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06/03/2013 09:00 AMKatherine K. Fuller, 87, of Essex, died on May 25 at the Essex Meadows Health Center. She was born in San Diego, California, on Dec. 25, 1925, daughter of Theodore C. and Alice (Hatton) Kistner. Kathy was raised in San Marino, California, and attended Scripps College, graduating from UCLA with a BA in political science. Kathy’s first husband, Edward Bruce Ferguson, was a Foreign Service officer, serving as vice consul to the U.S. Embassy in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, where they lived. Their daughter Linda was born there.
Upon Bruce Ferguson’s death in 1952, Kathy and Linda returned to California where she attended graduate school at UCLA. It was there she met and married a political science instructor named Bruce Adkinson.
Kathy’s life on the east coast began when she and Bruce Adkinson moved from California to New Jersey, where Bruce attended graduate school at Princeton. During that time, Kathy’s second daughter Susan was born. Bruce subsequently took a teaching position at the then-Hofstra College, and Kathy and Bruce purchased a home in Garden City, New York in 1959 and resided there until 1975.
During that period, she was involved in numerous organizations. She was president of the local chapter of the AAUW, president of the Pi Beta Phi Society, and president of the L.I. Panhellenic. She was also one of the co-founders of the Pro Arte Symphony Orchestra, which performed at Hofstra University.
In 1971, Kathy attended the first Arts Administration Certificate Program at Harvard. In 1972, she became the executive director of the Queens Symphony Orchestra, and in 1978, she moved into Manhattan to become the executive director of the American Symphony Orchestra, founded by Leopold Stokoski. In 1980, Kathy was offered the position of executive director of the Pasadena Symphony and subsequently moved back to her home town in California.
In 1982, on a brief visit to Garden City, New York, she met Bill Fuller, a Garden City native, and they married in June of 1983. Bill and Kathy resided in Garden City and also lived at Matinecock Farms in Glen Cove, New York, for 15 years. They enjoyed 25 years together before Bill’s death in 2008.
Kathy enjoyed classical music and played the piano. She was also a tennis player and golfer and was a long standing member of the Cherry Valley Club. Kathy adored her friends and loved life, most especially her California roots. Ten months prior to her death, she moved to Essex to be close to her daughter Linda. She lived and died in the beautiful surroundings of the Essex Meadows Health Center.
Kathy is survived by her daughters, Linda Callan and her husband John of Essex and Susan Dalton of Gloucester, Massachusetts; her beloved granddaughter Emily Dalton of Beverly, Massachusetts; and her 92-year-old brother Ted Kistner, of San Diego, California. She is also survived by the family of her husband Bill Fuller: his children, Bill, Jr. of Garden City, New York, Jenny Collins and her husband Brian of Garden City, New York, and John Fuller and his wife Christine of Portland, Oregon; Bill’s grandchildren, Will, Hannah, Sage, Charlie, Dan, Mike, Camilla, David, and Melissa Riffle and her husband Brendan and their children, Liam and Emma of Bellmore, New York, all of whom Kathy loved very much.
A celebration of Kathy’s life is planned for a future date. In lieu of flowers, memorial contributions may be made in her name to the Essex Meadows Employee Appreciation Fund, 30 Bokum Rd., Essex, CT 06426. The Robinson, Wright & Weymer Funeral Home, Centerbrook, is in charge of arrangements. To share a memory of Kathy or send a condolence to her family please visit www.rwwfh.com .