On Dec. 13, 2015, Sandra Otey Hartley, 73, passed away peacefully at Mercy Hospital in Portland, after a gallant fight against cancer. Sondra was born, reared and educated in Memphis, Tenn., graduating from the Hutchison School. She attended Randolph Macon College in Virginia and graduated from the University of Alabama.

In 1979, Sondra moved to Washington, D.C., where she met Douglas Hartley, a foreign service officer with the U.S. State Department. A few weeks after their wedding they moved to Salvador da Bahia, Brazil. Sondra's vivacity, charm, and looks, enhanced by her quick grasp of the Portuguese language, quickly won the hearts of the Brazilians. After living for five years in Salvador and in Rio de Janiero, Sondra and Douglas returned to Washington, where she worked with a book publisher and lectured on life in the foreign service. They spent summers with friends on the coast of Maine, bought property in Cushing and eventually built a house there, where they moved permanently in 2008.

Sondra was intensely interested in politics and was active as a volunteer at the Cushing School, the local Historical Society, the local food bank and the Farnsworth Museum. She was a member of St. John's Episcopal Church in Thomaston. Because of her openness, loyalty and unfailing generosity, she had a large host of friends.

Sondra is survived by her beloved husband, Douglas; and by three half-brothers; a half-sister; five stepdaughters; 10 grandchildren; and a great-grandson, who was born two weeks before her death.

A memorial service will be held Saturday, Jan. 2 at 11 a.m. at St. John's Episcopal Church in Thomaston, with another service to take place in Washington, D.C., in the spring.

In lieu of flowers, the family has requested that donations be made to the Cushing Historical Society, P.O. Box 110, Cushing, ME 04563 or the Cushing Community School, 54 Cross Road, Cushing, ME 04563.

Hall's of Thomaston has care of the arrangements.