Remembering Aurania

Forty-nine years ago today, a 25 year old woman died in a single car accident caused by icy roads in Billerica, Massachusetts, less than a mile from her home. She was my father's baby sister and my Aunt Aurania. I ran across her obituary this week, and did some unsuccessful hunting on the internet for records. I don't have enough information to identify her widowed husband, Frederick Patterson; with whom the family lost touch. There were no children. All of Aurania's immediate family have since passed on - her parents, Thomas and Irene, brother John (my father), and sister Katherin. They each suffered through her untimely accidental death that day decades ago. She shouldn't be forgotten.

"Baby" and her father

Aurania was the youngest of my grandparents children (by 9 years), and retained their nickname of  "Baby" into adulthood. When Dad enlisted for World War II, Aurania would have been (I think) just 3 years old.

Chicago of 1939 was Aurania's birthplace, but her parents relocated to Manchester, NH in the early 40's, and that's where she was raised. Aurania graduated from Notre Dame College in Manchester in 1961. In their alumni newsletter, they remembered her as "a smiling, cheerful person, whose philosophy of life was to try to bring happiness to others". A classmate's comments in the 1961 yearbook were, "She is an excellent, serious conscientious student, but her bell-like laughter proclaims her delightful

Aurania Haropulos in 1959

sense of humor. Endowed with wisdom beyond her years, still she has the gaity of youth and is popular among her contemporaries. We are proud to call her friend, and we know that whatever her creative dreams, she has the capacity to attain them."

I was only 9 when Aurania died. I'm left with emotional snapshots of a beautiful, kind young woman, a whiff of perfume, a charming laugh, and a wide smile. Thank God I at least have that much.