Ann Edwards Carter

Ann Edwards Carter was born on August 8, 1926; on August 15, 2018, she died in her home on Cambridge Avenue in Lakeland, Fla., one week after a gathering for her 92nd birthday. She was born in Tampa, Fla., to Katharine Tipton Edwards and LaMarcus Colquitt Edwards, who was a leading pioneer in the Florida citrus industry and co-founder and CEO of Pasco Packing Company in Dade City, Fla., where Carter grew up. She studied music at Rollins College in Winter Park and went on to study privately with the highly acclaimed New York Metropolitan Opera mezzo soprano Louise Homer, who was then retired and living in Tampa. Carter traveled frequently to New York City, staying at the famed Algonquin hotel to be near the original Metropolitan Opera when she was in her 20s and 30s. She also traveled extensively and crossed the Atlantic on the Queen Elizabeth with her mother and sister in the early 1950s. She married Leonard Carlysle Carter, Jr., and moved to Lakeland in the mid-1950s. For many years, she sang in the choir at the First Episcopal Church of Lakeland. She was a member of the Junior League of Lakeland, an avid gardener and greenhouse cultivator of bromeliads, a member of The Lakeland Garden Club, an accomplished tennis player, and she could frequently be seen walking Lake Hollingsworth in the evenings. As she grew older, she enjoyed nothing more than the weekly bridge games she shared with her friends. She is survived by her daughter, Katharine Tipton Carter of Kinderhook, N.Y.; her devoted daughter-in-law Joyce Carter of Wesley Chapel, her grandson Leonard Waverly Carter, also of Wesley Chapel, her granddaughter Ashley Carter Armstrong of Jacksonville, her grandson L. Carter Burns of Knoxville, Tenn., and her grandsons LaMarcus E. Carter, Jr., and Ross Carlysle Carter, both of Lakeland. Of special mention is her first cousin, oldest and dearest living friend, Betty Allen of Orlando. She was predeceased by her husband and her two sons, Leonard Carlysle Carter III, and LaMarcus Edwards Carter. A special thanks to Scott Langston, her “trusted” trustee, and to Shannah Butcher, her capable and caring guardian; both these professionals added measurably to the quality of mother’s life and care in her last years. Her daughter Katharine said, “I always thought my mother would outlive me…she never drank or smoked, did not cuss, only ate fruit and vegetables, and exercised almost every day of her life to maintain 120 lbs. And she could quote from memory any of Shakespeare’s plays, having read them all.” The Carter family extends a cordial invitation to the friends, neighbors and loving caregivers for the last six years to attend a celebration of the life of Ann Edwards Carter at her home at 2311 Cambridge Avenue, Lakeland, Fla., on August 25th from 4p.m. to 7 p.m.