Elsie Hyde Booth

Elsie Hyde Booth, 85, passed away on October 10, 2026, in Rockledge, Florida. A memorial service will be held at Christian Church at Port Saint John, 4645 Fay Blvd., Cocoa, on October 25, 2026, at 3:30 p.m.

Elsie was born on February 14, 1941, at her family’s home in Montevallo, Alabama. She grew up in Montevallo and Birmingham, where her older sisters, Mary and Evelyn, helped raise her. She graduated from Phillips High School in Birmingham.

In November 1956, she met Larry Booth on a blind date arranged by her best friend and his college roommate. They married on August 27, 1960, the day after his college graduation and commissioning into the Navy. They were married for 66 years. To Larry, she was the greatest blessing of his life.

Over Larry’s 21-year Navy career, Elsie moved every few years, living in places as diverse as Athens, GA; Jacksonville, FL; Key West, FL; Charleston, SC; Mechanicsburg, PA; Yokosuka, Japan; Norfolk, VA; Pearl Harbor, HI; and Columbus, OH.

She once recalled a trip from Tokyo to Hong Kong. “When I was in Hong Kong, I got to step over the border into Communist China,” she said. “There was a guard there and … it was his job to welcome you to step into Communist China and back out, but he made sure you didn’t go any further.”

After Larry retired from the Navy in 1981, they settled in Rockledge, Florida.

Faith guided Elsie’s life. “I can’t remember never being a Christian,” she once reflected. “I have always held on to my Christian faith. It’s just my life and the way I was brought up. I learned to be fair and kind to everyone. I’ve never had any discord with anybody.”

She was a devoted member of the former First United Methodist Church of Cocoa, where she participated in its ministries. In 1998, she began preparing hygiene kits for the church’s homeless outreach. The next year, she sewed her first 25 tote bags for women and children at the Salvation Army Domestic Violence Shelter in Cocoa, and by 2015 she had made 4,002 of them. She cared deeply for people who were struggling, whether they were homeless or asking for help on a street corner.

Elsie loved to sew and would say, “Any day spent sewing is a good day!” She made quilts for family and friends and enjoyed crafts (especially with her grandchildren), gardening, collecting seashells, puzzles, making fig preserves, and photography. For years she kept a darkroom at home.

Elsie marveled at the natural wonders in the world around her. She loved to watch formations of pelicans return from the ocean off Cape Canaveral to their nighttime resting places, dolphins and porpoises surfacing at the inlet off Jetty Park, and birds lined up on power lines, which always amazed her with how evenly they spaced themselves. She enjoyed meeting new people, made friends quickly, and will be remembered for her kind and caring heart.

In recent years, as she lived with Alzheimer’s disease, Elsie took part in clinical trials seeking a cure. She often said she hoped her participation would help others in the future.

Elsie is survived by her husband, Larry Booth; her daughter Annette (Tom) Laughlin, their children Kevin (Elyse), Becky (Nick), and Brendan (Nicole), and great-grandchildren Walter and Maeve; and her son Kenneth (Barbara) Booth and their children Alyssa, Nathan (Cassidy), and Lindsey. She was preceded in death by her parents, Johnnie Hyde and Gladys Myles Hyde; her two-week-old daughter Susan; her sisters Mary Hyde Jennings and Evelyn Hyde Sewell; and her brothers, JC Hyde and Donald Hyde.

In lieu of flowers, the family suggests donations to the Alzheimer’s Association or the American Cancer Society. Donations can be made by clicking on the appropriate organization’s link in the previous sentence.