In Memory of Joyce (Hill) Tayer

Joyce (Hill) Tayer, a long-time resident of Tiburon, California, and wife of deceased former mayor of Tiburon Donald Tayer, died peacefully on July 12 in her home from complications related to bone marrow cancer. She was 93.

Joyce grew up in North Bergen, New Jersey, a suburb of New York City. She graduated from Antioch College in Yellow Springs, Ohio, and then received her master’s degree from Harvard University’s Graduate School of Education. It was there, in Cambridge, Massachusetts, that she met the love of her life, Donald S. Tayer, who was studying at Harvard Law School. While in Boston, Joyce taught in the public elementary schools in Newton. After their Harvard graduations, Joyce and Donald moved to New York City where their children, Lisa and Marc, were born. In 1959, the Tayer family moved to San Francisco, where Joyce became an educator, training student teachers at San Francisco State University, and Donald became an attorney and partner at the San Francisco law firm still known as Beeson, Tayer & Bodine.

In 1964, the Tayer family moved across the Golden Gate Bridge to Tiburon, where Joyce lived for the remainder of her life. She became an artist, specializing in hand-made paper woven on a loom with fiber, and exhibiting for many years with the Marin art group Fibermania. She and Donald enjoyed the cultural arts of San Francisco and the Bay Area, and loved to travel within the U.S. and to numerous places around the world. For many years, Joyce and Donald enthusiastically attended the Carmel Bach Festival and the Oregon Shakespeare Festival in Ashland.

Joyce is survived by her daughter, Lisa (Tayer) Lance; her son-in-law, Les Lance; her grandson Tucker Lance; and by her son, Marc Tayer; her daughter-in-law, Wendy (Gorlin) Tayer; and her grandchildren Madeleine, Melanie, and Jason Tayer.

Donations in memory of Joyce Tayer can be made to Marin Theatre, https://purchase.marintheatre.org/Donations, and Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, https://donate.famsf.org.