Obituaries

It is with both joy for her life and sadness at her absence that we inform you that Nancy Gordon Knight, a long-time resident of the Fox Valley, passed away peacefully, in her sleep on July 9. 2019. Nancy was born on October 28, 1936 to Everett Ladd Gordon and Agnes (nee Arnold) Gordon. She and her family lived in Beverly, IL, where Nancy attended Vanderpoel Elementary School and Loring School for Girls. During high school, her family moved to Phoenix, AZ, where Nancy graduated from North Phoenix High. Nancy attended the University of Arizona for two years and then Northwestern University from which she graduated in 1958 with a degree in Education. Nancy was a proud member of the Kappa Alpha Theta, the first Greek letter sorority of women.

In 1963, she married Herbert Borwell Knight from Oak Park, IL and moved to Glenview, IL. In 1965 she had twins, Thomas Gordon Knight and Sharon Anne Knight in White Fish Bay, WI.  By 1967, Nancy and Herb were settled in Geneva and members of the Geneva Golf Club where they played a lot of golf and made lifelong friendships.

Nancy stayed involved in education until the early 1980s. Her career began as a 2nd grade teacher in Wilmette public schools where, as a gifted pianist, she often brought music into her classrooms. After moving to Geneva, she taught Sunday School at St. Mark’s Episcopal Church, where she also served on the Altar Guild. And, in 1974, incensed by the poor writing skills of her twins’ 3rd grade teacher, she ran for and was elected to the Geneva School Board where she also taught as a substitute teacher. As an active member of the Junior League, Nancy pioneered ART in a Suitcase in the 1970s in the Geneva public schools and brought the concept to Newport News, VA, after relocating there with her family in 1975. She and her fellow volunteers brought replicas of paintings by famous American and European artists into classrooms to teach and expose students to art. Amongst her favorite paintings were those by Winslow Homer, Peale, Renoir, and Monet. As her family will attest, she never met an art museum that was not worth several days of her life and the lives of others in tow!

Her interest in art led her to become a docent at the Mariner’s Museum in Newport News and a student of early American furniture in Colonial Williamsburg. When the family moved to Houston, TX in 1980, she became a docent at Bayou Bend, where she mastered the Hogg Family’s furniture collection —­­ a feat enabled by her prodigious memory.

In 1986, Nancy and Herb returned to the Fox Valley, settling in St. Charles. They joined the Dunham Woods Riding Club in Wayne and Max McGraw’s in Elgin and re-engaged with St. Mark’s Episcopal Church in Geneva — all communities in which they have been active members and supporters. Nancy’s legacy can be appreciated not only in the many lives she touched but in the beautiful and bountiful needlework in the chapel at St. Mark’s Episcopal Church in Geneva where her memorial service will be held on Friday, July 19 at 10:30 am. A reception will follow at the Dunham Woods Club in Wayne.

Nancy is survived by her devoted husband Herb Knight; her brother Frank Gordon (Austin, TX) and his wife Judy and their family; and her twin children Sharon Knight (Sonoma, CA) and Tom Knight (Oak Park, IL) along with their respective spouses John Hornbaker and Alicia Sams, and Tom’s daughters Caroline Knight and Margaret Knight.

In lieu of flowers, the family asks that donations be made in Nancy’s name to the Women’s Alzheimer’s Movement (https://thewomensalzheimersmovement.org/) which is dedicated to raising awareness about women’s increased risk for Alzheimer’s and funding women’s-based Alzheimer’s research.

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