Joy Whitney Scott
Oct. 14, 1932-May 11, 2026
Stanford, California
Joy Whitney Scott died peacefully in her sleep during her afternoon nap on Monday, May 11, 2026. She was 93 years old.
Joy was born on October 14, 1932 in Clearwater, Kansas, now a suburb of Wichita. Her parents were Essie Fern Cornelius and Gailey Arthur Whitney, Fern and Gail.
Joy was the second of three children. Her elder sister was (Donna) Gae Whitney and her younger brother was Malcolm ‘Mac’ Whitney.
Young Joy and family lived and moved through several towns in Kansas, as her father, Gail, taught in a variety of public schools during the early 1950s. Later he became a member of the faculty at College of Emporia, teaching biology at this small Presbyterian College.
Joy attended Emporia High School, where she was selected ‘Queen of Courts’ during basketball season, served as business manager of the high school yearbook during her junior year and as its editor during her senior year.
Largely because her father was on the faculty, Joy attended the College of Emporia (“C of E”). She had hoped to attend Kansas State University in Manhattan.
During the summer of 1953, Joy worked on the staff housekeeping crew at a large YMCA camp in Estes Park, Colorado. Because of family responsibilities, she was only able to serve as a staff member for the month of July, but it was during this time that she met W. Richard ‘Dick’ Scott, her future husband, also a staff member. It turned out to be a momentous month for both of them!
Joy returned to C of E for her last year of college and graduated in 1954 with a B.A. in Home Economics. During the following year, she taught Home Economics and Physical Education in a high school in Bern, KS.
In August of 1955, she married Dick in the 1st Congregational Church of Emporia. After honeymooning where they had met in Estes Park, they drove to Chicago so that Dick could pursue his Ph.D. at the University of Chicago. Joy served on the faculty for four years as assistant Librarian in the Laboratory High School, an elite school operating under the auspices of the School of Education of Chicago U.
During the holiday of 1959-60, Joy and Dick spent Christmas in Kansas with their families in both Emporia and Parsons, and then... drove to California where Dick had been appointed Assistant Professor Sociology at Stanford University.
In their first year in California, Joy worked as Children’s Librarian at the Menlo Park public library. During her first summer, she organized a very successful children's reading program. She left this post in 1961 when her first child, Jennifer, was born in June. Two other children, a boy, Elliot and a girl, Sydney, arrived during the next few years. During this time, the family had moved into a new Eichler home-a cutting-edge modern design-built for them on the Stanford campus.
After moving into the new Lathrop Place house, Joy took an active and ongoing role in landscaping and maintaining this remarkable property. They occupied this beloved indoor-outdoor home for more than fifty years. She also grew and managed a stunning Bonsai collection.
As the children moved toward independence, Joy began to work part-time with a fellow faculty-wife and friend, Molly Agras, at Courtyard Collection, a store in Palo Alto featuring textiles and crafted jewelry. A few years later, with Molly's encouragement, Joy returned to college, completing her MA degree in Library Science at San Jose University. In addition to attending classes, she worked part-time as a law librarian for several private law firms.
In 1991, Joy was appointed head librarian at the Center for Advanced Study of the Behavioral Sciences, a national studies center located on the outskirts of Stanford University–overlooking Lake Lagunita. She worked there until her retirement in 1998.
Joy enjoyed painting with watercolors, jewelry design, cooking, sewing, ceramics and frequent family adventures. During the last quarter-century of her life, Joy and her husband traveled extensively throughout Europe and many parts of Asia. Because of Joy’s love of textiles, she and Dick often visited Turkey. In 1998, Joy organized a two-week trip so that she and her textile friends could examine and experience in detail all of the stages–from sheep to loom–of the fascinating and ancient textile process.
Because of her childhood experience, Joy’s favorite U.S. destination was always Yosemite Valley, and she and the family visited there often.
Moving into retirement, Joy and Dick were active in helping to organize a couples group through Avenidas Village at the Palo Alto Senior Center which included several neighborhood “clusters”, including one on the Stanford campus. This provided a new and vibrant community in their last years at Stanford. Around 2020, as the COVID virus became more active, with the urging and assistance of their daughter, Jennifer, they left their Stanford home and community to move to Grass Valley, CA in the Sierra foothills. Here they have lived comfortably and happily until Joy’s death three months ago. Joy lived an active, productive life. She was a loving wife, an extraordinary mother, and an engaged and imaginative community member. She will be missed by all that knew and loved her.