Ann M. McKinstry
When Ann M. McKinstry and her family left the city to spend time at their house in East Hampton, one of the things she enjoyed most here was catching up with the news in The East Hampton Star, which she might have missed during the workweek back in Yonkers, N.Y. And when winter arrived and their visits were less frequent, Ms. McKinstry simply had the newspaper forwarded to her. “She always knew everything that was going on — to her it was the bible,” her son, Gerald C. McKinstry Jr., said.
Ms. McKinstry died on Oct. 23, 2018, at the Sarah Neuman Home in Mamaroneck, N.Y., from complications of a stroke at the age of 80. She had been married for 45 years to Gerald C.
McKinstry, who died in August 2013.
“The Hamptons house was such an important gathering place for our family. Both of my parents were teachers, and so we sort of grew up spending summers out there. We had barbecues all the time, and went to the beach religiously. It was said in her eulogy that we grew up thinking 4 o’clock was the perfectly normal time to go to the beach. We’d get sandwiches and go down to Indian Wells.”
Ms. McKinstry taught at St. Barnabas High School in the Bronx for 14 years, and spent another 25 years teaching at a White Plains, N.Y., Middle School before retiring in 1996.
She was born on Dec. 7, 1937, to John Higgins and the former Ann Keane in the Bronx. Ms. McKinstry’s forward-thinking mother, an Irish immigrant, encouraged her to be “educated and self-sufficient” and pursue a career. Ms. McKinstry listened. She graduated from the College of Mount Saint Vincent in the Bronx with a degree in education, and received a master’s degree in mathematics from Hunter College and a master’s in religious education from Fordham University.
In addition to cherishing time with her family and hosting holiday dinners, Ms. McKinstry enjoyed going to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the New York City Ballet, and the New York Botanical Gardens. “She was intelligent, elegant, dignified, meticulous, and funny,” her family said.
Ms. McKinstry is survived by her children: Maureen Cheesman of Alpine, N.J., Megan Ruppenstein of Darien, Conn., Gerald C. McKinstry of Ridgefield, Conn., and seven grandchildren. Her siblings, Eileen McHugh of East Hampton and John Higgins of Fort Myers, Fla., also survive.
She was an active parishioner of Most Holy Trinity Catholic Church in East Hampton. She was buried at Gate of Heaven Cemetery in Hawthorne, N.Y., on Oct. 27 after a funeral service at St. Paul the Apostle Catholic Church in Yonkers.