HARDWICK – Eleanor Cornish, while sleeping at home in the early morning hours of April 13th, 2026, slipped peacefully into eternal rest and many heavenly reunions. Her family was near, her hand was being held, and forsythia branches were blooming in a vase nearby. She was 94.
She was born Eleanor June Carey to Christine (Marquardt) Carey and Bernard P. Carey on June 12, 1931, in Montpelier. Her father was the youngest of five brothers who all served in World War 1. He had been a machinist in the Navy. Their two sisters, Marion (Smith) and Irene (Ashley) were life-long residents of Hardwick. Marion was a teacher, first in a one-room schoolhouse and then as a reading teacher at Hardwick Elementary. Irene was the proprietor of Ashley’s Drug Store at Mill and Main Streets in Hardwick. Eleanor’s mother, Christine was the tenth of 11 siblings from a German immigrant family and the first to be born in Canada on a farm near Winnipeg. Shortly after Eleanor’s birth the family, including her older brother Bernard, moved to Kansas City, Mo., where Eleanor spent her childhood to the age of 14.
She loved dancing, art, music and school, which started with a newly formed kindergarten with all the wooden toys and blocks. She enjoyed riding the streetcar with her mother and she started a lifelong love of baseball attending ball games with her dad. She walked to church with him on Sundays and remembered that on December 7, 1941, they heard the news of the attack on Pearl Harbor on their way home. Her father had not come back completely well from WW1. Nevertheless he recommitted to service work in 1941 as an experienced, 43-year-old machinist at the new North American Aviation defense plant. He ran a department of five called “Tool Hospital” developing and fixing parts for a high-priority WW11 mission. That commitment would greatly affect Eleanor’s life as four years later in 1945, due to her father’s declining health the decision was made to move back to Vermont to be with the Careys in Hardwick.
Eleanor entered Hardwick Academy in the spring of 1946. She made life-long friends in Hardwick. She loved the beauty of Vermont, her studies, especially English literature and had fond memories of ice skating, dances at Joe’s Pond and sugaring season. She worked the soda fountain at her aunt’s drugstore and played a fierce defensive guard, at barely 5’ tall, in half court girls’ basketball. In the summer before her senior year, her sister Carolyn was born making it a family of five. She graduated from Hardwick Academy in the class of 1948. Sadly, her father passed away the week of graduation and set in motion a return to Kansas City to live with her Aunt Ella and pursue college credits. She renewed friendships, took comfort in familiar surroundings especially the Nelson Atkins Museum of Arts, and worked in customer service for Trans World Airlines.
Eleanor married Wayne Preston Cornish in January of 1950 and together they created a loving home and raised six children. She shared her love of the arts, reading and baseball of course. There were many summer trips to Vermont. She was a loving mother, and her smile brought joy to all. With many crafting projects, adventures and outings, she was “the fun mom” to many of her children’s friends, then the “fun GranE” to those friends’ children and her beloved granddaughter, Christina.
When she returned to work, she brought that sense of fun with her. She worked at Hall’s on the Plaza, the retail division of Hallmark Corporation as gift wrap supervisor and fine china and tabletop inventory manager until her retirement. She later enjoyed working at the Costco in midtown Kansas City, always making friends. When her husband, Wayne, received a veteran’s care pension they moved to Hardwick to be with their daughters. There were autumn rides and card games with friends, Christmas with full, fresh trees and family celebrations.
A woman of deep faith and courageous in the face of early losses, she belonged to Our Lady of Lourdes Church, and later St. Francis Xavier in Kansas City and in Vermont, Mary Queen of all Saints Parish. Eleanor was preceded in death by her brother, Bernard Carey; her son, Rev. Daryl Cornish S.J.; her son-in-law, Edgar Davis; her husband of 66 years, Wayne; and her daughter, Judith. She is survived by her daughters, Diane, Susan and Shari; her son, James; daughter-in-law, Diane Clark; granddaughter, Christina (Erika); sister, Carolyn Aiossa (Anthony); nephew Nicholas and niece Carey; cousin Louise Carey LaBombard (Gene) and family, and her cousin Sally Smith and family.
A Mass of Christian Burial will take place later this summer in Vermont and Memorial Masses in Missouri in the coming months. Charitable contributions in her honor can be made to Hardwick Emergency Rescue Squad, P.O. Box 837, Hardwick, VT 05843, Mary Queen of all Saints Parish, P.O. Box 496, Hardwick, VT 05843 or to Jesuit Refugee Services (JRS.net)
Online condolences are welcomed at northernvermontfuneralservice.com
