Patricia A. Arceri, 85

Patricia A. Arceri, who had been ill for only a short time, died at home in Amagansett on July 14, with her husband and family at her bedside. She was 85.

According to Mary Jane Arceri, her daughter, Mrs. Arceri was a volunteer’s volunteer, who had helped myriad local organizations and attended East Hampton Town Board meetings often since moving to the South Fork full time in 1982. Before that, she had helped establish a sheltered workshop in Smithtown, originally called the Suffolk Center for Autistic Children, and was a Girl Scout leader and den mother. She was also a founding member and past president of the Good Samaritan Hospital thrift shop and guild in West Islip.

Patricia A. Arceri was born on Dec. 15, 1931, in New York City to Harry Spears and the former Mary Crimmins, one of four children. She graduated from Sewanhaka High School in Franklin Square. After marrying Louis Arceri, who survives, the couple lived in North Babylon, where they brought up five children. Beginning in 1962, the family spent summers in Amagansett, where they delighted in spending time at the ocean and bay beaches, especially at Fresh Pond and Lazy Point when the children were young, and in celebrating birthdays and holidays. She and her husband were drawn by their love of beaches and the sea to vacation on St. Croix and in Florida.

Here, she volunteered at American Red Cross blood drives, local and state elections for the League of Women Voters, as a guide at the LongHouse Reserve, and for R.S.V.P., which monitors elderly residents who live alone. She was an usher at the Bay Street Theater and the head of the Sunshine Club.

Her grandchildren, Nicholas Arceri, Rose A. Schellinger, and June Arceri, worked with Mrs. Arceri in many volunteer efforts, including selling poppies, the memorial flower of the American Legion, on Memorial Day, at book fairs at the Amagansett Library, and at the Great Bonac Footrace in Springs.

In addition to her husband, her daughter Mary Jane Arceri, and three grandchildren, all of whom live in East Hampton, Mrs. Arceri is survived by four other children, Nancy Arceri, Jim Arceri, and Louis J. Arceri, all of East Hampton, and Kenneth Arceri of Mastic. Also surviving are three great-grandchildren, and a brother, John Spears of Bethel, Conn. A brother, Walter Amrhein of Levittown, and a sister, Florence Meighan of Wantagh, died before her.

Mrs. Arceri was cremated. A memorial service will be held at Scoville Hall of the Amagansett Presbyterian Church on Sept. 16 from 1 to 5 p.m. The family has suggested donations in her memory to East End Hospice, P.O. Box 1048, Westhampton Beach 11978.