By Beth Potier, Media Relations

Our beautiful and vivacious Crescentia Healy True passed away this morning (Tuesday, March 14). Crescentia brought an uncompromising dedication to her work along with a wonderfully irreverent sense of humor, often accompanied by cackle that reverberated off every surface in the office. She enriched and inspired everyone with her strength of character and integrity.

While we cannot express the depth of our sorrow and loss, we can resolve to follow the exhortations of Mary Harris “Mother” Jones – with whom Crescentia shared may qualities – to “pray for the dead and fight like hell for the living.” That is what Crescentia did, and that is what we will continue to do in her honor and memory. Please keep Crescentia’s daughters, Eryn and Emma, as well as her parents and family in your thoughts and prayers.

Her Office of Sustainability Family
Tom Kelly, El Farrell, Sara Cleaves, Tyra Byers, and Nate Duclos.

Crescentia Healy True, 43, associate director of UNH’s Office of Sustainability and a tireless promoter of sustainable projects at UNH, died Tuesday morning, March 14, 2006, of cancer. True, who joined the Office of Sustainability (OS) in January 2005, spearheaded many projects: she was the lead organizer of the Energy Task Force; she created and lead OS’s WildCAP, a campuswide climate action program aimed at reducing UNH’s greenhouse gas emissions; she worked with Transportation Services to get six new compressed natural gas buses on campus; and she led the office’s waste vegetable oil/biofuels project, which will convert waste vegetable oil from campus food services into biodiesel. She also founded a nonprofit, On Belay, to help children deal with their parents’ cancer diagnoses. Gov. John Lynch honored her as Volunteer of the Month in January 2006 for her work with On Belay.

“She did it all with her engaging spirit and her love for life,” said OS program coordinator Sara Cleaves. “She really just had a way about her that inspired and empowered everyone around her.”

True is survived by her daughters, Eryn and Emma; her parents, Bill and Crescentia Healy of Newmarket; siblings Clare, Elizabeth, Greg, and Jim; and several nieces and nephews. Funeral services are Saturday, March 18 at 11 a.m. at St. Thomas More Catholic Church in Durham.