October 29, 1942 – February 7, 2025
Beryl S. Powell died peacefully on February 7, 2025, at St. Luke’s hospital in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, after a prolonged illness. She was 82 years old.
Beryl was the second of three children born to John Jermain Slocum, Sr., a diplomat, scholar, and U.S. Army Air Corps officer, and Eileen Gillespie Slocum, a prominent socialite and leader in the Republican Party. She was descended from such notable figures as Myles Standish, the Captain of the Mayflower and military leader of the Plymouth Colony in Massachusetts; Roger Williams, founder of the State of Rhode Island; Major General Lawrence Lewis Gillespie, a Medal of Honor recipient from the U.S. Civil War; Col. Herbert J. Slocum, who commanded the 13th Cavalry Regiment against Pancho Villa; and the Brown family, which founded Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island.
Beryl lived abroad with her family during her early years. Her father was a Foreign Service Officer with the U.S. Information Agency, part of the State Department. The family lived in Frankfurt and Bad Godesberg, Germany; Brussels, Belgium; and Cairo, Egypt. She attended Miss Hewitt’s Classes in New York City (now the Hewitt School) and The Potomac School in McLean, Virginia. She became an avid bibliophile at the urging of her father, and wrote four novels (including Mirror, Mirror and Grief), the first of which was published when she was seventeen years old.
Beryl was named “Debutante of the Year” in New York City in 1960, and went on to attend Radcliffe College (now part of Harvard University), from which she graduated with a degree in English Literature. During her college years she was hired by President John F. Kennedy to work at the White House Bureau of the Budget (now the OMB), and she also worked for Lieutenant General Alva R. Fitch, a Bataan Death March survivor, at the Defense Intelligence Agency in the Pentagon.
In 1967, Beryl returned to New York City where she met Adam Clayton Powell, III, the son of Congressman Adam Clayton Powell, Jr. and the jazz pianist Hazel Scott. The two were married in May, 1969, at the Washington National Cathedral. They lived in New York City for sixteen years and raised their two children there. Beryl worked at the New York Public Library, and at three publishing companies, where she edited The Journal of Differential Equations, among others.
In the mid-1980s, Beryl and her younger son moved to Newport, Rhode Island to be closer to her extended family. While living there, she worked as a paralegal at a local law firm, and as the head of finance at an automotive and industrial supplier. She also trained as a nurse, and assisted with her parents’ medical care after they fell ill in their later years. After her parents’ passing she traveled extensively, to locations such as China, India, Turkey, and numerous African countries.
Beryl completed her M.A. in 2007, and her Ph.D. in 2018, both at Salve Regina University in Newport. She then moved to the Midwest to live with her younger son and his family, and in 2022, moved with them to Eastern Pennsylvania.
Beryl is survived by her sons (former) Army Major Sherman Scott Powell, Adam C. Powell, IV, Ph.D., his wife Colleen Richards Powell; by her sister, Marguerite Leckrone, and her grandchildren William, Katherine and Hannah. She is predeceased by her parents and by her brother John J. Slocum, Jr.
A viewing will be held Sunday, February 16, from 2-3:00 pm at the Schmidt Funeral Home, 407 Belvidere St, Nazareth, PA 18064. A funeral service will follow at 3:00 pm in the funeral home.
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