"Kay Seymour House was a mentor and friend to me when as a young professor I began my work on Fenimore Cooper. Our conversations were always lively, but she commanded and demonstrated such a presence, I often felt a bit cowed by her until I learned to know her and her sense of humor. I have lots of stories about our time together and the help she provided me , but my favorite Kay memory involves corn. I complained to her one summer that Oklahoma had no decent corn to eat on the cob, and I lamented the absence of my grandfather's "Country Gentleman" white corn he grew in my native Pennsylvania when I was a child. It was the best because the small white kernels exploded off the cob. "I have better corn from my farm," Kay retorted, and she promptly overnight mailed me a dozen ears from Illinois. It was great corn, I agreed, but I never had the courage to tell her it was not quite up to the standard of my grandfather's. But loyalty was a concept Kay would have understood because she demonstrated it every day. She will be missed as a scholar when some of us face a knotty problem we knew she could help us solve, but she will always be missed as a friend, someone whose kindness and generosity made our days better."
In loving memory of
Dr. Kay House
August 5, 2016
Kay Seymour House (nee Elizabeth Kay House), age 92, was born May 19, 1924, in Payson, Illinois, the daughter of Emil Aaron House and Mary Seymour House. She passed away at Good Samaritan Home of Quincy, August 5, 2016, at 8:00 PM.
She received an AA degree from Stephens College, where she was elected to membership in Phi Theta Kappa, Chi Delta Phi, Kappa Phi Delta, and the Prince of Wales club. After being one one of the first two women editors of The Daily Illini, she graduated summa cum laude in 1945 from the University of Illinois. She was elected to membership in Phi Beta Kappa, Sigma Delta Pi, Mu Pi Sigma, and earned Bronze Tablet and Mortar Board awards. Her social fraternity was Kappa Kappa Gamma. A year later she earned an M.A. from Washington University in St. Louis, where she was also a teaching assistant in the English department. After a year of teaching science writing at the Ohio State University in Columbus, she returned to private life in Quincy until her divorce from Dr. Ralph Barr McReynolds in 1958. During that time she was active in the Boy Scouts, PTA, and the Congregational Church.
She became an instructor in English at Stanford University while completing work for a Ph.D. In 1963, she became a professor at San Francisco State University where she taught, with breaks for European service, until 1989, having been chairman of the department in 1987-1988. She was a Fulbright lecturer to Italy in 1968-1969 and Resident Director of the California State University Program in Italy from 1972 to 1974. Elected to membership in the Italian Association for North-American Studies in 1974. She was made an honorary member of International Tuscans in 1974.
In California, she was President of the Northern California chapter of the American Studies Association beginning in 1968 and was chair of the Boston convention session of this association in 1977. On her return from Italy, she became chairman of the screening committee for Fulbright scholars, 1974-1977, and helped screen Fulbright-Hays graduate students in 1984-87. She was a founding member of Omicron chapter of Phi Beta Kappa and served as membership chairman of the Northern California Phi Beta Kappa association from 1965-1970. A member of the Philological Association of the Pacific Coast and a fellow of the Huntington Library, she was a member of the Palace of Fine Arts League, the Browning Institute, the Friends of KQED, and the friends of the San Francisco Public Library. She was a board member of the library group five years and program chairman for two years. She was also a member of the Leonardo da Vinci society of San Francisco.
Having received a fellowship from the American Antiquarian Society of Worcester, Massachusetts in 1978, she was elected to membership in the Society in 1991. She was awarded Phi Beta Kappa of Northern California's prize for excellence in teaching in 1988. Listed in the Directory of American Scholars and Who's Who in America, she was a member of the Editorial Board for publication of the writings of J. F. Cooper from 1966 until 1990 when the Editor-in-Chief died suddenly and she was elected to replace him at the editorial headquarters at Clark University and the American Antiquarian Society from 1990-2002. The author of all or parts of ten books and a number of scholarly articles, many published in Rome. In 2005 she completed contributions to books on teaching Cooper, on a Cooper novel set in Venice, and on teaching American history through literature.
She was elected to the board of Quincy University in 2000 and was a member of Friends in Council, the Quincy Country Club, the American Council of Trustees and Alumni, the Association of Literary Scholars and Critics, and the Intercollegiate Studies Institute.
Surviving are her two sons: Barr H. McReynolds and his wife Ruth, of Quincy, and their children; Angela Reeves (Tim) Griffin and Devlin Reeves, both of Frisco, Texas, and grandchildren, Reagan Griffin, Cayman Griffin, and Kensington Reeves, all of Frisco, Texas; and Kirk S. McReynolds and his wife Liz, of Quincy, and their children, Adam Scott, Michelle McReynolds, and Sarah McReynolds, all of Quincy.
She was preceded in death by her parents and two sisters; Barbara Winters and Sue Higson.
Private family burial service will be at a later date.
Memorials: Good Samaritan Home of Quincy or First Union Congregational Church of Quincy.
www.hansenspear.com
Hansen-Spear Funeral Directors are in charge of arrangements.
Tributes
"Let me add to the excellent obituary on this website that Kay Seymour House was a widely respected and much loved scholar of the works of James Fenimore Cooper. Her 1966 book COOPER'S AMERICANS remains a widely read standard in the literary history of the early American Republic, and contributed significantly to establishing Cooper's reputatation as the first great American novelist. She was a founding member of the national scholarly edition, "The Writings of James Fenimore Cooper," and edited two of his major novels, THE PILOT (1986) and SATANSTOE (1990), as well as contributing notes to a third. She became the second editor in chief of the edition and reestablished an active publishing schedule after the death of the founding editor. Moreover, she was a mentor and friend to younger editors who learned from her generous sharing of critical insights both in historical and editorial studies. She was always accessible and ready to help with many other essays and collaborations throughout her distinguished career. Her many friends in the scholarly world greatly miss her warmth and encouragement, but take heart that her scholarly legacy remains a permanent contribution to American letters."