Beatrice Scheafer, formerly of Baldwin, dies at 109

Beatrice Scheafer loved telling stories about her family's Civil War experiences. And family members loved to listen because she was the last direct link to such rich slices of history.

One story she would relate told of her grandfather, a Confederate soldier, hiding in a tree as a Union patrol passed below. Another told of her grandmother and great-grandmother burying valuables in their Virginia yard to hide them from raiding Union troops.

A daughter of Virginia who lived more than 50 years in Baldwin and Merrick, Scheafer died Wednesday of heart disease at the home of her granddaughter, Carole Buynoch of Poquott. She was 109.

Her family called her "a remarkable woman," who until three years ago still climbed the stairs to her second-story apartment at a Baldwin senior-citizen housing complex.

"She loved being around people and was always telling stories," Buynoch said.

Another granddaughter, Susan Schiro of Wantagh, who has researched family history, said the Civil War stories were handed down by Scheafer's grandmother and great-grandparents. Scheafer was born in Rockfish, Va., in Nelson County, and family on her mother's side also fought in the Revolutionary War, Schiro said.

Scheafer herself became a family story in 1919, when at 19 she eloped with Edward James Scheafer of Manhattan. "Her parents didn't think she was old enough to get married, so they eloped," Schiro said. Edward was in the National Guard, assigned to guard a bridge near his future wife's Virginia home.

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The couple moved to Manhattan and later Bellerose in Queens.

After Edward died in 1947, at age 52, she moved to Merrick to live with her son, also named Edward. He died in 1976.

Buynoch said her grandmother never owned or drove a car, but liked to travel. She would take the Long Island Rail Road to visit her sister-in-law in Huntington and often went to the city for plays. She also visited Las Vegas and Hawaii.

On those train rides to Huntington she often wondered about Long Island's transformation from tranquil farmland to bustling suburbia, family members said.

Scheafer walked everywhere, did not eat red meat and had a healthy appetite for vegetables, especially yams and potatoes, Buynoch said.

In May 2009, Scheafer was matron of honor at the wedding of her great-granddaughter Carolyn Buynoch-Giardini.

In addition to her granddaughters, Scheafer is survived by a sister, Alice Hilton of Fort Myers, Fla.; a daughter, Beatrice Brown of Boca Raton, Fla.; five other grandchildren, 12 great-grandchildren and one great-great-grandchild.

Her ashes will be buried near her parents' graves in Virginia, the family said.