Barbara Kallaugher

Barbara Kallaugher died on January 23, aged 93.

Barbara was born in Boston, Massachusetts, in 1927, the eldest of six children of Evelyn Dolan, a Boston native, and William Alphonse Flynn, a native of Cape Breton Island in Nova Scotia.

She had fond memories of living as a small child in Boston with her French-Canadian grandmother in the small top-floor apartment she called “Granny’s Castle.” Her father’s multiple promotions within the Metropolitan Life Insurance Company led the family to relocate to Providence, Rhode Island, in 1934, and seven years later to Westfield, Massachusetts. It was in Westfield that Barbara met her future husband, John Kallaugher.

Barbara was the first member of her extended family to go to College, graduating in 1948 as a Child Studies Major from St. Joseph’s College in West Hartford, Connecticut. Here she met such luminaries as Eleanor Roosevelt and Igor Sikorsky, but it was the college’s “School for Young Children” that had a special impact on her. Here for the first time, she experienced the joy of sharing the company of very young learners. “It was an incredible awakening,” she would later recall, and upon graduation, she followed her passion and worked as a kindergarten teacher in Westerly, Rhode Island.

In 1951, John and Barbara were married, and in 1952, they moved to Norwalk, Connecticut, where they raised their five children. “My dream had come true,” she would later write. “I was married to John Kallaugher, and we had a station wagon full of children.”

Once the children were all in school, Barbara returned to work as an elementary school teacher in the Norwalk Public School System. As a teacher, her mission was to encourage a genuine curiosity in her students, to nurture the confidence to ask questions, and to help them develop critical thinking skills. When the Columbus Magnet School opened for the 1979/1980 academic year, she was named the second-grade teacher. “Our goal,” she said, “was to create a school that both parents and children would treasure as their learning place.” Ten years later, President Bush named The Columbus Magnet School a Blue-Ribbon School, one of the best in the nation. Barbara retired from teaching in 1990.

In 1980, Barbara became the first female board member of the Norwalk Seaport Association during the infancy of the annual Norwalk Oyster Festival. The festival has raised tens of millions of dollars for maritime education and local non-profits over the past 43 years.

In 1995, Barbara and John moved to Maryland to be closer to their grandchildren, living happily for many years in Westminster and later in Myersville. John passed away in 2010.  Since 2016, Barbara has been an active and enthusiastic resident of the Buckingham’s Choice Retirement Community in Adamstown. Barbara penned her autobiography “Lucky Me” in 2019. She then joined a writing group and inspired other residents to tell their own stories.

Barbara is survived by her daughters Gemma Cannon of Portland, Maine, and Maura David of Frederick, Maryland; her sons John Kallaugher of London, England, and Kevin Kallaugher of Glyndon, Maryland; her daughter-in-law Sue McKeown Kallaugher; her sons-in-law Paul David and Steve Cannon; nine grandchildren and three great-grandchildren; her brothers Thomas Flynn and Terence Flynn, and dozens of nieces and nephews. She was pre-deceased by a daughter, Evelyn Kallaugher, and a son, William Kallaugher.

Interment will be in St. Bartholomew Catholic Cemetery in Manchester.

Expressions of sympathy may be offered to the family at StaufferFuneralHome.com.