Elizabeth Dickman Blank, 51, of Chapel Hill, NC died suddenly on Monday, Nov. 5th at her home. Elizabeth Read Dickman was born on August 12th, 1961 in Cleveland Heights, Ohio to Catherine Crowe Dickman and Dr. F. Norton Dickman. She graduated from Hawken School in 1979, matriculated to The University of Michigan and later graduated from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. She was a math teacher at The Fletcher Academy in Raleigh, NC and was devoted to her students. She was an incredibly loving, attentive and dedicated mother.

Elizabeth was a lover of music, literature, poetry, history and science. She was interesting and articulate in many subjects. A vibrant, happy presence in our lives, Elizabeth had a contagious smile and a wry, sometimes irreverent sense of humor. Our beautiful Elizabeth was considered to be among the funniest, wisest, warmest, most light-hearted people on earth. We are grieved that she did not have more time to enjoy the authentic happiness we know she was enjoying. Fierce loyalty was a pronounced element in her personality and she will be missed dearly by her family and legions of friends.

She is survived by her two children, Becca (Rebecca Pierce Blank), a senior voice performance major at The North Carolina School of the Arts in Winston-Salem, NC and Sam (Samuel Alden Blank) a junior at Exeter Academy in New Hampshire. She is also survived by her mother and her mother's husband, William and Catherine Crowe Ragland, of Pittsboro, NC. She was predeceased by her father, Dr. F. Norton Dickman, of Cleveland, Ohio.

Her absence is palpable to her brother, F. Norton Dickman III, of Pittsboro, NC and her two sisters Catherine Taylor or Oakton, VA and Janet Elbetri of Chapel Hill, NC. She is also survived by many cousins, nieces and nephews, among them Connor Malloy Houghton, Sarah MacFerran Houghton and Adam Norton Elbetri. She married Daniel Blank in 1988 and, despite their separation, he remains part of the family as a sensitive and caring father to their children.

A celebration of her life will occur on Saturday, December 1st at University Presbyterian Church, 209 E. Franklin Street in Chapel Hill, NC at 2pm with friends and family gathering afterward at 301 Hillsborough Street, Chapel Hill.