Janice Aitken

SOUTH ROYALTON—Janice Eugenia Langdon Lonegren Shea Fournier Aitken, 79, died at her home on Mill Rd. on January 11, 2007, following a short illness.

From 1978-86, she was an award-winning reporter and columnist for the Valley News in Lebanon, N.H.

She was the wife of the late Robert Aitken, Jr., the late D. George Fournier, and the late Chester Totman Shea. Mrs. Aitken was born March 12, 1927, in Phoenix, Ariz. to Louis C. and Ruth Mildred (Wallace) Langdon and lived in Massachusetts before relocating to South Royalton in 1968.

Survivors inlcude her children: Robert Lewis Aitken and wife, Sandi of Granville; Marion "Nonnie: Dahnke Young and husband, Terry of Guilford, Conn.; Sandra Capporticelli and husband, Don of Athens; Bill Lelbach and wife, Sandra of Westport, N.Y.; and Tim Shea and wife, Cheryl of Orlando, Fla.; numerous Landgon and Shea nieces and nephews, and a granddaughter, Casey Brianna Shea of Orlando, Fla.

She graduated from St. Johnsbury Academy in 1945, but didn’t start her professional writing career until age 46. She authored a book, published in 1988, called Sidehill Sketches, which originally appeared in the White River Valley Herald (now The Herald of Randolph). She was also the editor, publisher and owner of the Green Mountain Gazette, a monthly tabloid that focused on Vermont history and Vermonters past and present.

Her ashes will be interred on a fine summer’s day at the Shea family plot in Spring Grove Cemetery, Florence, Mass.

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