Amy McDaniel feels right at home at Keystone Square Museum. Amy McDaniel, a relative newcomer to Lampasas, has amazed me with her involvement in the city’s historical, artistic and social activities.

She has served as president of the Keystone Square Museum, president of the 36 Club, chairman of the art committee for Vision Lampasas!, publicity chairman of Lampasas Association for the Arts, team captain and committee member for the American Cancer Society’s Relay for Life, a founding member of Friends of the Lampasas Animal Shelter and as an active member of the Methodist church.

Amy has painted on all three downtown mural projects and is only supposed to serve as an adviser on the museum committee to collect biographical information about retired teachers but insists on doing part of the work.

Beyond Lampasas, she serves as second vice president of the Capital District of Texas Federated Women’s Clubs.

In addition to her volunteer duties, Amy has worked as an oncall administrator for the Edward Jones branch office, as a gallery director and consultant at the Fourth Street Gallery, and as a visiting instructor at Central Texas College.

Amy has her hand in a lot of things, but she still has time for fun and relaxation, which involves frequent travel with husband Ken; decorating and enjoying a new home; walking her dogs; and visits of relatives from Connecticut and from her stepchildren Sandy McDaniel, a graduate student at Boston College, and 14-year-old Jacob McDaniel from Kentucky.

I was curious about her life before Lampasas, especially about her educational background and previous experiences that have made her able to be involved in many areas here. I am grateful Amy and I could sit one morning recently and visit so I could know her better.

I found out she was born March 6, 1962, in Middletown, Conn., to a father who was an Aetna Life and Casualty representative and to a mother who was a community volunteer and later worked at museums. Amy’s maternal grandfather, the patriarch of the family until his death in the early 1990s, was a car dealer, an investor and influential in Amy’s life.

Her father is deceased, and her mother, at 72, is excited about her new job as interim executive director of the Community Music School in Essex, Conn. Previously, she had been director of administration at the New Britain Museum of American Art. Ever energetic, she also has a company that caters wedding receptions, meetings and gatherings.

Amy said in addition her mother hosts chamber music concerts in her home, supports classical and jazz musicians, attends concerts every week and plays piano. She credits her mother for making her aware of the needs of their community, and in encouraging Amy to be creative and always to keep improving.

From her childhood, Amy remembers plays that she, her cousin and Anne, her sister who is five years her junior, wrote and staged on their front porch and charged neighbors admission. Then she and a group of friends put on neighborhood ballet performances each year. They also wrote, printed and distributed a neighborhood newspaper. Amy, as editor, often wrote about improving the neighborhood environment. She also worked as a volunteer at the hospital beginning at age 13.

Amy was educated in both private and public schools. She received her degree from Barnard College in New York City in 1984 with a major in creative writing. Then in 1992, she was awarded a Master of Arts from Columbia University and in 1996, a Master of Philosophy, also from Columbia.

Just out of college, she worked as an editorial assistant at Basic Books in New York City, assisting the acquisition editor in charge of psychology and psychiatric books. Then from 1986-89, Amy was an editorial assistant at Beacon Press in Boston, helping the acquisition editor in charge of fiction, psychology, anthropology and women’s studies. In 1990-91 she worked as an assistant editor at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City, where she edited the museum exhibition catalogs, invitations and miscellaneous printed matter.

She sometimes wishes she had not moved around so much trying to find her niche, however the varied experiences molded her and made her realize where she wanted to be.

From 1993 to 2003, she was an assistant curator at the Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art in Hartford, Conn., where she assisted the curator of American art with department activities that included organizing exhibitions, publishing collection catalogues, and writing and delivering public lectures.

Amy’s final job before she moved to Texas was as curator of the Florence Griswold Museum in Old Lyme, Conn. She was responsible for research and the care of a large and prestigious collection of American art centering on a Connecticut impressionist artist colony located in the historic town of Old Lyme. She also organized exhibitions, published collections and acquired new works during her tenure.

While on these jobs, Amy had been contributing to a number of publications. She still publishes here in Lampasas. Under her direction, Keystone Square Museum published “Images of America: Lampasas County.” She also is helping me get my “Remarkable Lampasans” columns published in book form.

What brought Amy to Lampasas? She met Ken McDaniel, a displaced Texan who was working for Edward Jones in Connecticut. They met one day in a coffee shop and fell into a conversation. They dated for five years; in the meantime, Ken had been transferred by Edward Jones to Galveston, where he worked as a transitional representative while he searched for an office manager’s job in Texas. Amy visited him there and his mother at nearby LaMarque.

Her first trip to Lampasas was in 2003, after Ken had been placed as financial adviser of the local Edward Jones office. She thought the city charming and that it could well be the setting for a Western movie. During that trip to Texas, she and Ken decided to marry.

Their wedding was on New Year’s Eve in 2004 at the Congregational Church in Haddam Neck, Conn., with the reception in her mother’s home.

Both Amy and Ken enjoy traveling and have done so frequently, thanks to Edward Jones trips won by Ken. They have traveled to Europe, Argentina, Chile, Honduras, Canada, Southern Africa and in the United States. Amy says that each time they go on a trip, they come back gratefully to Lampasas with a new perspective.

One of Amy’s favorite trips was to the Galapagos Islands which she and Ken explored from a small cruise ship. Every day was spent traveling by zodiac boat to one island or another with a naturalist who taught them about the animals, birds and plants. They saw albatross, flightless cormorants, marine iguanas, giant tortoises and many other animals that weren’t afraid of the travelers because they are protected and never harmed.

Amy also tells about Venice, one of their favorite destinations. She said Ken teases her about wanting his ashes to be scattered off the Rialto Bridge on the Grand Canal in Venice. That was their last trip taken in 2009.

If Edward Jones keeps awarding these trips, they hope to visit China and spend more time in South America.

After getting to know Amy better, it is easier to understand why she has gotten so involved in Lampasas. It has been her way of life since her youth.

We are fortunate to have Amy McDaniel in our community and thank Ken for bringing her here.

Bobbye Alexander Behlau was born in Lampasas and graduated from LHS in 1946. After living in San Antonio for 50 years where she was an elementary school principal, she and her husband, Joe, have retired in Lampasas.

A new school, which is to open in October 2010 in the Northside ISD in San Antonio, recently was named for her.

She is a descendent of the Alexanders and the Davises who settled here in the 1800s.

Mrs. Behlau can be reached at 556-4076 or by e-mail at beh1323@ sbcglobal.net.