Katherine “Kit” Armiger Kotcher, 77, of Cincinnati, Ohio, passed away on October 13, 2025, in Vienna, Virginia.

She was born on June 11, 1948, in Baltimore, Maryland, to John Warfield Armiger Sr. and Jean Stark Armiger, and was one of four children. Kit graduated from Roland Park Country School in 1966 and attended the University of Maryland and Catonsville Community College. From 1969 to 1972, she practiced and taught meditation at Savitria, a spiritual commune, while working as a Psychiatric Aide at Sheppard Enoch Pratt Hospital in Baltimore, Maryland.

In 1973, she married and later completed her bachelor’s degree in Psychology at Centenary College of Louisiana in 1976. That same year, she and her husband moved to Cincinnati, Ohio, where they raised their two sons, Ben and John.

Kit had a lifelong appreciation for antiques, a passion that deepened after inheriting her mother’s collection. In 1987, she took a course in antiques and later served as Production Coordinator for Is It Antique Yet? at Cincinnati’s PBS station, CET.

Following her work in television, Kit became an active participant in early online communities. She worked as Editor of Open Discussion and later as System Administrator for TriState Online, an electronic bulletin board service that operated in the early 1990s.

Fascinated by the natural world, Kit had a deep love of plants and animals from a very young age. She was the type of child who looked under rocks for every creepy crawly she could find, and this continued long into her adulthood. Kit encouraged this same passion in her children and indulged her son Johnny every time he asked for a new pet, regardless of the effort involved in caring for it. This led to a house that, at various points, harbored hamsters, mice, snakes, turtles, frogs, newts, fish, hermit crabs, dogs, and cats, oh so many cats. Not satisfied with just the house pets, Kit also provided food for the birds in her yard on a daily basis, which inevitably also made its way into the bellies of many happy squirrels, possums, raccoons, and groundhogs on her property. Kit was also an avid gardener - known for her beautiful peonies, wildflowers, herbs, and jade plants. She also grew abundant summer tomatoes, zucchini, and green beans, which she incorporated into nightly dinners for her boys.

A true child of the Age of Aquarius, Kit had a lifelong interest in astrology, esoterica, and the occult, and was a daily practitioner of I Ching. She also served as the family genealogist and historian, carefully preserving extensive records of the Armiger, Stark, and Kotcher family trees, with some materials dating as far back as the 16th century.

Above all, Kit will be remembered for the affectionate maternal impulse and quiet generosity she brought to all of her relationships, not just with her own children and family, but with friends, neighbors, members of the community, pets, and all living things in her immediate environment.

Kit was preceded in death by her brother, John Warfield Armiger Jr., and by the father of her children, Peter Giles Kotcher. She is survived by her sisters, Rev. Helen Stark Armiger and Sydney Warfield Armiger; her sons and their families—Ivan Kotcher (stepson), Ben and Miia Kotcher, and John Kotcher and Karin Jue, along with her beloved granddaughter, Akiko; and her nephew, John (Jake) Armiger, his wife, Martina Bennett, and their two sons, Jack and Kiran.

A graveside service for family will be held at Dulaney Valley Memorial Gardens in Baltimore, Maryland, on Sunday, October 26, 2025. In lieu of flowers, the family requests that memorial contributions be made to the Cincinnati Nature Center (https://cincynature.ticketapp…) and/or Cincinnati’s PBS station, CET (https://www.cetconnect.org/su…

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