Carolyn Elise Jacobsen
1924 – 2009
FAIRFAX, Va. — Carolyn Elise Jacobsen, 85, of Fairfax, Va., died Saturday, Dec. 19. Formerly, she lived in Sebastian, Fla., Boothbay Harbor, Lynnfield, Mass., and South Paris. She was the wife of Waldo Burnham from 1984 until his recent passing in October and Lyman Jacobsen from 1947 until his death in 1980.
She was born in Wilton, July 21, 1924, to Charles and Marion Comins. She graduated from Wilton Academy in 1941 and, after a year at Higgins Classical Institute, from the University of Maine, Orono, in 1946.
She began her teaching career at Paris High School in South Paris, that same year. She was a television pioneer in the mid 1950s when she hosted a local TV show called “Carolyn’s Kitchen” on WCSH Channel 6, an NBC affiliate, in Portland.
She later taught home economics at Gray-New Gloucester High School in Gray, and at Oxford Hills High School in South Paris. She received her master’s of science in home economics education in 1970 from the University of Maine. She retired from teaching in 1976. An avid sewer and quilter, she also loved to travel.
She is survived by her son, Jonathan Jacobsen, and his wife, Pam, of Oak Hill, Va.; her daughter, Laura Jacobsen Ho, and her husband, Peter, of Bakersfield, Calif.; grandchildren, Julie Collins, Robert Jacobsen and Erik, Gregory, and Jonathan Ho; her sister, Althea Cliff of Exeter, N.H.; three nieces; a nephew; six great-grandchildren; her stepdaughter, Nancy Root; stepson, Allen Burnham; and five stepgrandchildren.
She was the mother of the late Judith Jacobsen.