Diana Wilby (Hart) Sullivan

Diana Wilby Hart Sullivan passed away on Thursday, December 1, 2022, at the age of 93. The daughter of a British colonial policeman and a violinist—Lawrence Hart and his wife Violet Searle Hart—Diana was born in Batu Gajah, Malaysia, though she grew up in Eastbourne, in the south of England, and was evacuated to Somerset with her older sister Helen during World War II. 

Diana’s desire to help others manifested early: after the war, she trained as a midwife and a nurse in London, at St. Thomas’s Hospital. Early in her career, she traveled and worked many places in the United States and Canada, eventually settling in New York as the school nurse at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine’s Choir School. 

During this time, she met her future husband, Thomas V. Sullivan, while they were both working at Trinity Boys’ Camp in Connecticut. Soon after, he was ordained an Episcopal priest, and the two of them were married in 1962, in Cranleigh, Surrey, U.K. Their daughter Martha was born in 1964. 

The young couple eventually settled in central Massachusetts. Diana continued to work for many years as a nurse, first at Holden District Hospital, then as office nurse for a local pediatrician, then as the allergies nurse at the Fallon Clinic in Westborough. Her regular patients still remember her fondly, since she had a gift for making uncomfortable things like shots as pleasant as they could be. 

She also showed care for others in her volunteer activities. She served for many years on the Bement Educational Grants Committee of the Diocese of Western Massachusetts, for much of that time as the co-chair of the committee, understanding as she did that encouraging young people to continue their education is crucial to the future of this country. 

In her spare time, Diana enjoyed making all types of art, ranging from watercolors to rug-hooking—but always designs of her own, not images from kits. She also loved singing in the choir at All Saints Church. 

In her later years, she lived with her partner Arne Korstvedt in Worcester, until his death in 2012. 

Diana is survived by her daughter Martha, a composer and music professor, as well as by her sister’s children in England, and numerous Sullivan relatives. The family requests that in lieu of flowers, donations be made either to All Saints Church, Worcester—Diana’s spiritual home—or to the United Negro College Fund, because Diana was active in providing scholarships to college students, and because she believed that the most important political issue in this country is equality for Black Americans.

The link for giving to All Saints is 

https://www.allsaintsw.org/giving; for the UNCF, it is https://uncf.org/.

A memorial service in celebration of Diana’s life will be held at All Saints Episcopal Church, 10 Irving Street, Worcester, MA, at 11:00 am on Saturday, January 21.  

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