St. Johnsbury, VT Janet Louise Halley Kunz, a native of West Newbury, Vt., who traveled to Texas and Seattle before settling back in her hometown to raise a family, died at 3 p.m. on Monday, May 25, at St. Johnsbury Health and Rehabilitation Center. The cause of death was cancer. She was 85. Mrs. Kunz was born on Sept. 30, 1929 in Woodsville, N.H., daughter of Rebecca Eastman Merryman Halley and James Alexander Halley. She was raised in the village of West Newbury, Vt., in a house by a brook then called "Wee Hoosie," and later moved to a 245-acre farm on a West Newbury hillside overlooking the New Hampshire mountains. Thinking of her childhood in a memoir, Mrs. Kunz wrote, "(My) Mom had a huge vegetable garden and we raised nearly everything we ate. What with raising beef, pork, chickens and turkeys we had about everything we needed. It seems like we were always either working in the garden, canning food or working in the hay field. That was the part I liked best..." Mrs. Kunz played basketball in high school, attended Burlington Business College, and in 1951 moved to El Paso, Texas, to live with her brother and enter the work force. Later in the 1950s she worked in New Haven, Conn., for the assistant to the president of Yale University. She subsequently moved to Seattle, Wash., where she married Dave Harley Kunz and had two sons. Her family moved back to West Newbury in 1972. Mrs. Kunz spent the 1970s and early 1980s as a legal secretary before retiring. After her husband Dave passed away in 1997, Mrs. Kunz moved to a home apartment in Wells River, Vt. In her later years she maintained avid friendships with community members, playing Mahjong, quilting, and making crafts. Mrs. Kunz was predeceased by her parents; her husband; and her brother, Gordon Alexander Halley. Survivors include two sons, Ben Kunz and his wife Betsy Kunz of Cheshire, Conn., Sam Kunz and his wife Cami Carter of Orono, Maine; three grandchildren; nephew David Halley of Los Osos, Calif.; niece Linda Johansen of Corvallis, Oregon; sister-in-law Virginia Kunz of Great Falls, Mont.; and her network of close friends who shared her love of Mahjong and crafts. She was a member of the American Legion Auxiliary in Newbury, Vt., and the Grange in Auburn, Wash. A memorial service will be held at 3:30 p.m. Saturday, June 6, at West Newbury Congregational Church, Tyler Farm Road, West Newbury, Vt. A reception for friends and family will follow at the church hall. In lieu of flowers, memorial contributions may be made to Norris Cotton Cancer Center, 1 Medical Center Drive, Lebanon, N.H, 03756.