When my parents were forced to leave Eastchester in 1965, I had to leave a great 
bunch of friends behind. I lost my senior year with all of you and it still hurts. 
I spent a miserable year in a Florida high school with standards far below EHS’s 
and had to give up my former college plans for a school in Florida. I went to 
Stetson University in DeLand, Florida where I had a great time away from my 
controlling father. I then went to UNC-Chapel Hill to get a PhD in Linguistics. 
However, I noticed that there were very few teaching jobs in linguistics and 
jumped across to library science, since I had spent all those years in the 
high school library! I got my MA in Linguistics in 1973 and a MS in LS in 1976. 
My first job was at the Library of Congress, which is starting at the top of 
your profession. The massive bureaucracy was stifling and after 2 years I moved 
to Columbus, Ohio, to join OCLC which is the largest supplier of computer-based 
library services in the world. I had 12 great years there, moving up into 
management, doing a lot of travel and public speaking. I was burnt out by 1990. 
My life took an abrupt turn (see below) and now I am working as an ordinary 
cataloguer at the National Library of Australia. I feel like I am really doing 
work that will benefit our users (the entire country) and the people are great. 
Five more years and we’ll be ready for retirement. 

My personal life has been a roller coaster. I have been married three times and I 
think this one is the “soul-mate” of my life. I have no children as the first 2 
weren’t interested. My husband now is Brian Denehy (no, not the actor although 
they may be related) a science geek (PhD in physics) turned computer nerd. He has 
3 children by a previous marriage, all of whom are adults now. I have loved 
Australia since my first visit in 1986 and when the Internet was still young, asked 
for an email pen-pal. Brian responded since he had done post-doc studies at Case 
Western and knew Ohio. We started talking about Australian rules football (a mutual 
passion) and one thing led to another as they say in novels. I came over permanently
in 1991 and am still very much in love with my adopted country. While I miss many 
friends in the States, I have little close family, just a half sister in Briarcliff. 
My mother died in 1981 of breast cancer and my domineering father in 1989 of heart 
failure. 

My health is the main concern. I was diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis in the early 80’s 
and manage it with medication. I developed a congenital cornea defect in the mid-80’s 
and had cornea grafts in both eyes. I see somewhere near 20/20 but not as good as that 
sounds (blurred vision). Five years ago I was diagnosed with fibromyalgia which is an 
incredibly painful muscle disease. As I age all the conditions interact and I don’t 
know how many years of mobility I have left, and how much longer I will be able to 
travel long distances. However, I know all Americans are dying to visit Australia, 
so if there are EHS alumni who would like to visit the capital of the country, 
come on down! We’re not all like Steve Irwin (the Croc Hunter) but very friendly 
and the country is gorgeous.