Carolyn Denise Holbrook

Carolyn Holbrook, 63, of Asheville, NC, entered into eternal rest with family by her side on August 5, 2016. She was born on June 27, 1953 in Charleston, SC to the Late Duff Holbrook and Eleanor Holbrook, of Mc Clellanville , SC. Carolyn received her professional degree in landscape architecture from Virginia Tech in 1976 and started her federal career as a temporary employee with the Department of Interior- National Park Service, in Atlanta, Georgia in 1977. Within 2 months she achieved permanent fulltime status and began a lifetime of work that now leaves significant and lasting values to the stewardship of our nation’s public lands. Carolyn transferred to the USDA Forest Service, Pacific Northwest Region where she worked on three different National Forests during the next fifteen years. She worked on the Gifford Pinchot National Forest in Vancouver, Washington; the Deschutes National Forest in Bend, Oregon; and the Mt. Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest in Seattle, Washington. Carolyn then transferred to the Southwest Region of the Forest Service in 1992 and worked for 8 years as the Region’s Recreation Special Uses Program Leader in Albuquerque, New Mexico before transferring to the Chief’s National headquarters in Washington D.C. For the next fifteen years of her 40+ years of federal service, she served as the National Recreation Special Uses Program Leader and was extremely effective in establishing policy and guidelines. The thing that stands out to her Forest Service colleagues was her unwavering dedication to recreation special uses and her commitment to ensure that the public interest was served. She worked long beyond her projected retirement date because she wanted to see more special use policy revision that had been “on her list” for a long time. It was always the greater good that stood paramount in her mind. She will be long remembered by those of us whose lives she touched. Carolyn retired with 41 years of federal service. She will be remembered by her family as a loving sister, aunt, great aunt and friend. She is survived by her mother, Eleanor E. Holbrook, of Mc Clellanville, SC; two brothers, David L. Holbrook, of Mc Clellanville, SC and Todd Holbrook (Lisa), of Conyers, GA; one sister, Marilyn Buda, of Decatur, GA; and many nieces, nephews and loving friends. A Memorial Service will be held at Mc Clellanville United Methodist Church, 200 Pinckney St., Mc Clellanville, SC 29458 on Saturday, August 13, 2016 at 3:00 PM. In lieu of flowers memorial donations may be made in her memory to the Virginia Tech Scholarship Fund. Checks may be made payable to the Virginia Tech Foundation, Inc. and mailed to Office of Gift Accounting (0336), University Gateway Center, Virginia Tech, 902 Prices Fork Road, Blacksburg, VA 24061 Or donations may be made on-line by visiting http://www.givingto.vt.edu.” Expressions of sympathy may be viewed or submitted online at www.McAlister-Smith.com. Arrangements have been entrusted to McALISTER-SMITH FUNERAL HOME, MT PLEASANT CHAPEL, 1520 RIFLE RANGE ROAD, MT PLEASANT, SC (843) 884-3833.