Karin Mae Plaskett Fintzy was born May 20, 1937, in St. Petersburg, Florida. She proudly called herself a Florida woman born and bred. As was typical of her, this was a bit of hyperbole. She actually spent some years with family in Minnesota as a youth, but we’ll give it to her.
She adored her younger brother Carl, although there was the one time she pretended to be kidnappers outside his window when he was very young. Carl was traumatized and her mother said, “You’d better not have ruined that boy.” (He was fine and grew into an amazing man, so perhaps the scare was good for him. Who can say.)
She received an English degree from the University of Florida and went on to Harvard/Radcliffe business administration graduate school.
She married Robert T. Fintzy in 1963. Surprising since she was late to their first date and he considered punctuality a moral imperative. On the other hand, she was very beautiful.
She worked at a management consulting firm until her children (Rachel and Katherine) were born. After the kids were less of a handful, she returned to school to get a UCLA’s landscape architecture degree and then worked as a landscape architect/designer and later as a Palisades Coldwell Banker Realtor. The family moved to Pacific Palisades in the late 1960s and she resided there for the rest of her life.
She loved reading, theatre, gardening and years ago could twirl a baton. (The amateur version of an EGOT perhaps.) In her later years she was very involved in the PLATO Society and was a docent at the Getty Center and Getty Villa for over 30 years.
She passed away at the end of September. She was loved by many and will be missed by all.
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