Sue Samuelson (1956-1991) Simon Bronner

Few people imagined that Sue Samuelson's address at the 1990 AFS Meeting would be her last. Having already made her mark in folklore and folklife scholarship with college teaching positions, consultancies, papers at professional meetings, articles, book chapters, and books, she was too young to contemplate the end of life, no less the end of a career. But sadly she died on 17 January 1991 after more than two years of fighting lung cancer. She was 34 years old. Sue received a B.A. in anthropology at the University of California at Berkeley, where Alan Dundes introduced her to folklore scholarship. She was awarded the Steager Folklore Prize there her senior year. She entered law school, but withdrew after a week and went to UCLA for an M.A. in the folklore and mythology program and then to the University of Pennsylvania for her Ph.D. in folklore and folklife. At Penn, she wrote her dissertation on Christmas celebrations in America and developed the research interests in festivals, foodways, the folklore of children and adolescents, modem legendry, and applied folklore that would remain with her throughout her career. In recent years, Sue was especially active in the Children's Folklore Section (as Secretary-Treasurer and as Vice President) and the Foodways Section (as Conveener) of the American Folklore Society. She prepared a chapter on the transition from childhood to adolescence for the forthcoming Handbook on children's folklore sponsored by the Children's Folklore Section, and she collaborated with Ted and Lin Humphrey on the introduction to "We Gather Together": Food and Festival in American Life (1988). The Foodways Section has named its prize for the best student paper after Sue. A more complete tribute to Sue, along with a complete bibliography of her scholarship, will appear in an upcoming issue of the J ournal of American Folklore.

Penn State-Harrisburg

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