Nordelle Robinson Kelly
Nordelle Robinson Kelly of East Hampton died at her home on Tuesday, August 16, surrounded by her family. She was 74.
Ms. Kelly was born in Manhattan on March 9, 1937, to Vincenza Lillian Mastropaolo and Frank Robinson and grew up on Staten Island. Early on, she became enamored with culinary arts and the French language. As a hobby, she taught herself many professional cooking techniques, and at the age of 16, she entered Wagner College on Staten Island and became a French major. Ms. Kelly was a true Francophile for her whole life, loving the language, food, music, art, and literature of France.
She honed her foreign language skills during her first job as an assistant at the Services Culturelles of the French Embassy in Manhattan. After earning her teaching degree, she was part of a select few to join a special program in the French town of Besançon, and later she travelled to the city of Limoges where she taught English.
Upon returning to the U.S., Ms. Kelly was a French instructor at Queensborough Community College. She temporarily stopped teaching upon her marriage to Raymond F. Kelly, in 1969, with whom she moved to East Hampton in 1974. During her early years on the East End, she had a bread-baking business, which was quite unusual in that she convinced the owners of the mill in Water Mill to operate the grinding stone to turn her sack of wheat into flour. Her bread was made from some of the only wheat ground by that mill in generations. For many seasons she also worked as a personal cook as well as a pastry chef at both the Royal Fish and the Laundry Restaurants.
In the early 1980s, Ms. Kelly started to teach French at the Springs School at both the elementary and middle school levels. She also continued her own education at Stony Brook University to pursue her master’s degree, and traveled to France again several times to study at University programs in both Angers and Poitiers. In 1986 she began teaching French at both the East Hampton high and middle schools. Madame Kelly, as she was known to her students, continued to teach until 1997, when she needed to retire early due to complications of Lyme Disease. She loved her students dearly and enjoyed continuing to see them about town after her retirement.
After retiring, Ms. Kelly loved spending a peaceful life at her home in East Hampton. She enjoyed having more time to spend with her friends and family, as well as continuing her love of teaching which she did as a private tutor for a handful of students. Much time and energy was spent developing the gardens on her property and she took great pleasure in seeing everything grow and bloom as the years went by. She is deeply missed, family said.
She is survived by her children, Nina Kelly of Stuyvesant and Christopher Kelly of Brooklyn; two granddaughters, Olivia and Sabrina Walster, both of Stuyvesant; and siblings, Charles Robinson of Mississippi and Ann Despont of New Jersey.
Memorial donations may be made to the Retreat, theretreatinc.org, or to the Animal Rescue Fund of the Hamptons, arfhamptons.org.
on Aug 30, 2011