Catherine W. Priest's Obituary
Catherine Winslow Euster Priest, a regular summer visitor to Rehoboth Beach since 1933, and permanent resident of Rehoboth Beach for the past thirty years, died on September 3, 2022, at age 89 years old, three months shy of her 90th birthday. She is survived by daughters Caren and Bryn, eight grandchildren and two great grandchildren.
Catherine, known locally and in the family as “Kitsy”, was born in Washington, D.C. on December 30, 1932, to Francis Winslow and Laura Bryn, daughter of an Ambassador to the U.S. from Norway. Kitsy’s paternal, Winslow side of the family are descendants of The Mayflower.
As a child, Kitsy showed artistic talent and joined her mother as a regular participant in the Rehoboth Art League where she remained an active member all her life. Painting and drawing were her life-long passions.
Graduating Sidwell class of 1950, she entered Connecticut College in New London,
because of its strength in teaching art. After two years, she married fellow Washingtonian Roger Euster in September 1952, and transferred to Bryn Mawr while her husband completed nearby Haverford. In July 1953 her first child, Caren, was born. In 1954 through about 1958 she and Roger lived mostly in Washington, engaged in real estate; in 1955 their second child, Wayne, was born.
In about 1958 the family moved to New York City, where Roger expanded his business
ventures to include not only city real estate, but international transactions. In 1962
daughter Bryn was born, followed by Kitsy’s last child, Benjamin Worthington, called
Worth. Roger began to buy theaters, including, in 1967, the Village Theatre, which later
would become the famous Fillmore East. Roger Euster pioneered the presentation of
rock & roll bands such as The Doors, the Who, and Richie Havens, and events by the
poet Allen Ginsberg and LSD advocate Timothy Leary. As Roger moved his properties
through various corporations, Kitsy was for about six weeks the name owner of The
Village Theatre, during which Kitsy presented Ginsburg and Leary in anti-Vietnam War
events.
Kitsy and Roger’s marriage broke-up in about 1972.
Kitsy then spent about a year on her own, in an apartment in Greenwich Village, wearing
“hippie” skirts, and joining the Art Students League, where she studied under
traditionalist painter Frank Mason. Her drawings and pastels from this time show real
talent, capturing the look and feel of the late 60’s and early 70’s. Kitsy also took up the
Japanese martial art Aikido, and stayed in touch with the sensei (master) for the rest of
her life.
Then Kitsy discovered that she had breast cancer. Dealing with this was one of the things that made her most proud of herself - because she did not let it put her down.
With Caren and Wayne having gone off to college in about 1973, Kitsy established herself in a
Riverside Drive, New York City apartment with Bryn and Worth, having a spectacular view over the Hudson River, on the artistic and intellectual Upper West Side. While attending Frank
Mason’s instruction at the Art Students League, and taking Japanese Aikido lessons, she
also became a peripheral member of rabbi Shlomo Carlebach’s circle, the “singing rabbi”
of West 79th street.
Around 1976 at a New York West Side reception for a singing-group, she met film and
TV actor Martin Priest (real name Emmanuel Nureck). He won her heart by shaking out
a Lucky from his cigarette pack and lighting it with a match with one hand, thus never
releasing her hand that he held in his other hand. On finding that they would like to
become intimate, she faced the mastectomy issue head-on, pointing and saying “this
one’s real, and this one’s fake.” Martin responded by pulling-out his own false teeth and
saying “I’ve got you beat.”
It was after this, in about 1978, that Kitsy married a second time, to Martin. Kitsy thus acquired two stepsons, Kimm and Gary Nureck, by Martin with his first wife. Martin was the lead in the 1989 film “The Plot Against Harry”.
Services will be private.
Please sign the virtual guestbook located on the tribute page.
FLORIST NOTE: PLEASE DELIVER ALL ARRANGEMENTS BY 3PM, MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 12, 2022, TO OUR LEWES LOCATION.
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