Longtime volunteer with theatre and symphony in Venice remembered as 'a force'

VENICE – James Crandall and his wife Lynn Munroe Crandall were in Fort Lauderdale for a cruise when her brother Kenneth Fred Munroe suggested they come visit him in Venice, where they wound up moving in 2008.

“We fell in love with Venice,“ James Crandall said, while reminiscing about his late wife, who died May 5 at age 82 after extensive involvement in the community. “We were looking at that point, we had just retired, and we didn't know where we wanted to go.”

The couple first moved to Venetia, where they lived near her brother, who died in 2010, and Venetian Golf & River Club, Plantation Golf and Country Club and most recently The Floridian Club, just south of the Jacaranda Roundabout.

They set down roots though at Emmanuel Lutheran Church and got involved with numerous groups, putting their knowledge from careers as accountants in the Chicago area to use.

James became treasurer for the church and was one of the founding board members for Family Promise of South Sarasota County.

The couple also got involved with the Venice Symphony, with Lynn becoming the founding chairperson for the Venice Symphony Chair Society in 2017, which fostered interaction between the audience and performers while giving members an opportunity to help sponsor members of the symphony.

That first year the society had 23 members. Crandall said his wife had decided to step back once they hit the 100-member milestone.

“We now have 257 members and bring in probably about $70,000 a year,” he added.

Lynn Crandall was volunteering as the treasurer for the Venice Theatre when Camille Cline sat next to her at a meeting of the American Association of University Women in 2017 at Emmanuel Lutheran.

“I never knew when I sat down beside her that day at the AAUW in the Lutheran church, that I was just going to strike up a wonderful friendship with a person who frankly, I think changed my life,” said Cline, now the director of advancement at Venice Theatre.

“Lynn Crandall was a force in Venice from the time she arrived,” Cline said.

Cline – who credits Crandall with helping her connect with the theater as she was winding down her role as a fundraiser for the Friends of the Venice Library.

Once Cline learned that the Crandalls ran a mystery bookstore, “Salmagundi” for 12 years – from 1985 to 1997 – in Naperville, Illinois, she recruited them as Friends of the Venice Library volunteers. Both of them proved valuable providing suggested reading for patrons for two years.

“It was a good thing I wish it had lasted longer but physically we couldn’t do it,” Crandall said.

A whirlwind courtship

James Crandall was visiting a friend on Lakeshore Drive for dinner on May 27, 1983 and Lynn Munroe was there, too.

Their paths had crossed a couple years prior, while watching the Chicago Air and Water Show from a rooftop of a building on Lake Michigan.

When Lynn saw him that night in May, she still recalled their encounter.

“She looked at me and said, 'You were the one who told the joke about the rabbit, weren’t you?'” Crandall said, then quickly added, “It was a terrible joke.”

Lynn had just finalized a divorce that April, and it was a whirlwind romance; they married on Aug. 11, 1983.

A genealogy buff, Crandall can easily trace his Lynn’s heritage back to shortly after the Mayflower landed on Plymouth Rock.

Crandall can link his wife’s bloodline back to Mary Barrett Dyer, an English Puritan turned Quaker, who was hanged in Boston in 1660 and is one of four executed Quakers known as the Boston martyrs.

A bronze statue of Dyer stands in front of the Massachusetts state capitol in Boston.

More recently her father Fred Sennett Munroe, was a successful farmer – he ran the largest egg farm in Illinois, with 500,000 chickens laying eggs – and was on the board of directors for DeKalb Ag, which was sold to Monsanto in the mid-to-late 1990s.

A lasting legacy

Lynn Munroe Crandall’s final resting place will be as part of a family plot in Illinois.

James said no local services are planned.

After her husband, Kristofer Geddie, executive director of the Venice Theatre, may have the best memory of Lynn Crandall.

“Lynn came in with a fire and a passion for this organization and a passion for education that we shared – Lynn and I shared a lot of things – it was so much fun working with Lynn,” Geddie said. “I say this now, sitting at my desk that actually comes from her office in her house.”

Geddie took over as executive director shortly after Hurricane Ian devastated the Venice Theatre and Murray Chase transitioned to restoration director.

At that same time, the Crandalls were moving from Plantation to The Floridian and she offered him her desk, bookshelves and lamps.

“I come in every day and I think of Lynn Crandall.”

This article originally appeared on Sarasota Herald-Tribune: Longtime volunteer brought passion to theatre, symphony work in Venice