Carol Beatty

Carol E. Beatty, age 89, a longtime resident of Wayne, passed Tuesday, March 25, 2025.

She was born in Newark to William and Elsetta Gailey and raised at 174 Newark Pompton Turnpike in Wayne. She was in the first graduating class of the Wayne High School’s Class of 1953.

As Carol would wait for the bus to high school a passing truck would toot its horn at her daily and she would turn her back.  Eventually Carol’s sisters, who worked at the local luncheonette, would introduce her to the horn honking Donald Beatty who often frequented the luncheonette. Their first date was to the movie theatre in Pompton Lakes and as fate would have it they fell in love. Donald proposed marriage to Carol in the kitchen of the family home on Newark Pompton Turnpike and they married at the Pompton Lakes Reformed Church on July 19, 1954. After a reception at Community Fire Company #1 in the Mountain View section of Wayne they honeymooned in Niagara Falls, New York.

Soon after their marriage Carol and Don bought a log cabin in the Pines Lake section of Wayne where they raised their three sons. When Carol’s third son was just nine months old she got a call from a friend at the Wayne Police Department asking if she would be interested in being a crossing guard at the Pines Lake School in Wayne. Carol said yes she would help and figured she would do it for a couple of years. She would cross children along Pines Lake Road to the Pines Lake School for thirty-two years before retiring in 1997.

Carol was a member of the Wayne First Aid Squad’s “Wives Club” for many years. In 1971, she and Don started vacationing in Old Forge, New York and they finally purchased a mobile home in 1985. They moved to Old Forge in 1998 but Carol returned to Wayne shortly after Don's passing to be closer to family.

Carol was an avid crafter enjoying both sewing and crocheting.  You would often find her and her sisters at local craft shows where she sold hand-made pillows and potholders.

Carol was the loving wife of the late Donald Beatty (d. 2004); she was the loving mother of Donald Beatty, Jr. and his wife Cynthia of Wayne, William Beatty and his wife Joyce of Pennsylvania, and Mark Beatty and his wife Kathleen of Bloomingdale; she was the cherished grandmother of Ian Beatty, Kelly Post, Kim Beatty, Brittany Beatty, and Allison Beatty; she was also the dearly loved great-grandmother of Alexandra and Cassandra Post, Brynn, Kyle, and Charley Beatty; she was the loved sister of the late Joyce Fedell of Ormond Beach, FL, the late Merilyn Martin of Holly Hill, FL, Gloria Hinderlong of Jefferson, and Bonnie Longo of West Milford.

In lieu of flowers memorial donations to the Wayne Memorial First Aid Squad, PO Box 2004, Wayne, NJ 07474 would be greatly appreciated.