Obituary of Ellen C Baumann

Ellen Marie Chaplain Baumann went home to be with her Lord and Savior on September 1, 2020. Born in 1921, she was raised in Brooklyn and graduated from Erasmus Hall High School. Her family moved to Brookside in 1939, and New Jersey was her home for the rest of her life. A graduate of Cedar Crest College in Allentown, PA, she married William C. Baumann in 1944, and in 1951 the couple moved to Bernardsville, where they raised their four children. Ellen had many interests in addition to her family. She was a nature-lover and a voracious reader. The consummate hostess, she was an excellent cook and baker whose home was always open to visitors—missionaries from far-off countries as well as local friends and neighbors. In 1971, while serving as president of the board of trustees of the Visiting Homemaker Service of Somerset County, she edited and compiled three “Mini-Fuss” cookbooks to raise funds for the organization. Having moved to New Vernon in the 1980’s, she was a founding member of the New Vernon Garden Club and an active member of the Harding Township Historical Society. The thing that was most precious to Ellen was her personal relationship with Jesus. She and Bill were devoted members of Long Hill Chapel in Chatham and, later, charter members of Mendham Hills Community Church in Mendham. Predeceased by her husband and her sister, Betty Kiser, she leaves her four children: Betsy Ahl and her husband David; Penny Smith and her husband Pete; Martha Koppin and her husband Gordon; and Bill Baumann and his wife Tina. She had eight grandchildren and nine great-grandchildren.