Clotilde

Scala

Clotilde Olympia Fiore Scala of North Bergen, NJ, passed away peacefully on Tuesday
surrounded by family. Clotilde treasured her family above all else, embracing her position as
matriarch of her side of the family and that of her husband Salvatore's as well.
Born in 1923, Clotilde lived through the Great Depression. With hard work and determination,
she put herself through school, earning a Bachelor of Arts degree at Seton Hall University and a
Master's degree at Columbia University.
She became an elementary school teacher, a job that was her calling. She worked in the City of
Englewood public school system, one of the only White teachers in an otherwise all-Black
school. She became a part of history when the New Jersey Supreme Court, in a landmark
decision, ordered Englewood schools to desegregate, so that all students would be more likely
to have access to the best resources. When she retired from teaching, she worked side-by-side
with her husband at Scala's Beauty Supply in West New York, NJ.
When they needed a respite from the hustle-and-bustle of Hudson County, they would retreat
to the country house they had built on a piece of land in Hampton Township in Sussex County,
NJ. There, they led a more rustic lifestyle, gardening, growing vegetables and planting an
orchard of fruit trees.
Clotilde's husband, Salvatore, predeceased her. She is survived by her son Robert (Ruth), her
daughters Diana Lawsky (Peter) and Dawn Scala (Robert Hennessey), and her son David; as well
as seven beautiful grandchildren that she had the pleasure of seeing grow into adulthood; and
the many nieces and nephews she loved so well.
It comforts her family to know that she has been welcomed by the Lord into the Kingdom of
Heaven and has been reunited with her family and friends that arrived there before her.