By: Lacey Korevec
Historic Cranbury has a lot to thank Babs Thomsen for.
Friends and family will remember her as strong defender of historic preservation, a person who stood up for what she felt was right and changed the way locals viewed the historic value of their town.
Ms. Thomsen lived on South Main Street for 58 years. She died at her daughter Betsy’s home in Vienna, Va., on Monday.
"With Babs’ passing, Cranbury has lost one of its eloquent and forceful defenders of historical preservation," said Betty Wagner, a longtime friend of Ms. Thomsen’s. "For example, she participated in the effort to preserve the Updike property for farmland and open space and, prior to that, played an active role in the preservation of the old school."
Born Barbara Fleming, in Waterbury, Conn., in 1924, Ms. Thomsen moved to Cranbury in 1949 after she married her husband, Carl Thomsen, who was killed in a plane crash while flying for the Naval Reserves in 1958.
Ginny Swannagan, a friend of Ms. Thomsen’s, recalls the tragic event and the support Ms. Thomsen had from friends including Don and Rachel Armstrong and George and Mahbubeh Stave.
"Babs had just lost her husband and she had a young baby it was Betsy," Ms. Swannagan said. Ms. Thomsen also had two other children at the time, Carl and Barbara Carol. "And these wonderful women really were her good friends and supported her through that difficult time. She was strong and she did have good support here. She was very strong. I can’t imagine what that must have been like."
In the following years, Ms. Thomsen raised her three children and became involved in civic work and Cranbury politics, campaigning for Democratic candidates on the local and state levels. She also was a founding member of the Cranbury Housing Association, Cranbury Landmarks, an organization that preserves historic buildings in the township, and was a school board member in the 1960s.
"She was a cheerful, willing worker," Ms. Swannagan said. "Always dedicated to good causes."
Ms. Thomsen had a big role in preserving much of Cranbury’s Main Street through her work with Cranbury Landmarks. Many remember her most for her activism in the "Save the School Project," an effort in 1971 by a group of residents working to save the Old School building, now Town Hall, from demolition.
In a 1979 interview with Robert Lawson, much of which was printed in The Cranbury Press in 1997, Ms. Thomsen discussed saving the building.
"I think people are very, very pleased that the Old School building has been saved and that it’s doing useful work in the community, as many people thought it could from the very beginning," she said. "But it didn’t just happen by osmosis; it took a lot of hard work."
Ms. Thomsen was also involved with the township’s purchase and preservation of land in the Wynnewood development, which was later expanded when the township purchased the West Property along Cranbury Brook and preserved it as open space, allowing more land for the school and community recreation.
Ms. Swannagan said she remembers Ms. Thomsen’s feistiness and how it helped with so many controversial, local causes.
"She stood up for what she believed in and she joined the local causes," she recalled. " I can’t remember what they all were. But there were a group of women in town who were very strong and believed in certain things and stood up for them. And they weren’t always popular for that."
Before moving to Cranbury, Ms. Thomsen studied at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Rutgers University.
Later in life, she single-handedly created Canal Watch, Inc, a nonprofit organization that monitored and preserved the Delaware-Raritan Canal Park.
Ms. Swanagan said she will also remember Ms. Thomsen as an excellent seamstress.
"She took a piece of material that a relative of mine had brought back from the Middle East in the 1820s and she made it into a dress for me," she said. "And I’ll never forget that. I wouldn’t have entrusted it at that time to anyone else and she did a beautiful job."
Ms. Thomsen’s parents, Thomas and Annette Fleming, and her husband, Carl Thomsen, are deceased. She is survived by her sister, Polly O’Brien, her three children, Barbara Carol, Carl and Betsy, seven grandchildren and many nieces and nephews.
The family will hold private services.
In lieu of flowers, friends and loved ones may send checks payable to PMC-Jimmy Fund with "In memory of Babs Thomsen" in the memo to Katherine Gallagher, 100 Richards Ave, Unit 108, Norwalk, Conn. 06854.
