Many staff members [of the Morris County public schools] also knew the inevitable fate of 79-year-old retired aide and Mount Olive resident Hilda Marcin. Staff members knew her well and knew her plans to visit her daughter in San Francisco and knew which flight she was taking ...
"She was a person we all hoped to be like at that age -- to have that energy and enthusiasm," said Fair. Fair described Marcin as a Jessica Tandy-like character in her sharpness of wit and enthusiasm for life. "When other people would stop, she kept going."
Marcin was a classroom aide at Tinc Road for 14 years after retiring as an office manager at a Newark company, he said.
"The kids liked and respected her," Fair said. "She's the kind of person you
didn't forget."
School officials received confirmation about her death Tuesday from her
granddaughter, who works in the school district. Marcin's daughter lives in
Budd Lake.
"We struggled as a staff," Fair said, "even though we feel she's still with us. It made the tragedy so much more real."
Hilda Marcin