Crayton Bedford

Crayton Bedford died on June 27, 2026, of congestive heart failure.  Born on October 10, 1934, to Ward and Molly Bedford, he spent most of his young life on the family dairy farm outside Middlebury, Vermont.  He graduated from Phillips Exeter Academy and Amherst College (BA in music summa cum laude).  He served in the US Army for two years after college, during which time he married Ann Thompson.  He went back to Exeter after the army as Admissions Officer, and there he decided to pursue graduate studies to become a teacher.  A daughter, Deborah, was born in Exeter.  The young family all went to Berkeley, California, where Crayton received an MA in Mathematics in 1962.  They returned to the East Coast where Crayton became an instructor, housemaster, and coach at Phillips Academy Andover.  There, a second daughter, Alison, was born.

During the period 1967-1976, the family moved back and forth between the USA and France, while Crayton’s professional life alternated between teaching at Andover and administration with School Year Abroad.  Divorce in 1976 marked the end of this period, and Crayton left academics to pursue carpentry as a profession and to develop his musical skills.  He returned to academia when he was asked to join the faculty of University High School in San Francisco, where he and Alison moved together in 1979.

In San Francisco, he found teaching very rewarding and enjoyed many singing opportunities, both amateur and professional.  He was also interested in deeper personal questions.  He took time out from teaching to earn an MA in Culture and Creation Spirituality, and another MA in Somatic Psychology.  After a few years as a psychotherapist intern, he returned to UHS to finish his career as a teacher there.  During this period, he married Chris Iosbaker, whom he had met at graduate school.

Together Crayton and Chris decided to leave the Bay Area in 2003 for a slower pace of life in Asheville, North Carolina.  There he developed his artistic skills first discovered during his spiritual studies.  The natural beauty of the area inspired many exceptional landscapes.  He also discovered in the Swannanoa Valley Friends Meeting the spiritual fellowship he longed for.

He is survived by his wife, Chris Iosbaker of Asheville; his two daughters, Deborah Bedford-Strohm and husband Heinrich of Munich, Germany, and Alison Tise and husband Larry of Apex, North Carolina; three grandsons, two step-grandsons, and four great grandchildren. 

Memorial gifts may be made to the Swannanoa Valley Friends Meeting, PO Box 1032, Black Mountain, NC  28711.

A memorial service will be held on August 9, 2026, at 4 PM, at the Swannanoa Valley Friends Meeting, Ransom Fellowship Hall, Warren Wilson College, 101 Chapel Lane, Swannanoa, NC  28815.  Or you may attend by Zoom using this link:  https://us02web.zoom.us/j/86383524484?pwd=MFpxRHFlbDlmVmRsdm0yWmJkYTlxdz09

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