Janet Stout
French Horn
Janet Stout (d. 2023)
Janet was the daughter of Elmore and Esther Popp formerly of Kenmore, NY. She married David Stout, eldest son of Allen and Hilda Stout from Hallsport, NY on October 2, 1976, after they met through mutual friends in Saranac Lake, NY. They have no children.
Janet sought travel and new experiences and after graduating from Kenmore West, she visited German relatives with her mother traveling on the Queen Mary. She was awarded a BS from Buffalo State as a teacher of homemaking in 1963 after spending a year in Sweden at a folk-arts school. She taught in North Tonawanda and Pine Valley schools, applied for a Fulbright Scholarship and was an exchange teacher to Oxford, England with Pam Mattinson from near London, England. She returned to Pine Valley and was sought by the State Education Department for summer work in the Home and Careers Unit, which became her 25 year career with the title of Supervisor of Home and Career Skills.
In her later years there she helped organize Students Taking Action for Recognition, an honor program for high school students to recognize their skills with the assistance of FCCLA-NY. Janet traveled to most continents during her life, which gave her a world perspective; worked as a professional insurance agent and life planner for Lutheran Brotherhood with David; educated members of the Seneca Nation of Native Americans through their health department; and advised and helped educate her uncle’s children, Ronald and Zura Gerlach, and more recently their children. Janet trained Haitian women to sew in a week for several years with Functional Literacy Ministry of Pittsburg, PA.
Janet had a strong secondary interest in music and played French Horn in 5 community bands in western NY and southern Canada. She co-founded the New Horizons Band of Western NY at the State University of NY at Fredonia, music college; and supported the creation of the Buffalo Niagara Concert Band (now the Buffalo Wind Symphony). She coordinated the appearance of the NHB on the Community Stage at the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra and also played French horn on stage during community participation days. She traveled with another NHB member to the International Horn convention in Australia.
Janet will be remembered as a musician; trusted, kind, sharing, and sincere science-based advisor; educator; and concerned world citizen.
