Eleanor Whitfield
March 4, 1936 — April 28, 2026
“She is not gone. She has only gone home before us.”
Eleanor Marie Whitfield, born March 4, 1936 in Akron, Ohio to Edward and Margaret O’Donnell, died Tuesday, April 28, 2026 at her home in Cleveland Heights surrounded by her three daughters and seven grandchildren. She was ninety years old.
Eleanor came to Cleveland in 1957 to teach third grade at the Cleveland Public Schools’ Patrick Henry Elementary on the East Side, where she remained for thirty-six years. She married Thomas Whitfield, an architect at the Cleveland firm of Walker and Weeks, in 1959; they were married fifty-four years until Thomas’s death in 2013. Eleanor and Tom raised three daughters — Carol, Margaret, and Linda — in the same Cleveland Heights home she remained in until her death.
Eleanor was a constant presence at First Presbyterian Church of Cleveland Heights, where she sang in the chancel choir for forty-two years, taught the third-grade Sunday School class for thirty, and served on the Session twice. Rev. Holloway, who will preside at her service, was her pastor for the last fourteen years; the two of them met every Wednesday morning at the church kitchen to plan the week’s music.
She was a gardener — the front garden on Berkshire Road has been one of the more photographed gardens in Cleveland Heights for forty years — and an enthusiastic if mediocre golfer (her words). She read three novels a week from the Heights Public Library and never went to bed without finishing a chapter. She knew every child on Berkshire Road by name, and several of their children.
She is survived by her three daughters: Carol Whitfield (Robert) of Shaker Heights; Margaret Bell (David) of Bay Village; and Linda Whitfield-O’Brien (Patrick) of Chicago. Her grandchildren are Thomas, Sarah, Robert, James, William, Catherine, and Eleanor (named for her). She was preceded in death by her husband Thomas (2013), her brother Edward (1989), and her parents.
The family expresses their gratitude to the staff of Hospice of the Western Reserve, who cared for Eleanor at home in her final weeks with extraordinary tenderness, and to the elders and members of First Presbyterian, who carried her family in prayer.
A life in photographs
Notes of condolence
“Mrs. Whitfield taught me third grade in 1979. I still remember the way she made each of us feel like the smartest child in the room. There are a hundred Cleveland adults like me, and we all knew exactly what we lost the day she died.”
— Patricia Helbein, former student · Cleveland Heights
“Eleanor sang next to me in the choir for twenty-eight years. She had the voice of a much taller woman.”
— Margaret Lindstrom · First Presbyterian, Cleveland Heights
“My mother and Eleanor’s mother were neighbors in Akron in the 1940s. The friendship reached me, then my children. Three generations, one woman. Goodbye Eleanor.”
— Annette Casarini · Shaker Heights
Leave a note for the family
In memoriam
In lieu of flowers, the family has asked for memorial gifts to one of two organizations Eleanor loved:
- First Presbyterian Church of Cleveland Heights — Music Ministry · gifts may be sent to the church office at 2400 Fairmount Boulevard, Cleveland Heights, OH 44106
- Greater Cleveland Food Bank · greaterclevelandfoodbank.org