Elizabeth Best

Liz Best, 67, of Carrboro, NC, died on March 10, 2026, surrounded by family. She was born on April 6, 1958, in College Park, GA, a suburb of Atlanta, to Richard Watson Best and Rosa Elizabeth Holland Best. She attended Woodward Academy in College Park, graduating in 1976, and briefly attended the University of Georgia before eventually graduating from Georgia Southern University with a degree in journalism in 1982.

She worked as a staff writer at the Gwinnett Daily News in Atlanta and the Augusta Chronicle in Augusta, GA, before moving to West Palm Beach in 1987 and starting a family. She continued to work as a freelance journalist and was a frequent contributor to the Palm Beach Post, most often as the author of numerous “Meet Your Neighbor” features. She was an active volunteer at her daughters’ schools, including, most memorably, being the driving force behind a student publishing center at Palm Beach Public Elementary, in which students wrote fiction that was then bound and "published."

She retired to Carrboro, NC, in 2019, where she volunteered with TABLE, a nonprofit fighting food insecurity, and rarely missed a happy hour with her friends.

She is survived by two daughters, Martha and Alice Waters; a brother, Richard (Cathy) Best; two nephews, Joseph Best and Thomas (Ashley) Best; a great-niece, Ruby Elizabeth Best; and a large and very beloved extended family, as well as countless dear friends.

A celebration of life will be held at Franklin Motors in Chapel Hill, NC on the afternoon of April 9.