Charity Waymouth, a prominent lay person in the Diocese of Maine and the wider church, died Oct. 31 in a nursing home in Surrey, England. She was 85.

Born in England and educated at the Royal School for Daughters of Officers of the Army in Bath, she went on to the University of London and the University of Aberdeen. She became an eminent research scientist and wrote extensively on nucleic acids, tissue culture and cell nutrition. She became a staff scientist at the Jackson Laboratory, Bar Harbor, ME, in 1947. She remained there until 1981. She had a long association with the Episcopal Church, as a member and warden at St. Saviour's Church, Bar Harbor, and member of the standing committee and diocesan council in Maine. She was a six-time deputy to General Convention and was a member of the Committee for Ecumenical Relations, the Committee on Canons, and the Committee on the Constitution of the Church. She was a member of the Council of Advice to the President of the House of Deputies, serving with three presidents, and was a member and later president of the Committee on the State of the Church. Ms. Waymouth was a strong advocate for the correct use of language and edited many motions and reports at conventions. She attended the Anglican Congress in Toronto in 1963, and served on many boards and committees concerned with ecumenical affairs. She nominated the Rev. Fred Wolf as Bishop of Maine in 1969 and after he was elected she became probably the first woman, lay or ordained, to preach the sermon at the consecration of a bishop. She also preached the sermon at the consecration of the Rt. Rev. Harold Hopkins as Bishop of North Dakota. In 1988 she was the first recipient of the Fred Scribner Award as the outstanding member of the Diocese of Maine.