Carol Creutzburg was a strong driving force behind the education of Wayne history in recent times.
You may remember her Spotlight articles that ran in the Suburban and Wayne Times for many years on topics about early life in Wayne.
Creutzburg died on May 16, 2012. She was 91.
A board member of the Radnor Historical Society for many years, she was born and raised in Wayne and lived her most of her life, save for when she lived in New York City working as a fashion designer and pen and ink artist.
Her father Harry was a founder of main Line School Night, which is why the building the organization is housed in is called the Creutzburg Center.
“In many ways she was a very private person,” said Bennett Hill, who served as president of RHS when she was vice president. “She had many more years at the Radnor Historical Society and in Wayne than I did, and she helped keep me on track,” he said.
Her particular passion in history was the Wayne community, the people and their way of life. Creutzburg never married; she didn’t have any siblings.
“This was sort of her second home,” Hill said of the historical society.
She rode her bike everywhere and always dressed very artistically, he said. She had a pair of earrings made of varnished acorns that she wore often. “I can’t imagine her ever wearing a pair of slacks,” he said. “I think of lavender and tan as the colors she used a lot and they were very becoming on her.”
“She was a great asset to the historical society,” said Greg Prichard, a member. He said Creutzburg was a wealth of knowledge not only through her life but also through her research and reading of local history.
RHS is donating a plaque in her honor to Radnor Township for Harford, the original name of the home that became the Creutzburg Center.
Creutzburg was a good friend of Dorothy Finley, who owned the house that now houses the Society. Which may be why she was so “possessive” of the historical society. It was very important to her.
There is a file for Creutzburg at RHS that includes some of her pen and ink works. There is also a large quantity of her Suburban articles. She enjoyed doing the articles, Hill said.
Creutzburg “was genteel, almost of an earlier age,” he said.
“I always had the feeling that you shouldn’t try to pull off too many of the outer leaves,” he said of her. “She didn’t want that."
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