Meet Alice (B 4) & Harold Denfeld:

At seventy-eight, Alice Van Valkenburgh Muller Denfeld, the mother of seven, the grandmother of sixteen and great-grandmother of six, still has the kind of resume that would make your head spin.

She is President of the Southeastern Zone of New York State Retired Teachers Association, on the Board of the Brookside Daycare Center and the local Diabetes Foundation, a health care counselor for Medicare and Medigap and a member of the local Democratic committee. In addition, she is on the council of the Friends of Valkill, a group that first rescued and now staffs the only home Eleanor Roosevelt ever called her own. She was also named Great Grandmother of the year of Duchess County.

Since retiring, Alice has also taken up painting and playing the piano. She has been to Europe several times, including a trip to the British Isles and sightseeing in Norway, Sweden and Denmark. She also took a trip to Valkenburg, Holland.

Alice was a kindergarten teacher. She developed her school district's curriculum for a fluid first grade transitional program that made it easier for children to move between kindergarten and elementary school. When New York State later mandated kindergarten screening, Alice became her school district's first Developmental Learning Specialist.

Not that Alice only kept her career going. She also raised her seven children, was President of the PTA, started a 4-H Club for boys and worked on the hospital auxiliary. She says her house was a magnet for youngsters. "Weekends would find the house full of kids," she remembers. In addition to all of this she started her own remedial school for reading and math.

In January 1998 she married Harold Denfeld. Harold served in the US Merchant Maine during World War II. He had his own Industrial Testing Laboratory for many years and ended his working career with General Electric Aircraft Engines. This job took him all over the United States and Canada. He has been active in Hospice, US Power Squadron, and SCORE (Senior Corps of Retired Executives). After retirement he was consultant for and assisted with Pratt & Whitney and NASA in the redesign of the SSME (Space Shuttle Main Engine).

Harold has three children and eight grandchildren from a previous marriage. They bought a motor home and travel extensively: west to Arizona twice and this year they "did" Florida down the West Coast and up the East Coast. They are presently renovating their home in Hyde Park, NY, and enjoying themselves immensely.

(Written by Harold Denfeld)