Julia (Moriarty) Hayes

Julia Moriarty Hayes, 81, of Coventry, CT died May 28, 2016. She was born to Matt and Julia Moriarty on August 31, 1934 in Manchester, CT. Julia lived a life of adventure. As a teen, she would walk from Coventry Lake to Shady Glen in Manchester to visit with her future husband, the artist David Hayes. She then married that man. He would go on to become one of America?s great sculptors. Early in her life, she took her two babies to a foreign country where neither parent knew the language. They learned, they stayed, they had two more children and raised their family in Paris. Julia sought out all that was interesting. She kept a microscope on her kitchen table in France and showed her children single celled animals. She picked up an advanced degree in biochemistry and went on to teach several thousand young people at Manchester High School, then East Catholic High School, where she was the Science Department Chair. All the while, she steered the often unpredictable domestic household and helped propel her husband David to become one of the country?s acclaimed artists. While teaching and raising four boisterous children she took time to give French cooking lessons at the University of Connecticut, which earned her a half page story in the New York Times. Julia also collected advice from women at the outdoor markets in Paris and published ?French Cooking for People Who Can?t,??an effortless primer on French cooking for anybody with an interest in good food. She is also a published poet:??What to Say of Garlic Mustard??came out in 2010. Julia Hayes was predeceased by her husband of 56 years, the sculptor David Hayes; by her parents Matt and Julia Moriarty of Manchester, by her brother Matt Moriarty and sister Mary Margaret Lynch, and by her son Michael who died at birth. She is survived by her children, Sir David Hayes (Julie), Brian Hayes ?(Aveline), Mary Siegrist (Kevin), John Hayes (Mary) and granddaughter Alexandra Henry (Taylor), as well as by her brother Maurice Moriarty (Ellen), and sister Connie Kerwin (Donald). ? Calling hours will be held at 9:00am, Saturday, June 4, 2016, at Potter Funeral Home, 456 Jackson St. (Rte. 195) Willimantic, CT. Procession will leave at 10:30am for an 11:00am Mass at St. Thomas Aquinas Chapel at the University of Connecticut, with Interment to follow at St. Mary Cemetery in Coventry.