Obituary of Elizabeth Niles

Elizabeth A. Niles, 60, a lifelong resident of Montclair, died Thursday, March 31, 2011, surrounded by her family, after being struck by a vehicle on Bellevue Avenue, on her way to catching the morning train to work in New York. A 10 a.m. service will be held on Tuesday, April 5, 2011 at Union Congregational Church, 176 Cooper Ave., and Upper Montclair. Interment will follow at Mount Hebron Cemetery also in Upper Montclair. Visiting hours will be held on Monday, April 4, 2011 from 2 to 4 and 7 to 9 p.m. at the Hugh M. Moriarty Funeral Home at 76 Park Street in Montclair. Ms. Niles, known to all as "Betsy", grew up in Verona and Upper Montclair. She attended Montclair Kimberley Academy and graduated from Hollins College in Roanoke, Va. in 1972. She then earned a master's degree in education from Columbia University. She loved books, words and educating children, and spent most of her career as a children's book editor working for Scholastic Publishing, Pearson Learning and, most recently, Mondo Publishing in Manhattan. One of Ms. Niles favorite books was The Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion, an account of the year following the death of the author's husband, John Gregory Dunne. On the wall of her Manhattan office, she posted a quote from that book, so that she could remind herself, in part, how life needed to be lived to its fullest in every moment: "Life changes fast. Life changes in an instant. You sit down to dinner and life as you know it ends." Ms. Niles is survived by her parents, Edward Lea Apgar and Marilyn Rogers Apgar, formerly of Montclair and now residing in Vero Beach, Fla. She is also survived by her children, Alexandra Niles of Upper Montclair; Peter Edward Niles and his wife, Lauren Niles, and, their son, Jacob Lee Niles of Rising Sun, Md; her brother John Rogers Apgar and his wife, Belen Ybarrondo, of San Diego, Calif., her sister Sally Lea Apgar of Jupiter, Fla., and her son, Patrick Rogers Kelly. She also leaves behind Daniel Paul Sarnowski of Cutchogue, N.Y., her loving companion for the past 10 years, and Robert Jarmen Niles, her former husband, of Baltimore, Md. In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to the NJ Organ and Tissue Sharing Network, a non-profit, federally-certified organ procurement organization, located at 691 Central Avenue, New Providence, NJ 07094 and on the web at www.sharenj.org or by phone at 1-800-SHARE-NJ.