Carole Esther (nee Terwilliger) Meyers

June 20, 1945 – October 16, 2024

Carole was a San Francisco native, born on June 30, 1945 at St. Mary’s Hospital in the Mission District to Esther Mary (nee Furst) and Earl Walter Terwilliger.  In anticipation of the end of World War II, she was to be named Victoria.  But she arrived early, and so she was named instead for actress Carole Lombard.  The family resided in the Haight-Ashbury neighborhood.  She won “prettiest baby” in a contest when she was a toddler.   Her hair was white-blond until she was around 5, when it turned raven with red tones, and then in her later years turned back again to silver-white.

Carole attended grammar school in Norwalk, California, and belonged to a dance group that performed the Charleston.   She graduated from Norwalk High School in 1962, where she was a majorette.  She then attended U.C.L.A for two years, graduating in 1969 from San Francisco State College with a degree in Anthropology.  She then attended Fresno State College on a scholarship and earned an elementary school Teaching Credential.

For several years, Carole taught elementary school in East Palo Alto and in Oakland.  She married Gene Howard Meyers, from Chicago, at the Claremont Hotel in Berkeley in 1971, and she and her husband purchased an English-style cottage in Berkeley and settled there.  They were married for 53 years.  Carole quit teaching to raise their two children and began a career in writing about family travel, contributing to such publications as The San Jose Mercury News and The San Francisco Chronicle.  With her husband, she founded Carousel Press and went on to write and publish nine editions of Weekend Adventures in San Francisco & Northern California and two editions of Eating Out with the Kids in San Francisco, as well as editing and partially writing The Family Travel Guides anthology.  She also wrote the Disney Family Fun Vacation Guide to California & Hawaii, and edited both Dream Sleeps: Castle & Palace Hotels of Europe and The Zoo Book:  A Guide to America’s Best.

When her children grew up, she overcame a fear of flying, joined the Society of American Travel Writers (SATW), and became an avid world traveler, visiting and writing about places such as Easter Island, rural England, and Fiji.  She was elected to serve SATW as Freelance Council Chair for four years.  She wrote and published the http://www.berkeleyandbeyond.com website from 2012 to 2024.   Her stories will remain there through 2029.

Carole was interviewed on countless TV and radio shows including the Today Show, always giving viewers and listeners new ideas about where to spend their leisure time.  She was also quoted in The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal.  Carole was fortunate enough to share an elevator with photographer Richard Avedon, artist Chuck Close, and rocker Mick Jagger–whose music video for “Visions of Paradise” she appears in as an extra.

Carole resided at the same address in Berkeley, California, since 1973.

Carole passed away on October 16. 2024 in Berkeley, with her husband beside her.  She was 79.  Survivors include two children–publicist Suzanne Meyers of San Antonio, Texas, and director David Meyers of Pacific Palisades, California–and six grandchildren, as well as her three younger siblings:  Connie Terwilliger of Nevada City, California, Debbie Murray of El Cerrito, California, and Donald Terwilliger of El Paso, Texas.

Donations in Carole’s memory would be appreciated to Doctors Without Borders.

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