Charlotte Reischer Clark of Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts, USA, died unexpectedly Tuesday, January 29, 2019, in her 90^th year in Amherst, Massachusetts. She lived a life filled with international travel and countless lifelong friendships with people around the globe.

Charlotte was born July 17, 1929, in Harvey, Illinois.  She was the fourth child of Charles J. and Geneva Holmes Huston of Flossmoor, Illinois. She went to high school in Harvey, Illinois and then went east to Mt. Holyoke College where she earned a B.A. in Economics in 1951.

She met and married Otto Reischer, an economist, while they were both working at the U.S. Department of Labor in Washington, D.C.  Together they had four children and Otto's career took them to British Columbia, Michigan and back to Washington, D.C.  The family moved to Pakistan in 1963 and then later to Jordan where Otto worked with the United Nations Development Programme.  During the 1967 Six-Day War, Charlotte and her two younger daughters were temporarily evacuated to the Isle of Sark.  

Charlotte immersed herself in the local culture wherever she lived and made connections and friendships that lasted a lifetime.  In the summer of 1969, her husband died while on vacation in Vermont.  Charlotte took the family back to Arlington, Virginia.  There she spent ten years raising her children and working as a successful realtor.  Not surprisingly her clients became part of her ever-expanding circle of friends.

In 1979 she rediscovered her childhood friend George W. Clark who was now a professor of physics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.  They hadn't seen each other since they were students at Mt. Holyoke College and Harvard College. By the end of 1979, they were living together in Brookline, MA, marrying a few years later.  Their life together included summers at their home on Martha's Vineyard playing tennis and sailing, winters in Brookline entertaining family and friends, and frequent travel to Europe and to Asia for professional meetings and pleasure.  She had a passion for travel and meeting new people and in later years she enjoyed the revisiting of old friends in new and old places. 

Charlotte was blessed with the gift of friendship maintaining some connections that went back generations while making new friends throughout her life.  She was a dedicated and gifted correspondent writing letters and emails that recipients cherished.  She loved to gather people together - large groups of family, friends, and students to enjoy food, wine, and conversation.  New friends met old friends and formed new connections. The joy she found in sponsoring and supporting young artists and authors widened our circles infinitely. 

Charlotte’s pleasure in her gardens, on the Vineyard and the house in Chestnut Hill, was inspiring.  Watching her trees grow and adding new plants and sharing the plants was part of the joy.  She also enjoyed her tennis games throughout her life and travels, and right up to the end worked out with her fitness trainer, Sergio.

She was deeply committed to the care given the mentally ill and served on the board of the Massachusetts Mental Health Center. She had strong feelings about women’s health and reproductive rights, supporting NARAL and Planned Parenthood.

Mount Holyoke College played a major role in Charlotte’s life giving her a circle of friends who kept in touch until the end. She often sponsored students providing a bed for both international and American students in Arlington, Virginia and later in Chestnut Hill. Recently she helped run the fundraising for the class of 1951, giving back to the place that had been so important to her.

Not the least of her joys were her second husband George W. Clark and her children, step-children and her four grandchildren.  Charlotte is survived by her husband and four children - Bridget Reischer and her husband James Harburger of Newton, MA, Blair Reischer and his wife Martha Bozman of Arlington, VA, Sybille Reischer Ecroyd and her husband John of Auckland, NZ, and Electa Reischer of Dorchester, MA, and by her husband’s two children - Katherine Clark of Hudson, NY, and Jacqueline Clark of Boston, MA as well as her four grandchildren - Otto Ecroyd, Rosalind Reischer, Peter Reischer and Geneva Harburger.

There will be a Memorial Celebration of her life on July 20, 2019, in Chestnut Hill. 

Contributions can be made in her memory to the following charities:  The Museum of Fine Arts (https://www.mfa.org/give ); National Alliance for Mental Illness (https://namimass.org/); NARAL Pro-Choice Massachusetts (https://prochoicemass.org/)