Shelter Island Reporter obituary: M. Archer Brown

Archer Brown of Shelter Island died on April 13, 2025, at Stony Brook Hospital. She was 86 years old.

Archer was born in New York City on March 4, 1939, the only child of Mary and Kenneth Brown, and raised in Larchmont, N.Y., attending public school there. She graduated cum laude from Mt. Holyoke College in 1960 as the school’s first Russian major.

Archer spent 40 Years working in the field of international education — first as Assistant Executive Director at the Council on International Educational Exchange in Manhattan. In 1978 she moved to Washington, D.C., where she joined NAFSA: Association of International Educators, from which she retired in 1998 as the Deputy Executive Director.

She served on the boards of directors of a number of nonprofit educational organizations in New York and Washington and was a recipient of several national and international awards, including the U.S. Department of State, for service to International Education.

She also co-produced an Off-Off-Broadway theater in the 1970s with her then husband, and edited or contributed to a variety of publications including “Murder Mystery Ink,” “Educating Students From Other Nations,” “Manhattan Menus,” and “Guide to Education Abroad for Advisors and Administrators.”

Archer traveled extensively in the U.S. and abroad as a speaker or panelist on international education. Her interest in other cultures began as a 16-year-old exchange student in Belgium, and her personal and professional travels took her to the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, Southeast Asia, Central Asia, China, and several countries in the Caribbean as well as Europe, visiting a total of 37 countries — some more than once, and 48 states.

She retired to Shelter Island in 1998, worked briefly at Peggy Mach’s sculpture studio, and then joined the staff of the Shelter Island Reporter in 1999, where she worked variously for 16 years as a reporter, Community News Editor and proofreader, continuing as a regular contributor until last year.

Archer was Shelter Island Library’s corresponding secretary, initially, and served for a number of years as a member and secretary of the library’s Board of Trustees, and was a volunteer “Book Sale Lady.”

She was a founding member of the Guttersnipes in the Ladies Bowling League at the American Legion, and a recording secretary to the board of Sylvester Manor, as well as a Board member of the Shelter Island Lions Club.

Archer’s marriage to Terry L. Schreiber of New York City ended in divorce in 1978 and there are no immediate family members surviving her.

Details of a Memorial Service will be forthcoming.

Archer has been blessed, she has said, with wonderful friends, a fulfilling career and the accumulated interests of a lifetime — books, travel, dining out, human nature, other cultures, and a love of laughter.