, Brown Chapel Choir, and later sang with Concora in Connecticut. She believed in community service and civic engagement. After moving to Glastonbury, she began decades of volunteer commitment to education, town governance, and development and community organizations and was elected to the town’s Board of Finance, on which she served for 42 years and of which she was chair or vice-chair for nearly 39 years. In 2015, when she stepped down at the age of 83, the town celebrated her. She brought the same devotion to Brown, championing the Pembroke Center for Teaching Research on Women and sitting on its Associated Advisory Council for more than 20 years, serving on alumni committees, advocating for the Pembroke Center, planning class reunions, interviewing college applicants, fundraising, and traveling with fellow Brunonians all over the world. In 1994, she was presented with the Brown Bear Award for her service. In 2018, she moved to North Hill Retirement community and participated in a residents’ council. She enjoyed attending concerts at Symphony Hall and having articles from the Glastonbury Citizen and Pembroke Center reports read to her when her vision failed. She was proud to be the first of three generations of Brown women graduates. She is survived by her daughter Melanie Northrop ’81; a son and daughter-in-law; six grandchildren, including Sarah Forman ’13 and Rebecca Forman ’16; and a great-grandson.